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The local cuisine, often enhanced by a mesmerising waterfront setting, is one of the great joys of travelling around the lakes. Regional dishes range from smoked hams and seasoned sausages to creamy risottos and fresh lake fish.

Lombard cuisine is highly varied, with ingredients sourced from lakes, mountains and flatlands. Rice, rather than pasta, is the mainstay of their diet; it is grown on the paddy fields of the Po Valley. Cream is very common, and butter tends to prevail over olive oil in local cooking. Lombardy also produces large quantities of corn, which is made into ubiquitous polenta. However, the lighter ingredients of the Mediterranean diet are also here: abundant fish, fresh fruit and vegetables – plus, of course, a glass or two of red wine.

Each region has its specialities. The Alpine influence can be seen in the array of cheeses, salami, polenta and mushroom dishes on offer in rural inns. The Austrian legacy around the north of Lake Garda has left the locals with a taste for veal, pork, beef, dumplings and gnocchi, while on the southern shore you will find roasts, stews, game and white truffles. Olive oil, oranges, lemons, peaches and pears represent a Mediterranean input. Milan may have moved towards more international tastes, such as sushi, but it still produces the famous risotto alla milanese.

Places to eat

The region is liberally endowed with restaurants, from simple tavernas to temples of gastronomy. These days there is little difference between a ristorante, trattoria or osteria. The region has many unpretentious pizzerie, often offering pasta, meat and fish as well. The best use wood-fired ovens (forno a legna), but these are sometimes open only in the evening. You can often find places serving cheap slices of pizza (al taglio), the favourite Italian takeaway.

Cafés are generally referred to in Italian as bar, which is actually the counter where coffees are served. Italians frequent bars at all times of day, from the breakfast cappuccino and cornetto to the late-night liqueur. Standing at the bar (al banco) is invariably cheaper than sitting at a table with waiter service. The pre-dinner aperitivo, from around 6-9pm, is a way of life in towns and resorts. The price of the drink may seem steep, but snacks, canapés and often a whole buffet are included in the price and can provide a cheap alternative to dinner in a restaurant. Cafés and bars offer a remarkable range of beverages: Prosecco or spumante (Italian sparkling wine, which you can have by the glass), spritz (Prosecco with Campari or Aperol), Negroni (Campari with vermouth and gin) and a long list of liqueurs and cocktails. An enoteca (wine bar) will offer a plate of sliced prosciutto crudo, salamis or cheeses to accompany its wide choice of wines.

Upmarket dining

You only have to see the stars studded across the region’s maps in the Italy Michelin guide to realise how many gourmet restaurants there are here. The settings can be grandiose or minimalist, the food traditional or innovative, and many are sited in some of the region’s most extravagant, romantically-sited hotels (see page 69).

Ordering your meal

Restaurant menus offer four courses: antipasto, the starter; primo, the first course, which is pasta, risotto or soup; secondo, the second course, such as fish or meat (accompanied perhaps by a contorno, a vegetable side dish); and finally, the dolce (dessert), or cheese and coffee. Don’t feel pressurised into wading through all four courses; opting for just a couple – and not necessarily the secondo – is perfectly acceptable.

Food and drink prices

Throughout this book, we have used the following price guide for a two-course à la carte dinner for one with half a bottle of house wine.

€€€€ = €80 and above

€€€ = €50–80

€€ = €25–50

€ = under €25

What to eat

Thanks to the extensive rice fields on the Padua plain, risottos are abundant. Most famous of all, and served throughout the region, is risotto alla milanese, made with short-grain Arborio rice, slowly cooked with onions, beef marrow and stock, served with liberal amounts of butter and Parmesan cheese, and flavoured and coloured with saffron. Rice dishes can be enriched with fish, seafood, meat, wild porcini mushrooms, truffles or seasonal vegetables.

The other main primo is ravioli, stuffed perhaps with perch and parsley, black truffle, or ricotta or cottage cheese and basil. Look out for cansonsèi ravioli from the Bergamo and Brescia regions, or tortelli di zucca from Mantua: a sweet-and-sour pasta wrapped around puréed pumpkin and crushed amaretti, served with butter and Grana Padano.

