Original subtitles

- Hello.

I'm in Puglia, which is the heel...

Can you see me through the olive branches?

They're hard to avoid in Puglia,

a region that's home to 60 million olive trees.

That's one olive tree for every Italian in Italy.

This region is Italy at its most elemental...

Simple, fresh cuisine that's grown and produced here,

fragrant olive oil, beautiful vegetables,

cheeses renowned the world over.

Focaccia. Si.

And durum wheat for pasta and bread.

Look at that.

I'm Stanley Tucci.

I'm fascinated by my Italian heritage,

so I'm traveling across Italy to discover how

the food in each of this country's 20 regions

is as unique as the people and their past.

You really want it to be like that.

- Need to be like this.

- Despite being such a fertile region,

Puglia is also one of Italy's poorest.

- It was nicknamed the shame of Italy.

- Located in the south, a place the Italians call

Il Mezzogiorno, or "high noon,"

because of the intensity of the midday sun,

poverty and hardship are very much

a recent memory in this part of the world.

- But today, Puglia is coming into its own.

There's a newfound sense of pride

for its gastronomic roots...

And an appreciation for its rugged landscape.

So I want to find out how this region

has seemingly gone from rags to riches...

- Grazie.

- And turned its humblest ingredients

into sources of national pride.

You're very smart, aren't you?

That's it. That's the story.

Puglia is the heel of Italy's boot,

a long, thin peninsula

with more than 500 miles of coastline.

Puglia's capital, Bari,

sits perched on the eastern coast.

Walking around the city,

you're aware of two worlds colliding,

a struggle between the way things have always been done

versus the... delights, shall we say,

of modern bureaucracy.

A major trading post since Roman times,

Bari has served as a gateway to Greece, the Middle East,

and beyond.

Port cities are notorious for hustlers and crime,

and while Bari may have seen its fair share of that,

if you look a little closer, the city reveals

its distinctive charm...

- Something author and guide Sophie Minchilli

has a longstanding respect for.

- Hi, Stan. - Hi.

How are you? - Good.

How are you? Welcome to Bari.

- Oh, thank you very much.

Do you live here now or no?

- I don't live here, but my dad grew up in

the building right behind you. - In this one?

He grew up there? - Yeah.

- Really?

- My great grandparents were architects.

They did the building and the whole seafront.

- Wow. - Pretty cool.

- Yeah, that is pretty cool. - Yeah.

- Yes, you're very... - I'm proud.

- Connected to the city. Yeah. - Yeah, I am.

- Sophie's first taking me to Bari's port

to see one of the most ancient but not strictly legal

Barese institutions,

the fishermen of Molo San Nicola.

- It's sort of semi-legal, let's say.

They don't really have a permit to sell fish.

They sell it anyways.

But nobody chases them away?

- No. They've tried over the years,

but they still stay strong.

- They stay. - Yeah.

- In an industry that's increasingly regulated,

these fishermen are determined to continue trading.

- They speak a strong Barese dialect

that even most Italians would struggle to understand,

competing with each other to sell

a wide array of seafood to passersby.

Ciao, ciao, ciao.

- It's really typical in Bari

to eat raw seafood, in general.

They call it the sushi of Italy.

- The Barese have been eating raw seafood here

as far back as the 1500s.

- So they're called tagliatelle

because they're cut in thin strip...

- 'Cause they look like tagliatelle.

- But they're not, obviously.

- But it's octopus.

Right? Is it octopus?

- It's squid. - It's squid.

- Yeah.

- To prep the squid, the fishermen beat it

to tenderize it, then rock it in seawater

to help retain its shape and texture.

- Do you understand anything? - Not at all.

- It's almost impossible.

It's another language.

- It is another language, yeah.

- Ready to try some? - Yes, oh, yes.

- It's delicious.

I love it.

- Oh, I think he wants that...

- Si.

- He wants us to go eat it over there.

