If on holiday you are looking for good food with a variety of tasty dishes, your palate will certainly not be disappointed in Caorle, as the area offers fresh, quality raw materials, zero km, from fish to vegetables, to valuable products such as DOC and DOCG wines.
Caorle’s food and wine have a long tradition of recipes and typical dishes rooted in Veneto cuisine. As a fishing town, Caorle has always based its cuisine on one product in particular: fish. Baby octopus, cuttlefish, scallops and squid are just some of the ingredients of the tastiest dishes you can order in the restaurants of our town, and it is the scent of fish cooked in its various forms that pervades the streets of the historic centre at lunch and dinner time and will certainly tempt you too if you find yourself strolling through its streets. Pasta with squid ink, sardines in saor and boiled baby octopus are some of Caorle’s traditional recipes, many of which are shared with nearby Venice.
And then there are the fresh vegetables and fruit grown in the countryside behind the town and sold at the weekly market and at local agricultural cooperatives. Apples, peaches, pears, grapes, but also radicchio or white asparagus, which find the ideal environment in the sandy soil to grow tasty.
In a context where food and wine are such an important part of culture and everyday life, it is normal to come across village festivals and events celebrating particular products or to have the opportunity to enjoy food and wine itineraries dedicated to them, which also have the merit of creating a network between producers and an opportunity to meet end customers.
The wine routes are undoubtedly among the most famous: inland from Caorle one can follow the routes of the Lison-Pramaggiore DOC wines and the Piave wines, of the Lison Classico DOCG, but also go as far as the hills of Conegliano Valdobbiadene, the production area of the Prosecco wine of the same name.
Food and wine itineraries around Caorle
Apart from the beautiful beach, Caorle offers a wide range of activities that become even more numerous if you are willing to move away from the historic centre and the sea to explore the hinterland.
For example, by car (or in some cases by bicycle) you can reach signposted routes created to promote local excellence, food and wine itineraries that lead you to discover local products in their places of production.
Food and wine itineraries around Caorle will take you to rural landscapes surrounded by rows of vines, to places where grapes ripen and are harvested to be transformed into some of the world’s finest wines. It will be interesting to discover how reds, whites, still and sparkling wines are made in the cellars of the Veneto, walking through the cellars and buying them directly from the producers. But not only wine, there are also typical products, fruit and vegetables that have been awarded the DOP and IGP marks for their goodness and uniqueness and that can be tasted on the menus of the restaurants scattered along the food and wine routes around Caorle.
- The Lison Pramaggiore DOC Wine Route
- The Conegliano Valdobbiadene Wine Route The Piave Wine Route The Radicchio of Treviso Route
Local products in Caorle and surroundings
Every good holiday includes relaxation, fun and good food. Caorle is obviously not lacking in any of these things, but in particular the good food is unparalleled.
Whether you want to treat yourself to a tasty lunch or dinner in one of the pizzerias, restaurants or pubs in the resort or you prefer to prepare something tasty in your seaside flat, in Caorle you can count on a wide choice of fresh local products that are the basis for healthy and delicious dishes. From fresh fish caught early in the morning and sold daily at the fish market located at the entrance to the city, to the products of the land cultivated in the agricultural cooperatives, among which Ca’Corniani stands out, or sold at the weekly market, there are many local products from Caorle and its surroundings to choose from.
The “moscardino” of Caorle
The “moscardino” is a small mollusc that is very common throughout the Mediterranean Sea and prefers sandy and muddy bottoms between 15 and 90 m deep, typical of the northern Adriatic.
Caorle is home to a large number of moscardini, which is why fishermen have specialised in fishing these small molluscs for centuries. It can be fished all year round and is easy to find at fish markets, fishmongers and retailers in Caorle and the surrounding area.
The flesh of the “moscardino” is very lean and at the same time contains a good quantity of protein, potassium, phosphorus and collagen: because of these organoleptic characteristics it is very suitable for low-calorie diets. Moreover, given its specificity, the institutions and competent bodies have embarked on the process of recognising the PGI mark for this typical Caorle product. The preferred way to eat the baby octopus is boiled or stewed: if you want to prepare baby octopus at home as they are prepared and enjoyed in Caorle, read the typical recipe for boiled octopus.
The white asparagus of Bibione
A few kilometres from Caorle lies another seaside resort, famous among other things for a particular typical product that is cultivated in that area, the white asparagus.
The cultivation of white asparagus was introduced to the area in the 1960s by Istrian exiles who, fleeing from Istria, settled in Bibione and the surrounding area, bringing with them the knowledge of asparagus cultivation techniques learned in their homeland. The sandy soil proved to be particularly suitable for the asparagus seedlings that grow luxuriantly in Bibione. White asparagus can be used to make excellent risotto dishes, but asparagus can also be enjoyed boiled, and it is a tradition in the Veneto region to serve it with boiled eggs.
To promote the white asparagus, Bibione dedicates a festival to it every year, which usually takes place at the end of April.
Local wines
The landscape inland from Caorle is a rural one characterised by extensive fields and vineyards. The vineyards in particular, with their regular shape and orderly structure that creates pleasant perspectives, are one of the prides of the area because they produce excellent grapes that give fine wines.
Leaving the beaches and heading towards the Marango area and then further north towards the countryside of Lison, Pramaggiore, Annone Veneto and Mazzolada the vineyards and wine farms become more and more frequent. This is the area of the DOC wines of Lison-Pramaggiore that is particularly characterised by the production of red wines, but also of fragrant and delicate white wines. Among the red wines, we must mention the full-bodied Merlot, Cabernet and Refosco, while the white wines include Verduzzo, Chardonnay and Tai.
If you go directly to the local farms that sell their wines directly, you can take home a precious souvenir of Caorle and its territory without spending much.
The fruit and vegetables of Caorle
The basis of a healthy diet must include fruit and vegetables, even better if you know where they come from and that they are grown naturally.
The countryside around Caorle is characterised by agricultural land that has always been dedicated to the cultivation not only of wheat and maize, but also of fruit trees and vegetables. Fresh produce can be bought from shops and retailers in Caorle and the surrounding area, sometimes directly from the producers who, depending on the season and availability of fruit and vegetables, put up signs along the road outside their houses saying “Apples”, “Pears”, “Watermelons”, “Radicchio”… All you have to do is stop and go directly to the farmer to take home fresh, local, zero-kilometre produce. Alternatively, just go to the weekly market that takes place in Caorle every Saturday morning and in the villages during the summer (Porto S. Margherita on Tuesday evenings, Duna Verde on Wednesday mornings).
Food and wine events in Caorle
The food and wine in Caorle is a very important aspect for this in the city and its surroundings are not lacking in food and wine events that celebrate the local excellence and are often opportunities for the community to celebrate and meet. During the summer, of course, the food and wine events in Caorle are much more numerous and are distributed both through the streets of the historic centre and in the hamlets. If we then add the village festivals and fairs that are organised inland, the result is a truly rich food and wine calendar.