Fruit, vegetables and pulses

Alife onion

Alife onion, a Slow Food Presidium: copper-red, sweet and braided into 'nserte

On the Alife plain, across Alife, Piedimonte Matese and San Potito Sannitico, this onion is grown from bulblets and lifted by hand in summer. Once the leaves have withered, the bulbs are braided into strings of twelve to twenty and left in the sun to finish drying. Only a few family farms still grow it; the Slow Food Presidium is backing its revival.

• A round, slightly flattened bulb of 200-400 g with a vivid copper skin
• Firm, crunchy white flesh streaked with violet
• Sweet and aromatic, never harsh, so it is good raw too

How to enjoy it. Slice it raw into salads, fold it into omelettes or preserve it sweet-and-sour; locally it leads in cipollata, a bean soup with carrot, celery and extra virgin olive oil. Hung in its braid, it lasts until the following spring.

Production areas

Campania

Season

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