We can't eat it right here. - Ah. Grazie.

- Grazie. - Thank you.

Thank you. Thank you.

Police tolerate

the fishermen selling fish here.

Just don't get seen eating it anywhere near them.

- You never know how many of them there will be,

but there's always someone selling fish.

- Okay, let's try it.

I mean, all right.

- So, yeah, you just eat it.

Chewy.

- Yeah, but it's not that chewy.

- No. - It's not that bad.

- I know. It's good, right?

- No, with the lemon, yeah. - Yeah.

- Do you want more?

- Sure.

- Do I want more?

- If you like it.

- I do like it, actually.

I didn't... I didn't expect to like it.

A few minutes' walk from Lungomare,

and we're in the Old Town of Bari,

Bari Vecchia.

- It's like a maze.

Like, the further you get into it,

it's all little alleyways like this and arches.

- Yeah.

- When I was a kid, it was actually considered

sort of dangerous to come to the old part of Bari.

- Oh, really?

- And now, I think this is one of the most

beautiful roads in Italy.

- Some 6,000 people form a tight-knit community here,

where the reality of life

is in evidence everywhere you look.

- No separation.

I mean, that's the space... - No.

- They have, and they make the most.

- Yeah. Yeah.

- Their laundry's outside.

But the underwear is always behind.

Nobody sees it.

- Oh, really? - Yeah.

If you look... if you look, you know it is.

The underwear's always behind.

It's about 2,000 years old, so it is really old.

- It's pretty old, yeah.

The list of powers that have invaded Bari

is as long as your arm,

and after centuries under siege,

the Barese could be forgiven for developing

a certain disdain for whatever authority

happened to replace the previous one.

- What'd he say?

- "Take a picture of me holding the beer."

- Now we're walking through Arco Basso,

which is also known as the Orecchiette Road.

- Orecchiette Road.

- Because you'll see there's a lot of women

making orecchiette. - Orecchiette.

With many of their husbands out at sea,

the women were left to fend for themselves

and provide for the family.

Around the 1950s, they started making orecchiette,

or "little ears," to sell from their homes.

But a few years ago,

the council tried to stop their trade.

- For hygiene purposes, you can't really

be making pasta out of your home

and selling it to people at restaurants.

But just like the fish market, they...

- They just kept going. - They stayed strong.

- Orecchiette for these ladies are a way of life.

And while they can't sell to restaurants,

they fought back and won the right

to sell for personal use.

- Now they actually have a role in society.

They're bringing money to the neighborhood.

- Yeah. Sure. Yeah. - They're working.

- The more time I spend here, the more I see

that the Barese are doing things their own way.

A few minutes away, Sophie wants to introduce me

to a dish that's full of Barese attitude.

At Urban Bistro, Chef Celso Laforgia

makes a dish unique to the city

and one that you'll find nowhere else in Italy.

Why is it called "assassina"?

- Because the ones who tried for the first time,

he called the chef a killer.

- Oh, because it was so spicy.

- Because it was so spicy and burning.

- How do you make it? - I can... I can start?

- Yeah, go! - Yeah?

Okay, you start with olive oil.

- Yes. - Chili.

If you prefer more spice and more...

- Me, no. - So we put that...

- Just a little bit. - Gentle.

- The two things that you need to do it

is a powerful fire and a big pot.

- To fit the whole spaghetti.

- So you're just putting in raw spaghetti?

- Yes.

- Pasta is basically never cooked this way.

- And then we put hot water and tomato sauce.

- Like a marinara, sort of.

- Like a marinara sauce, yes.

- The trick is to burn it enough to make it crunchy

but not so much that it's bitter.

- So it's gone.

- Oh, my God. - Look at that.

- So it really is... you really want it to be like that.

- Yes, it needs to be,

if you want to call assassina.

- Celso's method goes against everything I've ever learned

about cooking pasta, taking it dangerously close

to complete incineration.

- Different colors, different textures.

