Casanova

Where the Adriatic Frames the Plate

Polignano a Mare has always traded on its geology. The town sits on a limestone promontory above the Adriatic, its medieval centre a compact grid of whitewashed streets that ends, abruptly, at sheer sea cliffs. That physical drama has made it one of the more photographed towns on the Pugliese coast, and it has also shaped the ambitions of its serious restaurants. In this context, a dining room with unobstructed sea views is not incidental — it is an argument about what a meal here should feel like.

Casanova occupies the first floor of the Palazzo del Suono del Mare, one of the historic buildings fronting the town's Piazza San Benedetto. The room's mosaic floors and Venetian chandeliers place it in an architectural register that is older and more formal than the agrarian trattoria tradition that defines much of Puglian eating. The panoramic terrace extends the offer outdoors in fine weather, giving the sea views a directness that the interior windows mediate more gently. In cities like Rome or Florence, a room this composed is unremarkable; in a coastal town of this scale, it signals a particular level of intent.

Puglia's Larder and What It Means for the Plate

The editorial angle at restaurants like this one is always partly agricultural. Puglia produces more olive oil than any other Italian region, and its coastline provides some of the Adriatic's most consistent fish and shellfish. The heel of Italy's boot has, for centuries, been a net exporter of raw ingredients rather than finished gastronomy — the wheat that built Italian pasta, the tomatoes that anchored southern Italian cooking, the orecchiette and taralli that defined its own vernacular food. The contemporary Puglian restaurant's task is to bring that larder into finer focus without flattening its character into a generic Italian tasting menu.

Casanova's approach, according to the available record, is to work within the gastronomic traditions of Puglia and Italy while reinterpreting them. That positioning matters. It places the kitchen in the creative-regional category rather than the strict-preservation category. The leading cooking in this mode, found across southern Italy at addresses like Quattro Passi in Marina del Cantone or, at the apex of the form, Reale in Castel di Sangro, draws on hyperlocal sourcing and applies contemporary technique without erasing provenance. The ingredient remains legible; the cooking deepens rather than disguises it.

For a coastal kitchen in Polignano, that means the Adriatic is doing most of the heavy lifting on sourcing. The sea here delivers ricci di mare (sea urchin), polpo, and the local riccio , each with a character formed by the clear, relatively shallow waters of the southern Adriatic. Inland, the Murge plateau provides lamb, aged cheeses, and the fava beans and cicorie that define the most honest Puglian cucina povera. A kitchen drawing on both territories has access to a range that many more celebrated Italian regions cannot match for sheer diversity across a short distance.

Polignano's Dining Scene in Wider Context

Polignano a Mare is a small town, and its dining scene should be read accordingly. It does not carry the institutional density of, say, Modena, where Osteria Francescana anchors a whole culinary identity, or of Milan, where Enrico Bartolini operates in a peer environment of dozens of serious restaurants. Polignano's serious dining tier is thin but genuine, shaped by the town's growing status as a destination for Italian and international travellers who arrive via Bari, roughly 35 kilometres to the north.

Within that local context, Casanova sits at the formal end of the spectrum. For a sense of the town's wider range, Jamantè offers a more contemporary approach to Puglian ingredients, while Meraviglioso Osteria Moderna operates in the osteria-modern register that has become common across southern Italian towns that blend tradition with lighter, more current formats. Casanova's Palazzo setting and its more deliberate architectural staging put it in a different category from either, closer in spirit (if not in scale or recognition) to the kind of grand-setting regional cooking found at Dal Pescatore in Runate or Enoteca Pinchiorri in Florence, where the room's history is part of what you are paying for.

The Italian fine dining tier has become sharply stratified in recent years. At the summit sit the three-Michelin-star houses , Le Calandre in Rubano, Piazza Duomo in Alba, Atelier Moessmer Norbert Niederkofler in Brunico , each operating with significant investment in both technique and identity. Below that, a broader middle tier of regionally serious restaurants does the more locally grounded work of keeping Italian culinary geography alive. Casanova belongs to the latter conversation, which is the more important one for understanding what Puglia tastes like right now.

Planning a Visit

Polignano a Mare is accessible by train from Bari on the Ferrovie del Sud Est regional line, a journey of roughly 30 minutes. The town's historic centre is compact and walkable; Piazza San Benedetto, where Casanova sits at number 5, is within a few minutes of most of the old town's key points. The terrace is the draw in spring and summer, when Adriatic light holds well into the evening, though the interior room's architecture stands on its own in cooler months. Booking ahead is advisable during the peak summer season, when Polignano's popularity as a day-trip and short-stay destination from Bari and beyond compresses demand significantly. For broader planning across the town, the EP Club Polignano a Mare restaurants guide covers the full range of dining options, and the hotels guide addresses the town's growing accommodation offer, which now includes several cliff-positioned properties. The bars guide, wineries guide, and experiences guide complete the picture for those spending more than a single day in the area.