5 Days in Puglia for Food and Wine: A Suggested Itinerary

The short version: five days lets you eat your way down the heel of Italy. Start in Bari for street food and fresh orecchiette, spend two days among the trulli, masserie and olive groves of the Valle d’Itria, then finish in baroque Lecce and the Salento with Primitivo, Negroamaro and the best pastry breakfast in the south. Below is a loose, food-first shape for the trip, with the tours and tastings worth booking along the way.

A note on how to use this: these are suggestions and options, not a day-by-day timetable. Tours, tastings, cellar visits and cooking classes usually need booking, and market days, opening hours, train and bus timetables and prices change through the year, so treat the days as a flexible outline and confirm anything time-sensitive directly with the operator or venue before you travel.

At a glance

Day one: Bari

Begin in Bari Vecchia, the tangle of white lanes in the old town, where women still roll and shape orecchiette by hand at tables outside their doors and sell them by the bag. It is one of the most memorable food sights in Italy, and a Bari food tour is the easiest way to see it with someone who knows the families. Expect to graze: focaccia barese with tomatoes and olives, fried panzerotti, crisp squares of fried polenta called sgagliozze, and, down at the old port, raw sea urchins and seafood eaten standing up with a cold beer. Our orecchiette guide explains the pasta, and what to eat in Puglia covers the plates to look for all week.

Day two: the coast and a masseria

Head south along the Adriatic to Polignano a Mare, perched on cliffs above the sea, and the working harbour town of Monopoli. Lunch on grilled fish or a plate of crudo, then spend the afternoon inland at a masseria, one of the fortified farmhouses that dot the countryside. Many run hands-on lessons where you make orecchiette and cavatelli from durum wheat, stuff fresh vegetables and eat what you cooked with the farm’s own oil and wine. This is the day to book one of the Puglia cooking classes. If you want a slower trip, a night or two in a masseria makes a lovely base.

Day three: the Valle d’Itria

The Valle d’Itria is the postcard Puglia of cone-roofed trulli, dry-stone walls and ancient olive trees. Alberobello has the famous trulli quarters; quieter Locorotondo gives its name to a crisp local white wine; Martina Franca is known for its cured capocollo; and in Cisternino you pick meat at a butcher who grills it for you on the spot, the local fornello pronto tradition. Puglia makes more olive oil than any other Italian region, so add an olive oil tasting in a grove or a historic underground mill; our Puglia olive oil tours guide explains what to expect. Look out for fresh burrata and stracciatella, which come from this part of the south.

Day four: Lecce

Move down to Lecce, the honey-coloured baroque city of the Salento. Breakfast like a local: a warm pasticciotto (shortcrust pastry filled with custard) and a caffè in ghiaccio, espresso over ice with almond milk. Later, snack on a rustico leccese, puff pastry filled with béchamel, mozzarella and tomato, and taste dishes like ciceri e tria, pasta with chickpeas, some of it fried for crunch. A Lecce food tour strings these together through the old town; our Lecce food tours guide compares the options.

Day five: the Salento wine country

Spend the last day among the vineyards of the south. Puglia’s two great red grapes are Primitivo, rich and ripe, at its most famous around Manduria, and Negroamaro, darker and earthier, the backbone of Salice Salentino. The region also makes a lot of easy, chilled rosato, perfect with lunch. Wineries are spread out, so a Puglia wine tour with transport is the relaxed way to visit two or three; our Puglia wine tours guide helps you choose. If you still have energy, the Salento coast and its beaches are close by for a final seafood dinner.

Where to base yourself, and how to travel it

The simple structure is two or three nights in the north (Bari, Monopoli or a masseria in the Valle d’Itria) and two nights in Lecce. Regular trains link Bari and Lecce in under two hours, and local trains reach some Valle d’Itria towns, but the countryside, masserie and wineries are far easier with a car or on an organised tour. Remember that wine tastings and driving don’t mix, so many visitors book a tour with transport for the wine day. Summer is hot and busy; May, June, September and October are the sweet spots, with the grape harvest in late summer and the olive harvest from about October. Plan the whole trip from the Puglia food and wine hub.

Frequently asked questions

How many days do you need in Puglia for food and wine?

Five days is a good length: a day in Bari, two days on the coast and in the Valle d’Itria with a masseria cooking class and an olive oil tasting, and two days in Lecce and the Salento wine country. Three days works if you pick either the north (Bari and the Valle d’Itria) or the south (Lecce and the Salento).

What food is Puglia famous for?

Orecchiette pasta, focaccia barese, panzerotti, burrata and stracciatella, raw seafood, olive oil, and in Lecce the pasticciotto custard pastry and the rustico. The main wines are Primitivo and Negroamaro reds and plenty of rosato.

Do you need a car in Puglia?

Not for Bari and Lecce, which are linked by train and easy on foot. For the Valle d’Itria, masserie and wineries a car makes life much easier, or you can book tours that include transport, which is the safer choice for wine tasting days.

Where should I stay in Puglia for a food trip?

Split the trip between the north and the south: Bari, Monopoli or a masseria in the Valle d’Itria for the first nights, then Lecce for the Salento. A masseria stay adds farm food and often a cooking class on site.

Plan your Puglia food and wine trip

Start with a Bari food tour or a Lecce food tour, book a cooking class, an olive oil tasting or a wine tour, or see everything on the Puglia hub.