- And the key to knowing it's ready?

Use your ears.

- Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah.

- Oh, now I'm getting the picante a little bit.

- A little bit? - Just a little.

- I'm sweating.

Wow, that's really great, Celso.

- Thank you very much.

- Honestly, I've never seen

anything like that before.

I love that.

And I've been around too.

The assassina is a dish

that could have only been created in a city like this.

Like its people, it's fiery, uncompromising,

and it breaks all the rules.

Wow.

Beyond its many agricultural riches,

Puglia's most prized contribution has to be wheat,

something local chef Pietro Zito

has developed a unique appreciation for.

- We're in the north, in the Foggia province,

known as the breadbasket of Italy

because it produces more durum wheat

than anywhere else in the country.

But that wasn't always

the case.

- Yeah, it's nice.

- Si.

Like most people in this part of Puglia,

Pietro Zito's connection to wheat goes back

to Benito Mussolini's reforms in the 1920s.

- Si.

- Mussolini thought self-sufficiency

through increased food production

was key to establishing Italy as a world power,

but in reality,

what the farmers actually received

were often inferior plots of land.

Unconcerned, Mussolini pushed ahead

with his expansionist ambitions.

And he took to the fields himself,

displaying his wheat-threshing muscle

in a bid to persuade Italian farmers to persevere

with the land they were given.

In the end, Mussolini's aspirations

dragged Italy and her people first into war,

then into recession,

with the poorest left to survive

by scavenging for whatever they could find in the fields,

even remnants of burnt wheat.

- To prepare fields for the next seeding,

any straw left over after harvest

used to be cleared by burning it off.

- The stigma of having to resort to such extremes

would linger for decades.

- But Pietro is on a mission

to revive these simple flavors.

- Buongiorno.

- And his friend Nicola L'Agrasta

has developed a modern technique for recreating it.

- Toasting the grain is a delicate,

yet labor intensive process.

- But it produces a dark flour

which can be used for making bread

as well as the Puglian snack taralli,

a kind of cross between a cracker and a breadstick.

With some of the...

- Yeah. - Yeah. Yeah.

They're really good.

- Mmm. Mmm.

They're really good.

The flour is used to make dark pasta,

which Pietro prepares for his restaurant

Antichi Sapori, or "Ancient Flavors,"

in the town of Montegrosso,

with the help of a local expert.

Using a mixture of burnt and white grain

to ensure the flavor is not too bitter,

Concetta crafts each individual orecchiette

by hand.

Her kitchen days may be behind her,

but she still has plenty of advice for the chefs.

- No, no, no, no, no.

Pietro's going to show me

how he prepares his signature dish,

burnt grain orecchiette in a cream of fava beans,

topped with burrata and charred black olives.

- Si.

- Si.

Si.

- Oh, it's beautiful.

Fava beans are a favorite staple of Puglia.

But cooked with onions and blended with oil,

they become smooth and creamy.

- Mm-hmm.

- Mm-hmm.

- Yeah.

- Yeah.

Oh, come on.

- That is amazing.

Yep. Yep. Yep.

Oh, my God, that's so good.

Thank you.

- Yeah. Oh, yeah.

But it's so unusual.

Pietro has revived these flavors

with such skill and affection

that, despite their humble origins,

his dishes now hold their own as world class cuisine.

There's a dignity to his approach,

and if his packed restaurant is anything to go by,

it's welcomed by the whole community.

- As we're driving through Puglia,

you see these buildings that are ubiquitous,

called trulli,

and they're these conical-shaped buildings

with a little finial on top.

And they're built that way because, in the 14th century,

there were very high property taxes.

When the tax man come around, they would basically

deconstruct the top of the house,

and then you weren't taxed on your house

if it hadn't been completed.

And then the tax man would leave,

and then they would rebuild the house again.

They don't take them apart anymore.

That's it. That's the story.

They're so cool, though.

No place else in the world really has... has them.

