What to Eat in Sorrento
Sorrento is an Italian town perched on the cliffs of the Sorrentine Peninsula in Campania, looking across the Bay of Naples at Vesuvius - and it has built its food on lemons. They grow on terraces right above the sea and they carry a protected mark. You'll come across them at every turn: in shop windows, in your aperitivo glass, in the icing on a dessert. Writing about food in Sorrento means writing mainly about lemons - and right after that about Naples, which is closer across the bay than the map suggests.
Lemons from the Terraces of Sorrento
The local variety is called ovale di Sorrento: an oval lemon with a thick, intensely aromatic peel that has carried the European IGP mark since the turn of the millennium. The fruit ripens under straw mats called pagliarelle - they cast shade, slow the ripening and make the peel the most valuable part of the lemon. That peel then drives the whole of Sorrento's cooking: it steeps in alcohol to make limoncello, it scents the cream in delizia al limone, and it cools you down in lemon ice cream. The neighboring Amalfi Coast has its own protected variety, the elongated sfusato amalfitano, and locals really don't like the two being mixed up - one coastline, two lemons and a quiet rivalry you can taste.
What to Eat in Sorrento
- Limoncello. A sweet liqueur made from the yellow peel of local lemons, and the Sorrentine Peninsula is its true home. The protected designation Liquore di Limone di Sorrento calls for at least 30 percent alcohol; you drink it ice-cold after a meal, and out on the terraces as a limoncello spritz with prosecco.
- Gnocchi alla Sorrentina. Potato gnocchi baked with tomato sauce, fiordilatte mozzarella and basil - the one dish named directly after Sorrento.
- Delizia al limone. A sponge dome filled with lemon cream and soaked in limoncello syrup. The Sorrento pastry chef Carmine Marzuillo introduced it in 1978, and today the whole Campanian coast claims it as its own.
- Gelato al limone and crema amalfitana. Lemon ice cream made from local lemons, and a smooth milky lemon cream modeled on the delizia. Sorrento's gelaterias are built on those two flavors.
- Spaghetti alla Nerano. Spaghetti with fried zucchini and provolone del Monaco cheese. The dish was invented in the 1950s at the Maria Grazia restaurant in Marina del Cantone on the far side of the peninsula, and it has belonged to the whole Sorrento area ever since.
- Provolone del Monaco. An aged cheese made from the milk of cows that graze the slopes of the Monti Lattari, the most famous cheese on the peninsula and a DOP. It is named after the heavy cloaks the herders wore to carry it to market in Naples - they apparently looked like monks.
- Treccia di Sorrento. A fresh cheese of stretched fior di latte curd, braided into its trademark plait. Treccia is at its best with tomatoes and olive oil.
- Noci di Sorrento and nocino. Besides lemons, the Sorrentine Peninsula is also walnut country; the unripe nuts, traditionally picked on the night of St John, are steeped to make nocino, a dark bittersweet digestivo to end dinner with.
- … and dozens more Italian dishes on the list: What to Eat in Italy.
Naples, Capri and Amalfi on a Sorrento Plate
In Sorrento the cooking of the whole bay comes together within a few hundred meters. Pizza got here from Naples, twenty-five kilometers away across the water, with pizzaioli trained at its ovens - and over time the locals added their own version, pizza sorrentina, with a flatter rim and mozzarella from the peninsula. The fried street food comes from Naples too, led by the frittatina, a ball of pasta in a crisp coating. The nearby island of Capri contributed the caprese salad and the chocolate and almond torta caprese, while Amalfi gave scialatielli, the pasta whose origin is argued over all along the coast.
Where to Eat in Sorrento
- Trattoria Torna a Surriento. A family trattoria run by a couple from Naples on Via Santa Lucia, a few steps off the promenade and still off the beaten track: polpette in slow-simmered ragù, gnocchi alla sorrentina and scialatielli with salsiccia. The biggest surprise for me was the eggplant preserved in oil. In the evening there is singing at the tables, so this is a place for a long dinner rather than a quick lunch.
- Genny street food. A window serving fried Neapolitan specialties on Via degli Aranci by the Circumvesuviana station: frittatine, arancini and crocché, crisp and never greasy.