Vegetarians

There is an increasing number of restaurants offering at least one meat-and-fish-free dish, and with every year there are more establishments with vegan options. Where there are no main vegetarian dishes on offer, opt for a vegetable-based antipasto and primo (first course), but check first that stocks used for sauces are meat-free. Fresh, seasonal vegetables, often used to enrich pasta and risotto dishes, include melanzane (aubergines/eggplant), carciofi (artichokes), zucchini (courgettes), radicchio (red-leaved chicory), funghi (mushrooms) and porcini (wild boletus mushrooms).

Lake fish is plentiful and served in multiple ways. As an antipasto, it may come marinated, smoked, soused or puréed, as a primo it is added to pasta and risottos, and as a secondo it may be stuffed with vegetables and herbs, cooked in a sauce, or just grilled, fried or baked.

The most common species are lavarello, a white lake fish, perch (persico), trout (trota), pike (luccio) and char (salmerino). Lake Iseo’s speciality is tinca ripiena, baked tench stuffed with breadcrumbs, Parmesan and parsley and served with polenta. Around lakes Iseo and Como, menus may feature missultini (or missultitt); this is twaite shad, which has been stretched out on racks to dry in the sun, then grilled and served with olive oil and vinegar. On Lake Garda look out for the highly prized carpione, a type of carp, and coregone in crosta, a white fish flavoured with fennel and cooked in a salt crust.

Although fish is king around the lakes, most menus also offer a range of meat dishes. Along with simply cooked steak, pork, chicken or veal, you will find dishes of more humble origin: braised donkey, stewed tripe or, on the Padua plain, frogs’ legs, eels and snails. The main Milanese specialities are osso buco (veal shank stew), cotoletta alla milanese (veal cutlet fried in breadcrumbs) and cassoeula (pork and cabbage casserole). Game features in the mountains, and in Trentino you will find Austrian-style sausages and sauerkraut, smoked hams and speck.

The region excels in delicious cheeses, from tangy gorgonzola and pungent taleggio to creamy stracchino, robiola and mascarpone. Parmesan-like Grana Padano, produced on the Padua plain, can be eaten sliced as an appetiser or part of a cheese platter, and is used in many pasta and risotto recipes. Market stalls have dozens of regional cheeses, marked freschi (fresh) or stagionati (mature). If in doubt, sample a cheese or two before buying.

What to drink

The DOC (denominazione di origine controllata) is an official mark of quality, but don’t ignore the vino da tavola (house wine), which is often a good local wine. In more sophisticated establishments, you will be handed a hefty tome of wines, predominantly regional and national, but international too. Neighbouring Piedmont, Emilia-Romagna and the Veneto, all of which produce larger quantities of wine than Lombardy, will feature on most wine lists.

Although not one of Italy’s great wine-producing regions, Lombardy has over a dozen wine-producing areas, and a quarter of the wine is DOC. The best of the red wine is produced on the steep slopes of the Valtellina in northern Lombardy: Grumello, Inferno, Sassella and Valgella. Franciacorta, south of Lake Iseo, is best known for sparkling spumante, made from Pinot and Chardonnay grapes. This is often drunk with fish in local restaurants as well as an aperitivo. From the shores of Lake Garda come the white Custoza and Lugana, the red Garda Valtenesi and the light, scented red and rosé Bardolinos.

A good meal is usually concluded with a digestivo (liqueur), such as a brandy, grappa or limoncello (made from lemons).

If you want a small black coffee, ask for a caffè, or for a milky coffee, a caffè latte (ask for a ‘latte’ and you will probably get a glass of milk). This and cappuccino (or cappuccio as the locals call it) are only drunk at breakfast in Italy, although Italians are used to tourists asking for it at all times of day. A good halfway house is a caffè macchiato, an espresso with a dash of frothy milk in a small cup. If you want something with a real kick, order a caffè doppio, a double espresso; or after a meal, try a caffè corretto, with grappa, brandy or Sambuca added. For a good night’s sleep forget the real thing and order a caffè decaffeinato or decaff.

Dessert (dolce) is typically an almond or apple tart, or a cake, especially tiramisù, the alcoholic chocolate and coffee gateau. You may prefer to do as the Italians and buy an ice cream from the local gelateria, enjoying it while strolling down the street. After all, the Italians are said to make the best ice cream in the world.