These little cone-shaped clusters of houses

tell you something about the people here.

They were nearly always built in groups of four or five,

so families could share not just the land,

but things like wells and communal ovens.

One of the main towns in the Valle dei Trulli

is Cisternino.

Among its labyrinth of alleyways

and whitewashed buildings,

you'll find Puglians going for a passeggiata,

the age-old tradition of taking a stroll.

And if you follow your nose,

chances are you'll stumble across

one of the many fornellis,

like Bère Vecchie,

run by young restaurateur Vito Zurlo.

Si.

Opened by Vito's grandfather in 1927,

this fornello isn't your average butcher shop,

but we'll get into that in a minute.

- Wow.

- Si.

Cisternino's fornelli grew

from the ancient tradition

of communal feasting at village fairs.

So keeping that tradition alive,

the modern fornelli don't just sell the meat.

They cook it for you on the spot.

- Bombette.

Bombette means "little bomb,"

a reference to the explosion of flavor

that comes from cooking

the tastiest strips of fatty pork neck

filled with, well, just about anything.

- The fat from the pork netting

enhances the flavor of the offcuts

used in these gnummareddi rolls.

So what started out as a snack created from affordable meat

that would otherwise be discarded

has evolved into a local delicacy.

- Okay, great.

- Si, si, si.

- Si, si.

- Si, si, si.

The same type of oven used hundreds of years ago

is still used today.

With indirect heat ensuring everything gets cooked evenly,

they load the fattiest cuts at the top

so the meat below is completely drenched

in the delicious juices.

And after just 15 minutes...

- Wow.

The first one...

- Really? - Si.

- Okay, then I have to try this one.

- Mmm.

Mmm. Okay.

That is really good.

That's like... That's like perfect.

All that fat.

I love that.

- Mm, no.

- Mm-hmm.

- Really?

- And with the gnummareddi to finish things off...

It's good.

My want for protein is well and truly sated.

- Si. - Oh. I can breathe easy.

Way more than just a festival of meat,

what these fornelli really celebrate

is something that people here cottoned onto a long time ago.

Grazie. Grazie.

That no matter what you're consuming,

it tastes a lot better

when you share it with someone else.

- In the Andrea area of Puglia,

nestled among a sea of olive trees,

is the Petroni Olive Farm.

Here, Agostino Petroni and his family

tend to over 13,000 trees all planted by his father.

- We use olive oil

for literally everything in our cuisine.

Whenever I travel around the world,

both me and my brother, we always have

a little can of our olive oil.

- You do travel with it? - Yeah.

No olive oil? - I...

- You cannot just like, please, take this away.

I don't want it anymore.

- Look... Look who you're talking to.

I'm... you know, I'm obsessed with it, yeah.

Yeah.

- I mean, in front of us,

we have about 2 million olive trees.

Andrea produces as much as Tuscany,

to give you an idea.

- Whoa.

That's huge. - Yeah.

And we actually sell lots of olives to Tuscany.

- And they put it in their olive oil?

- Yeah. - I won't tell.

- I should not say this. - I won't tell anybody.

Wow.

The taste of Puglian olive oil

is exceptional.

Terrain, climate, and mineral-rich soil

combine here to create a unique peppery flavor

that's revered the world over.

It's way more than just a source of Puglian pride.

With some 60 million trees being harvested to produce

over 50% of Italy's supply, Puglian oil production employs

a huge number of people...

Over 100,000 in this region alone,

which is why it's so disturbing to discover

that this thriving historic industry is under attack

from a ruthless invader.

The first casualties are 150 miles away

in the wild reaches of Salento.

It's so far south, the Romans never even bothered

building roads here.

- As you can see, everything is dead.

- Yeah, completely dead. - Yeah.

- And these are ancient trees?

- These are about 800 years old to 1,000 years old.

- Having watched over the community

for hundreds of years, a staggering 20 million trees

here in the south are under attack from a deadly virus.

