Italian traditional foods: not only pizza

Italian traditional foods (TFs) characterize the identity of Italian people. Although the food industry is one of the main businesses in Italy, the value of TFs is more than production processes and their economic value, and more than a way of eating. Primary production as well as derived foods represent a meeting point between nature and culture and express the huge geographical and historical diversity of the Italian regions. Italian TFs are the foundation of the Mediterranean Diet, which has been inscribed in 2013 on the Representative List of the Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity, and is widely considered as a healthy dietary pattern. Grains, grapes, olives, vegetables, dairy and specific processed foods are the basis of the Italian food industry with significant economic and export value. The economic importance drives research and innovations towards studies in the traditional food sector. For instance, genetic and genomic studies evidenced different phenolic acid content in durum wheats as well as their effect on the quality of processed end-products. In wine production, the selection of autochthonous yeast strains with peculiar oenological properties serve for preparation of a model for transfer of the innovation to SMEs. The valorization of table-olives can be carried out through selection of microorganisms as autochthonous starters of fermentation. Functional foods as plant compounds or end-products enriched with bioactive compounds can be obtained with innovative technologies, such as supercritical CO2 extraction or using by-products of the food industry. Overall, several studies demonstrated the healthy promoting feature of several compounds of some traditional foods. Finally, Italy may play a significant role also in promoting novel foods, as demonstrated at Expo 2015.