Ascoli olives are a speciality of central Italy, well worth tasting at least once in a lifetime. They consist in little meatballs of fresh and cured meat wrapped in the flesh of green olives before being coated with breadcrumbs and fried. The result is a delicious finger food appetizer, as well as being this region’s most renowned  street food. 

The trickiest part of this recipe is the method used to remove the olive stones, so it is advisable to select a soft variety of green olives, making it easier to detach the flesh from the stone. As well as being an excellent recipe for serving with an aperitif they also make an ideal snack when spending an evening watching soccer on the TV.

The Recipe:

Start to prepare the olives which have to be pitted by removing the flesh with a single spiral cut starting from the stalk – as you would do with an apple – in order to remove the stone and wrap the flesh around the filling. Once this operation has been carried out, put the spirals of olive flesh in salted cold water to keep them firm.  

Chop the onion, carrot and celery and gently fry in a pan with a little oil, then add the meat previously chopped into pieces that are not too small and gently fry it with the tomato purée.  The meat does not need to cook thoroughly. Remove it from the heat and let it cool to a lukewarm temperature before popping it into the mixer together with the mortadella and raw ham. Add the parsley, 2 of the 4 eggs, parmesan cheese, the bread previously soaked in water and squeezed well, then – most important – the nutmeg. You should obtain a firm dry mixture.   

Mould the mixture with your hands into olive shaped balls; wrap the flesh of one green olive around each little ball. Dust each ball with flour and then dunk it in whisked egg mixture (using the other two eggs), before finally coating with breadcrumbs. Fry the olives in boiling olive oil – a few at a time to avoid reducing the oil temperature – until they are all nice and golden. Stand them on absorbent kitchen paper to dry and serve them hot. To give a street food twist to your aperitif, serve the Ascoli olives in a conical brown paper bag. 

What wine to serve with Ascoli olives
When serving an aperitif with Ascoli olives, it is a good idea to choose a wine from the same area, such as a Passerina: a straw yellow colour with a delectable fragrance of tropical fruit and a taste that is surprisingly full-bodied and dry. Another nice option would be Falerio dei Colli Ascolani: slightly acidulous with a delicate fragrance of green apple and a smooth taste that is perfect for aperitif nibbles.