- It's called Xylella fastidiosa.

So it arrived with a bacteria on a plant.

And then one of the insects that lives in here

bit this infected plant

and got the bacteria in its saliva.

When an insect goes on an olive tree...

- Yeah.

- And bites the leaf an olive tree,

the tree slowly dies and dries out.

- When the virus was first announced to be the cause

of the trees dying, in 2013,

many Puglians flat-out refused to believe it.

- What really disturbed people is to think

that the trees have been so resilient

for thousands of years...

- Yeah.

- In a couple of years, there was just...

They just started to die.

People could not believe what was happening.

There was lots of rebellion.

And there were lots of conspiracy theories.

And it was so crazy that the researchers

that were trying to stop the spread of the disease

got investigated.

- Really? - Yeah.

- 'Cause they didn't trust them?

- No, because the idea... They were basically saying

that it was the scientists' fault that this disease

was basically spreading so much.

- In fact, we have scientists to thank

for the discovery that certain types of olive tree

are resistant to the bacteria.

Caught early enough, they can be used

to improve resistance in ancient trees

through a process of grafting.

Otherwise, it's a question

of ripping out the old trees altogether.

- It's advancing about 20, 30 kilometers every year.

We are facing a situation that we either

plant these varieties that are resistant...

- Yeah. - Or we won't have

any more olives in this area.

- It's that... it's that simple.

- Yeah, it's that simple.

- Their presence is commanding even in this state of decay.

But back at Agostino's farm,

with views across the thriving groves

and a table laden with the fruits of their labor,

it's heartening to hear that his family

has wasted no time in addressing the issue.

How many new trees have you planted,

the variety that's resistant?

800 plants.

- 800 plants.

- And 2,000 of Leccino.

But I hope to... To save the others too.

- So can we taste the olive oil?

- Of course.

- This is... these are the olives

we were looking at before?

- Yeah, this is the best olive oil in the world.

- According to the producer, yes.

- Yeah.

- I show you now how to do it.

- Show me how to do it.

- You have to make it a little warmer.

All the flavor comes up.

- Up. - Then you have to smell it.

- I didn't know it was going to be so complicated.

- We take this very seriously.

- Yeah, this I know.

- Then we have to taste it.

Yes?

- Okay.

- But there is a specific way to do it.

I won't do it.

- What are you doing?

- In this way...

The oil will... - Aerate.

- Yeah, will aerate. Yeah.

- Yes, aerate. - Aerate.

Yeah.

- Wait, how'd you do it?

- You pull your tongue up and then you...

Yeah, but that's delicious, though.

The reverence for the trees and what they produce here

is akin to that felt towards community elders.

With such mystical qualities, no wonder the oil

is seen as key to unlocking the sublime flavors

of any simple ingredients it happens to touch...

- And then you can put this oil in all this food.

- Friselle being the perfect example.

Take a dry rusk of bread, throw on a few fresh tomatoes,

and a healthy glug of your finest Puglian olive oil...

- And there you have it, dry bread

magically brought back to life.

What could taste out of date tastes out of this world.

That is really good oil.

People can say, "Oh, our oil this," or, "Oh, our oil that,"

but actually, this is really good.

Thanks to the efforts of families like Agostino's

to save their beloved trees, Puglians have gone

from refusing to accept there was a problem...

Thank you.

To refusing to accept defeat.

Thank you so much. Thanks.

- Grazie. Grazie.

- Dominated by its 13th century cathedral,

the Puglian city Altamura

is known across Italy for its bread.

And in Italy, wherever you find good bread,

chances are you'll also find good cheese.

Caseificio Dicecca is run by a close-knit family

of cheesemakers orcasari.

But young maverick casaro Vito...

Buongiorno.

Has big ideas of his own.

- Nice to meet you.

This is my sister, Victoria.

- Nice to meet you. A pleasure.

And there are more, right?

- Yeah, five of us.

