Street food in Bari Vecchia

Discover where to eat the best panzerotti, focaccia and raw fish in Bari. Discover street food in the old city.
Another good reason to visit Bari is the food in general and the street food in particular. There is endless variety that just has to be discovered by sampling on the spot.

You can find the entire gastronomic history of Bari in the alleys and narrow streets that lead away from the fish market square in the heart of the city, Bari Vecchia.

Here, local women prepare and display their freshly-made products: from popizze, a kind of fried pizza dough ball, to sgagliozze, slices of fried polenta sprinkled with salt (the best are found at Maria's, an elderly lady who makes them with supreme skill every day), and focaccia, the classical morning or afternoon pizza snack prepared primarily with tomatoes, olives or onions (Panificio Fiore, a bakery which for four generations has baked the best focaccia in the city, is near the Basilica of St. Nicholas), and lastly panzerotti, similar to popizze but stuffed with tomato and mozzarella or ground beef.

If you like fish, try the street food at the famous fish market at Molo San Nicola. Behind the ruins of the Margherita Theatre is the marina, popular with sea dogs old and young, site of the famous ‘nderrallelanze, the point where boats berth with their catch. Here you can try eating freshly-caught seafood (mussels, sea urchins, clams) and baby octopus, commonly referred to as “pupils” because they are still small, the way the locals do: raw, with lemon.

What To Eat