Puglia: Bari, The Capital of Puglia
As we closed our time in Puglia, we moved to Bari the last night to be closer to the airport for our flight out the next day.
Bari is a vibrant port city on the Adriatic coast and is the capital of the Puglia region. We weren’t there long so we spent most of our time in Bari Vecchia (old town).
When we arrived, we left our luggage at the hotel and walked the maze of narrow streets checking out some of the Bari sights:
Nonnas making pasta – There are a couple of streets where you can watch local women make handmade orecchiette pasta outside their homes
Basilica of San Nicola – There was a wedding happening at this famous 11th century church in old town that holds the relics of Saint Nicholas, the historic inspiration for Santa Claus
The Murat District – A modern part of town with wide boulevards, shops and the Teatro Petruzzelli opera house
What we ate – We enjoyed some really good local food in our 20 hours in Bari!
We ate lunch at L'Assassineria Urbana, where Stanley Tucci ate during one of the episodes of his show Stanley Tucci: Searching for Italy. We !), then enjoyed spaghetti all’assassina (killer spaghetti), a local dish from Bari where raw spaghetti is cooked directly in a pan with tomato sauce and chili without boiling in water first, giving it a crispy and charred texture. Mike ordered the classic version, and I ordered the one with octopus (once more octopus dish before leaving Puglia couldn’t hurt!). We also ordered a side of stracciatella cheese at the waitress’ suggestion, and it was a good addition to the spaghetti. It was all really good!
For dinner, we cooked our own meal at a cooking class. I was really excited about this as we’d never taken a cooking class together before! It was a hands-on pasta making and tiramisu making class. We prepared fresh pasta and tiramisu and then had them for dinner. Following dinner, we walked to a local gelateria to learn how to recognize real, handmade gelato and taste some. It was super fun and the pasta, tiramisu and gelato were all great!
Where we stayed – We stayed at the Movenpick Bari. It was a nice hotel within easy walking distance of everything we wanted to see and do. Our room was a suite so roomy and perfect for our last night in Puglia (we really only slept there). One bonus to the Movenpick is that they have chocolate hour each night in the hotel lounge at 5pm, so we enjoyed that before our cooking class.
Return to the Puglia overview blog: Puglia, Italy: What Dreams Are Made Of.