Words: Dan
Photos: Hark
Honorable mention: Tom

Travel & Food: Eating & Drinking in Naples pt.2
23 Photos: 36 hours in Naples, Italy

Once a month here at Hark1karan, we like to set aside a day where we indulge in all things food and drink. We select a handful of places to eat and drink around London and spend time with some good people. Another thing we like to do is to travel so it was inevitable that we would mix the two. So we caught a flight to Naples and experienced possibly one of the best cuisines in the world.

Having touched down late in the morning and grabbed a taxi to our accommodation, it must be said that Naples on the surface is not the most aesthetically pleasing city on the eye. However, what it lacks in beauty it more than makes up for it with its people, food, culture and general way of life.

Naples as a city has been through a lot from being devastated by the worst eruption of Mount Vesuvius in 1906 to their beloved football team being declared bankrupt and relegated to Serie C1. Neapolitans strength in adversity and the points mentioned previously make Naples a great place to visit.

Onto the food, most of our research consisted of where the best places to eat pizza were, but a different place caught my eye, a place that can only be described as truly authentic Neapolitan food. This place is a true locals spot that beats any Michelin star place. A small place called Cibi Cotti, family run and right in the market, fresh produce guaranteed. If that wasn’t enough the lady behind it all Nonna Anna (Grandmother Anna) was there overseeing her life’s work. Every person that entered would greet her with a ‘Ciao Nonna’ (Hi Grandma) you’d think she was a local celebrity. So we grabbed a table and we started to order a crazy amount of dishes for us to share. Vegetable Risotto, Luganica Sausages, Gnocchi, Octopus all washed done with some Peroni Red a true feast for the eyes and stomach. The Luganica was meaty and flavoursome. The octopus so fresh you wouldn’t be surprised if it was caught that day. The risotto was hearty and the gnocchi was made on site with a silky, creamy and gooey cheese sauce that melted in the mouth. Home cooked food that you’d expect at your grandparents house, amazing stuff. For 30 Euros all 3 of us left more than satisfied and looking forward to what was to come for the rest of the trip.

To finish off we decided to get ice cream at a place recommended to us by the lady at our hostel at a place called Remy. Creamy gelato to finish off proceedings you can’t go wrong at all especially in a balmy 15 degrees in December.

As we plotted our next move over an Aperol Spritz, again the lady at our hostel said we should go to a place called Cammarota Spritz that does spritz for 1 Euro. We headed to the spot and arrived just as the rain started pouring and indeed the spritzes were 1 Euro. For another Euro you can get some juicy Noccelara olives. Before we knew it we started talking to some locals in my limited Italian whilst also acting as translator to both sides.

A couple of hours passed and 4 or 5 spiritz later we started getting hungry and we went to grab some pizza at Antica e Friggitoria Di Matteo. With Naples and pizza it’s very hard to decide which to go to, purely down to the fact that they are all good. We chose Di Matteo because they offer the Neapolitan street food staple called frittatine. Frittatine is deep fried macaroni with cheese balls filled with meat. It has everything you want from street food, cheap, tasty and filling. We ate some as a nibble whilst we were in the queue which we waited in for around 45 minutes as one guy kept shouting names as people excitedly went in.

By the time we were called in we were quite literally starving and ordered a couple of pizzas, a selection of fried goodies (frittatine, arancini and crochette) and 3 Peroni’s to quench the thirst. With Naples being the birthplace of pizza I had high hopes. Up until that day the best pizzas I’d ever had were at Braz in Sao Paolo and Franco Manca in London. The base was soft and doughy charred in parts from the wood fire oven. The toppings bursting with flavour, the tomato sauce in particular was the best sauce I’ve had on a pizza. The place was buzzing as they steadily turned over tables without kicking you out it was all very chilled out as we became accustomed to during our brief time in Naples. We ended our evening with a couple more spritz before hitting the hay.

23 Photos: 36 hours in Naples, Italy

Travel & Food: Eating & Drinking in Naples pt.2
23 Photos: 36 hours in Naples, Italy

Words: Dan
Photos: Hark
Honorable mention: Tom