And we work here all together.

- How is that? - Amazing.

- Is it? - Yeah.

- Sometimes it's a little hard?

- Yeah. You know, we fight every day...

- Yeah.

- But at the same time,

we love each other.

- And your grandfather...

- Yeah. - Started this.

- Angel Antonio, my grandfather,

bought this place.

But before him, his father,

he start in a farm in Altamura

with nothing, with two, three cows,

and he start to make mozzarella,

scamorza, caciocavallo.

- Four generations of Diceccas have continued to make

these iconic Southern-Italian cheeses.

- Follow me please, Stanley. - I will. I will.

But bucking convention, Vito chose

not to join the family business,

escaping Puglia to travel the world instead.

When he told people he was a cheesemaker,

he was surprised how enthusiastic they were.

He returned to his family's caseificio

eager not just to continue the family tradition

but to do something no one in this region

Create a Puglian blue cheese.

- As you know, Puglia is most famous for burrata.

- Yeah.

- So today, I want to show you what I did 15 years ago.

This was my first blue cheese I did in Puglia.

- Vito has created 66 different types of blue.

Pretty impressive when you consider

how hard they are to make.

Typically, mold is injected into a cow's milk base,

which is left to age in mountain caves

for up to six months.

- Right now, wherever you go, you find Gorgonzola.

It's an amazing cheese.

But I want to do my own cheese.

So we break it.

This one is a goat blue cheese,

one of the stronger taste cheese that we have.

And this is the heart of the burrata.

It's a burrata cream.

- Oh. So then this is a cow's milk?

- This is cow's milk. - Cow's milk.

- But the base, it's...

- Is goat milk? - Goat. Yeah.

So we break like this.

- What made you think to do this?

- I live in California for a while.

- Oh, you did? - Yeah, in Pasadena.

- Oh, in Pasadena.

- And I love surfing, so, you know,

the blue of the ocean.

So I want to do blue cheese.

While Vito's brothers were open-minded

about creating new cheeses,

a Puglian blue was a step too far for the family.

- Si. Si, si.

Eventually, with the help of his family's

constructive criticism, Vito perfected the recipe,

and a spoonful of blue was born.

- So... - Yes.

- These are taralli... - Yes.

- Made by my mom. - Yes.

- So we dip the tarallo inside the blue cheese.

- That's really incredible.

- Yeah. - The mixture of the two...

You have the sharpness of the blue,

but then it's... it's softened by the... by the burrata.

- Yes. - That's incredible.

You're very smart, aren't you?

Others might be content to stop there,

but Vito's continually improving on his creations

and experimenting with new ideas.

And where better to put his theories

to the ultimate taste test

than a cheese bar,

which he opened with his fiancée, Roberta,

in the middle of the Mercadante Forest

just outside Altamura.

So here...

- I've never heard of a cheese bar before.

- Yeah. - I like this.

- This is the only one in the world.

- Here, customers enjoy the full selection

of Vito's invented cheeses.

But he's never forgotten how he started out

on this unconventional journey.

- Cheeses. - Cheeses.

One item on the menu is focaccia barese,

which Vito's mother used to make

for his school lunches.

- So when I used to get in a class,

I was bullied with the sounds of a cow, like, "Moo."

- They... they bullied you?

- Yes. - Yeah.

- So has that changed now,

the way people view cheesemakers?

- You're like a hero now.

- Yeah, yeah, yeah.

- So we put the burrata

on top of the focaccia, like this.

- Grazie.

- Stanley.

- Thank you.

Mmm. That's delicious.

That's so good.

Listening to Vito's stories,

it makes perfect sense that for him,

both profession and family are inextricably linked.

We call her "Baby Burrata" when she born.

And who knows?

Thanks to Vito's drive

to revitalize the family business,

their daughter, Chiara, might just represent

the fifth generation of casari.

- Straying just a little

from the flat terrain of Puglia,

I'm making my way to one of Italy's

most ancient and perhaps most unique cities.

