Burrata, literary meaning buttered, is an artisan cheese from the Puglia region of Southern Italy, especially the provinces of Bari and Barletta-Andria-Trani. The cheese is made by hand with cow's milk, rennet, and cream. It is believed that the cheese was created by Lorenzo Bianchino Chieppa, a cheesemaker who had an idea to form a shell of stretched mozzarella strings and fill it with luscious, rich cream and smaller, leftover pieces of mozzarella.

This Apulian delicacy is traditionally prepared with a soft, yeasted dough that combines semolina, wheat flour, and mashed potatoes. It is usually topped with cherry tomatoes and olives, but some varieties occasionally employ other combination of ingredients, such as different vegetables, coarse salt, or rosemary.

Panino col polpo is a traditional sandwich originating from the Bari area. This simple sandwich is made with a combination of octopus, bread rolls, olive oil, parsley, salt, and black pepper. The octopus is washed, brushed with olive oil, and grilled slowly over embers while being brushed with a mixture of olive oil, salt, pepper, and parsley as it cooks.

These crescent-shaped turnovers are traditionally prepared for the Carnival season, and even though it is believed that they originated in the Apulia region, panzerotti are extremely popular all across southern Italy. They resemble small calzone pizzas—both in shape and the dough used for its preparation—but instead of being oven-baked, panzerotti are deep-fried, which is why they're also called calzoni fritti (fried calzones), pizze fritte (fried pizzas), or simply frittelle (fritters).

This traditional Italian savory treat is prepared with various fillings that are enclosed between two layers of puff pastry. Typically round in shape, rustico is usually filled with a combination of béchamel sauce, tomatoes, and mozzarella cheese, but there are also varieties that employ spinach or ricotta.

Scamorza is an Italian pasta filata cheese made with cow's milk. The cheese is shaped into two connected balls, one smaller than the other. Its texture is semi-soft, firm, and chewy, while the flavors are milky and smoky. These two balls of cheese are strung to ripen for 2 weeks, and the process gives the cheese its name, meaning beheaded.

Pasticciotto is a popular Italian dessert consisting of a shortcrust pastry filled with flavorful pastry cream. Traditionally, the crust is made with lard, so that it is moister and softer than the regular crust prepared with butter. It is recommended to consume pasticciotto fresh out of the oven when it is still piping hot.

This variation on parmigiana di melanzane hails from Puglia. The recipe for this Puglia-style casserole sometimes calls for using zucchini instead of eggplant, along with olive oil, flour, eggs, tomatoes, mozzarella, cooked sausage meat, and grated Parmigiano-Reggiano.

Orecchiette con cime di rapa (orecchiette with broccoli rabe) is one of the most popular pasta dishes from the Italian region of Apulia, especially beloved in the region's capital, Bari. Orecchiette have a perfect shape for scooping up the chunky pieces of boiled broccoli rabe, or rapini - a leafy, green vegetable closely related to turnip.