- Antica Gelateria Sorrentina. The Gargiulo family gelateria on via Fuoro in the historic center, with the third generation behind the counter. My pick: lemon, and the flagship crema amalfitana alongside it. We paid the same as we would in the places tourists never find, which on one of the city's main streets is not a given.
- Pizzeria da Michele. A small pizzeria and rosticceria just beyond Piazza Tasso, where it is mostly locals picking up a box to take away. I ate a pizza with sausage, eggplant and basil at a plastic table by the entrance and enjoyed every bite; the work at the oven goes on right in front of you.
- Bar Nonna Emilia. A small bar right on the waterfront of the Marina Grande fishing quarter: a limoncello spritz or a Bellini with a view of the sea, the moorings and the fishermen at their nets. An ice-cold spritz by the water was the best way to unwind that I found in Sorrento - nobody here looks at their watch, and after a few minutes you will stop looking at yours.
From Sorrento you can take a boat to Amalfi and Positano, or a train to Naples or out to Vesuvius.
Enjoy eating your way around Sorrento!
Delizia al Limone: The Lemon Dessert of Sorrento and Amalfi
Delizia al limone is a lemon dessert from the Italian region of Campania: two sponge domes sandwiched with lemon cream, soaked in limoncello syrup and coated in a thick lemon glaze. It was created in 1978 by the Sorrento pastry chef Carmine Marzuillo, and it nearly ended up being called a lemon sigh. Today the whole coast from Sorrento through Amalfi to Naples claims it.
Genny street food: Frittatina and Fried Naples in Sorrento
Genny street food is a small bistro serving fried Neapolitan specialties on Sorrento's Via degli Aranci - frittatine, arancini, crocché and montanare, all done Naples-style. The frittatina, a flat fried disc of pasta and béchamel, has barely made it beyond Campania, and in Sorrento nobody pretends it is anything but an import. Reviews put Gennaro and Rosa's place among the best rated in town.
Antica Gelateria Sorrentina: A Family Gelateria in Sorrento
On via Fuoro in Sorrento, an older gentleman and a sign claiming 1860 lure you into a small gelateria. Nobody can prove the date, but the documented version is the nicer one: the Gargiulo family once sold milk here, and from milk it was a short step to gelato. Today the third generation makes it, and the flagship flavor is crema amalfitana, a milky cream with lemon.
Pizzeria da Michele: Sorrento's Namesake of the Famous Naples Pizzeria
Da Michele - a name that in the pizza world means Naples and a chain of more than seventy branches from London to Tokyo. The Sorrento one isn't among them: it's the small pizzeria and rosticceria of Michele Sorrentino, a few steps from Piazza Tasso, where locals come for a box to go. Unlike the Naples family, he needs nothing more than his own first name - and no court case to keep it.
Bar Nonna Emilia: Aperitivo in Sorrento's Fishing Quarter
Bar Nonna Emilia sits right on the waterfront of Marina Grande, the fishing quarter of Sorrento, which as late as the 1950s you could only reach on foot down a stairway. A limoncello spritz or a Bellini here comes with a view of the sea and the fishermen at their nets - and with the riddle of two Emilias who between them have been feeding this one street for nearly eighty years.
Limoncello: The Lemon Liqueur from Sorrento and Amalfi
On the label limoncello looks like a centuries-old heirloom, but its documented history only starts in 1988, when someone on Capri registered the first trademark. What kind of liqueur it is, why the IGP mark belongs to the lemon and not to the bottle, how the Sorrento and Amalfi versions differ, and how a bottle carried home from the square below the cathedral in Amalfi tastes.
Torna a Surriento Restaurant: A Sorrento Trattoria Named After a Neapolitan Song
The name is borrowed from the most famous song ever written about Sorrento, but the cooking is Neapolitan. Torna a Surriento is a family trattoria opened in 2017 by a couple from Naples, on a quiet lane a short walk from the main promenade. I ate ragù with polpette, gnocchi alla sorrentina and scialatielli there - and I'd call the bill a lot of music for a song.