Cinque Terre & Liguria Food & Wine
Liguria is Italy’s kitchen garden by the sea: basil pounded into pesto, focaccia eaten warm at breakfast, the cheese-filled focaccia di Recco, trofie and trenette, anchovies from the gulf, and the terraced vines of the Cinque Terre that make the crisp white and the sweet Sciacchetrà. This is our Cinque Terre and Liguria hub. Below are the top-rated experiences, then our cooking and Genoa pages.
Top-rated Cinque Terre and Liguria experiences
Boat trips with wine and lunch
Why Liguria for food? Because it invented pesto and focaccia, grows its wine on cliffs above the sea, and packs it all into the most photogenic coast in Italy.
Formats: pesto and focaccia cooking classes with a sea view; Genoa food tours and market walks; boat trips along the Cinque Terre with wine and lunch; sailing-and-aperitivo evenings.
What to eat and drink: pesto alla genovese, focaccia and focaccia di Recco, trofie al pesto, farinata, anchovies, and the Cinque Terre DOC white and its sweet Sciacchetrà.
Pesto, focaccia and the Ligurian table
Liguria cooks green and simple. Pesto alla genovese — basil, pine nuts, garlic, Parmigiano and Pecorino, olive oil, ground in a marble mortar — is the region’s gift to the world, best learned by making it yourself. Around it: focaccia, eaten plain and warm or, in Recco, stuffed with soft cheese; farinata, a chickpea pancake; trofie and trenette pasta under more pesto; and the anchovies of Monterosso. A cooking class or a Genoa food tour is the fastest way in.
The wine on the cliffs
The Cinque Terre — Monterosso, Vernazza, Corniglia, Manarola, Riomaggiore — grow their vines on dry-stone terraces so steep the grapes are still carried by hand and monorail. The DOC white, from Bosco, Albarola and Vermentino, is a mineral seafood wine; the rare Sciacchetrà is its sweet passito, made from grapes dried on racks, poured with dessert. Boat tours along the coast pair the villages with a tasting, the best way to see the terraces from below.
How to do it
Base in Genoa for the food and the market, or in the Cinque Terre and nearby La Spezia for the villages and the boats; the train links them all. Cooking classes and boat tours book up in summer, so reserve ahead. Spring and September are the sweet spot — warm sea, thinner crowds. For the neighbouring wine country, see our Piedmont pages a short way north.
Frequently asked questions
Where is the best pesto cooking class?
In the Cinque Terre villages and in Genoa, where you grind basil in a marble mortar the traditional way; several classes come with a sea view. See our cooking classes page.
What wine does the Cinque Terre make?
A crisp DOC white from cliff-grown vines, and the rare sweet Sciacchetrà made from dried grapes — a dessert wine worth seeking out.
Genoa or the Cinque Terre for food?
Genoa for the market, the focaccia and the classic city food tour; the Cinque Terre for cooking with a view and the boat-and-wine trips. They are forty minutes apart by train.
Read next: What is pesto? Pesto alla genovese explained · Cinque Terre planner: food, wine & getting around
How we choose
We list only experiences with a strong rating over a meaningful number of reviews and free cancellation where available, and we favour small-group and family-run hosts. FindEatLocal earns a commission when you book through GetYourGuide or Viator links on this page; it doesn’t change the price you pay. More about how we choose.