Fruit, vegetables and pulses

Navelli chickpea

Navelli chickpea, a small upland legume from the saffron plain

On the dry, stony fields of the Navelli plain, 700 to 800 metres up at the foot of the Gran Sasso, small, smooth, cream-coloured chickpeas grow at deliberately low yields. Beside them is a rarer rust-red, wrinkled type that the few growers of the Slow Food Presidium keep sowing.

• A tiny, smooth, pale seed: the white chickpea that once went to market
• Red ones are firmer-skinned and mealier inside, with a bolder flavour
• Long rotations with wheat, barley and spelt bring it back to a field only every three to six years

How to enjoy it. Stew them, or scent them with saffron from the same plain; the red ones need longer cooking and shine in soups, such as the chickpea and chestnut broth once served on Christmas Eve.

Production areas

Abruzzo

Season

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