πŸ•It's Street Food Week! Say Ciao to Olive Ascolane

Yes! This has to do with olives! How did you guess?

Except to say it like an Italian, repeat after me: oh-LEE-vay. That's plural. One olive would be oh-LEE-vuh.

So today folks, we are going to a place in the Marche region - the town of Ascoli-Piceno. The origin of this delicious little street food treat is baked into the name: olive all'ascolane - they come from Ascoli!

As with a lot of the best street food out there, these goodies are breaded and fried. They are olives stuffed with a meat mixture of beef, veal and pork. This recipe in English says they were allegedly

invented by the cooks of wealthy families as a way to utilize meat leftover from abundant feasts.

Nowadays, they are an easy-to-eat street food you can order as an antipasto before your pizza, and not just in Marche, but also throughout Italy. In Ascoli you can order them from outdoor kiosks and eat them straight from a paper cone. This page has videos showing how to fry them, whether they're made fresh or frozen.

The green olives used are the Oliva Ascolana del Piceno DOP. The "DOP" means denominazione di origine protetta (protected designation of origin) - these particular olives only come from this particular place.Β 

Have you ever had olive ascolane? Personally, I used to not like olives at all (I know! Blasphemy!) but eating these got me over that pretty quickly. They are delicious!

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