A weekend in Ravenna and a recipe for piadina
Plus a short address list of our favorite restaurants, gelaterie and bookshops in Ravenna
My first bite into a piadina dates back to 2005. I was in Riccione, a seaside town famous for its beach resorts in Romagna, on the Adriatic Coast. It was early spring, and the town was almost empty, but you could sense the buzzing atmosphere of a coastal town that was awakening for the season. I was there with my University best friend Laura to attend a swimming competition with our fan club (one of my many past lives!), my senses were wide awake as I was rolling out of a winter season that stretched far beyond the past months. We grabbed a piadina for lunch, the round, thin, flexible flatbread from Romagna, usually stuffed with cheese, cold cuts, or vegetables. I can still picture in my mind that little shop—white tiles and red decors—at the end of the main street where I picked a piadina with arugula and squacquerone, the local soft, creamy cheese, almost runny like yogurt.
Warm in my hands, filling, and satisfying, that piadina was the perfect street food for two young girls in their twenties who were traveling on a tight budget, eager to discover the world. This is how I felt, biting into that piadina at the edge of Spring, my life brimming with opportunities and travels, the future ahead of us, even if we were just a shy three hours from home.
From that first piadina in Riccione, it is a sense of freedom, discovery, and fun that I associate with the most typical street food of Romagna.
My best memories of piadina are all connected to low-season trips to Romagna when the coastal towns are less crowded but show the tourists the same warm, laid-back hospitality that made this land famous worldwide.
Rimini 2013. Tommaso and I had been dating for a couple of months when I was invited to Rimini for a blogger event. It was one of our first romantic weekends together, on the Adriatic Coast, in the sweetest month of the year. Well, it is difficult not to have good memories of that long September weekend: I remember long walks on the empty beach at sunset, interesting workshops and talks, winning the Macchianera Awards as best food blogger—this definitely added to the excitement of those days—, and a delicious piadina with fried sardines at Casina del Bosco, sitting in their lovely outside space.
Ravenna 2024.
, author of the newsletter , the most complete and well-written Italian newsletter dedicated to cookbooks, invited me to Ravenna for a Supper Club at La Bottega di Olivia. The plan was simple: we would talk about Cucina Povera, the chef would cook a couple of recipes from the book, paired with a gin selected by the owner, and after the event we would have a weekend in Ravenna, to explore the city, discover its food, and finally spend some time with Francesca and her family.Everything was beyond my expectations: the perfectly organized supper club at La Bottega di Olivia, the gin tonic (!!), the recipes the chef cooked from my book—isn’t it rewarding when someone cooks from your book and creates delicious food with their spin on it?—the time spent finally chatting in real life with Francesca, after more than a year of online friendship, her jaw-dropping bookcase brimful with cookbooks, her bucatini all’amatriciana (she is from Rome, after all), and the piadine we grabbed at La Piadina del Melarancio before driving back home.
Ravenna. A short address list.
Thank you for sharing your favorite addresses with us.
La Bottega di Olivia. They hosted the book event and supper club in collaboration with
. It is a deli during the day, where you can eat your lunch or get your takeaway food. At night it’s the perfect spot for an aperitivo. The owners have a deep passion and knowledge for gin, so try one of their gin tonics. Just above the Bottega they also have Le Camere di Olivia, a cozy guesthouse you can use as a base to explore Ravenna.Bianco Gelateria. Very close to La Bottega di Olivia, this ice cream shop conquered us with their kindness and Livia with their dark chocolate flavor. They have also vegan, dairy-free, and egg-free options.
Sbrino Gelateria. Colorful and playful, this gelateria reminds me of an amusement park or a circus. It has a great selection of gelato flavors, including many vegan options. We got strawberry, dark chocolate—both requested by Livia, as you can imagine—pear and ginger, and caramelized peanut.
Ca’ de Ven. The restaurant is located in a Medieval building that—through the centuries—has been an aristocratic residence, an inn, a well-stocked grocery store, and more recently a restaurant. Come here for their piadine, crescioni, charcuterie boards, cappelletti, and grilled meat. Watching the locals eat their cappelletti al ragù accompanied by wedges of warm piadina was pure delight.
Osteria Passatelli. While Francesca and I were busy with the supper club at Bottega di Olivia, our husbands and kids had dinner at Osteria Passatelli, located in the former Mariani theatre. Here you can get traditional food from Romagna—passatelli, piadine, cappelletti…—, including pizza and seafood dishes.
La Piadina del Melarancio. A bustling eatery in the city center where to get your piadina fix. You can find traditional piadine with many fillings, from the most classic prosciutto crudo, arugula, and squaquerone cheese to hearty sausages and onions, and crescioni (stuffed piadina). Usually, it is quite busy, so you might have to queue outside.
We grabbed our piadine and crossed the city center heading towards Parco della Rocca Brancaleone, an enclosed green space much loved by the people in Ravenna, where our kids could play free and we could enjoy our food in the sun. There’s a café there where you can get water, coffee, and a cold beer to pair with the piadina.
Libreria Modernissima. Just in front of Ca’ de Ven, you’ll find this independent bookstore where you’ll love to get lost among their carefully selected books. You’ll also find lots of interesting design objects. I found there my previous cookbook, From the Markets of Tuscany, and was delighted by the surprise!
Momo libreria per ragazzi. An independent bookstore for children and teens, where you can find a fine selection of illustrated books, graphic novels, and novels. We spent a good 30 minutes here with Livia, who was picking book after book from the shelves, asking us to read them for her.
Piadina Romagnola, a street food from Romagna
Walking the streets of Ravenna, or strolling along the Rimini beach promenade, on the Adriatic coast, you will notice locals and tourists snacking on the local street food, piadina. It is a round, thin, flexible flatbread from Romagna, folded and stuffed with cheese, prosciutto, vegetables, and more.
The thickness and width of piadina vary according to the area where it is produced: those of Rimini are wider and thinner, while in Ravenna, in the North of Romagna, piadina is thicker and smaller. The fillings are endless, from the classic combination of prosciutto crudo, rocket, and squacquerone, a local soft and creamy cheese, to fried sardines, grilled sausage, vegetables, and even sweet chocolate spread.
Piadina, defined by the XIX century poet Giovanni Pascoli as the bread of Romagna, so deeply connected it was to its people and traditions, was born as humble peasant food, a substitute for bread made with alternative poorer flours that were not as expensive or difficult to come through as wheat flour. Now piadina is one of the most appreciated street foods of Italy, affordable and crowd-pleasing.
RECIPE - Piadina romagnola - Thin Flatbread from Romagna
Once in a while, we have piadina night at home. Quick to make and easy to freeze (see note below), piadine are perfect for busy nights or informal gatherings with friends. Lay the table with your favorite ingredients or with pantry staples - cheese, cold buts, grilled vegetables, but also spreads like pesto or tapenade -, warm the piadina on a hot griddle pan, and let everyone play with flavors and textures.