In the neighboring region of Basilicata

lies the city of Matera.

Until the 17th century,

this was actually part of Puglia,

and the two regions have been long tied

through a shared history and culinary heritage.

Take a stroll, and you'll see the usual stuff...

People going about their business,

maybe even treating themselves to a pastry.

May I recommend thetette delle monache,

or nuns' breasts?

They're a local specialty.

It's a long story.

- Hi, Stan. - Francesco.

- Nice to meet you. - Nice to meet you too.

None of this seems remarkable, perhaps,

but it wasn't always like this,

as local historian Francesco Foschino well knows.

And this is your city?

- Yes, this is my city.

I was born here, my grandparents,

my great grandparents, and so on.

- Really? - Yes.

I have a surprise for you. - Really?

- Yes. - All right.

- Just around the corner. - All right.

A few steps from the relative modernity

of the town square,

we are transported back in time.

- That's Matera old city.

- That's incredible.

I've never seen an Italian city like this before.

- No, it's quite unique. - Yeah, yeah.

This ancient town grew across one slope of the rocky ravine

known locally as "La Gravina,"

and although it dates back to the 10th century BC,

for many, it will trigger more recent memories.

From the last James Bond movie, right?

- Oh, yeah.

That has been the first movie

when Matera in the cinema

was actually Matera and not some other places.

Because during the '50s and the '90s,

when most of the movies were shot,

the old city was completely abandoned

and deserted. - Really?

- And when we, from Matera, wanted to see

our old city alive,

we had to go to the movie theater.

- So a lot of this was just abandoned?

- All of this. - Abandoned?

- Abandoned. - And then people lived

sort of around it. - Exactly.

- The Sassi's labyrinth of underground caves

were occupied since the Paleolithic Age.

Look at that. What is that?

Is that a church in there? - Yes.

In that little mountain, there are two churches that are dug.

- They dug into the mountain... - Exactly.

- To build the church. Amazing.

Poor sanitation and poverty meant disease was rampant.

But little was done about it until the 1950s when Matera

became a valuable tool in securing

post-war funding for Southern Italy

through America's Marshall Plan.

All of a sudden, it was in Italy's interests

not just to pay attention, but to play up

Matera's desperate conditions.

- It became so infamous

that it was nicknamed the shame of Italy.

Can you believe that? Such a beauty?

- No, it's incredible.

The label served its purpose.

Money was secured, modern homes built,

and the caves abandoned.

But now a new generation has emerged...

People like Francesco and, more recently,

Chef Vitantonio Lombardo,

who has turned an abandoned cave

into a restaurant that celebrates

Matera's complicated history.

- Customers here enjoy dishes with inventive names

like "I dropped an egg in the garden"

and "Drone view of La Murgia."

Not just full of flavor,

his recipes are loaded with symbolism,

with one dish in particular

capturing Matera's incredible transformation.

- These glands, essentially offal or sweetbread,

are something the Materani would have eaten

100 years ago.

But the twist is it's then shaped and covered

in dark breadcrumbs to make it look like a black truffle,

the very symbol of decadence.

- While the sweetbread and the filet

are cooked in the oven,

the plate is prepared with a unique dusting.

- The last elements are a rich red wine reduction

contrasted with a simple potato puree.

- Oh, yeah.

- Si.

- Okay? - Yeah.

That's fantastic.

I love that you made this look...

- Yeah, that's amazing.

Okay? - Beautiful.

- Thank you.

Wow.

- Okay? - No...

- Si, si, si, si.

- That is amazing.

I gotta say... wow.

- Vitantonio's strength lies in paying tribute

to the very things he was supposed to be ashamed of.

As with everyone I've met in Puglia,

this spirit of innovation was forged out of hard times.

But by reclaiming their past,

the Puglisi are going beyond setting the record straight.

They're writing their own script,

and for once, it's on their terms.