Gorizia's prized winter radicchio — a local red chicory whose forced heart curls open like a rose, brilliant red shading to pink and garnet. Lifted from December to February and eaten above all raw, it is opened like a flower on the plate, dressed simply with oil and a drop of vinegar, then set off with hard-boiled or quail egg, warm borlotti beans and crisp pork cracklings, lardo or speck.
A chicory of the Gorizia plain and the sandy banks of the Isonzo, on both the Italian and today Slovene sides of the border, Rosa di Gorizia has Habsburg-era roots: the Austrian official Karl von Czoernig recorded a 'reddish chicory' grown around Gorizia in his 1873 survey 'Gorizia, la Nizza austriaca'. Broadcast-sown in spring among oats or winter cereals and harvested after the first frosts, it is then forced in darkness on warm beds of sand and straw until its heart regrows as a tender rose. In the 1950s a cross gave the canary-yellow 'canarino'. Grown now by only a handful of families on about 2.5 hectares around San Rocco, Sant'Andrea and Salcano, it is a Slow Food Presidium and a Friuli-Venezia Giulia PAT.
Crisp and juicy, with a clean, faintly bitter bite that softens into sweetness; the tender forced leaves snap between the teeth, cool against the richness of egg and pork fat.
The rose owes everything to forcing. Cut and brought into dark, cool sheds at around 10°C, the plant regrows its heart without light, so no chlorophyll forms and the leaves stay red rather than greening — the colour comes from anthocyanins that cold weather drives the plant to accumulate. The same cold hydrolyses stored inulin into fructose, so a would-be bitter chicory turns sweet, while the bitter sesquiterpene lactones fall away as the etiolated heart grows tender. Kept turgid in the moist bed, the cells stay crisp. Dressed raw, oil coats the leaves and carries fat-soluble aromatics while a little acid brightens and firms them.
Variations
Beyond the classic salad with egg, borlotti beans and cracklings, the rose is served with lardo or speck, or with nothing but oil and vinegar. The canary-yellow canarino is a sweeter, milder strain. Larger heads are halved; smaller ones left whole as a flower. Restaurants pair it raw with seafood or use it barely warmed, though purists keep it uncooked.
On the Palate
Where Rosa di Gorizia sits in the Italian flavor cloud
Ingredients
Serves 4
How it's made
7 steps · 15 min active + 10 min waiting
- 15 min
Trim the root base, keeping each forced head whole; peel away any bruised outer leaves so the rose stays intact.
- 23 min
Swish the heads gently in cold water to rinse off any sand, then drain and pat dry without crushing the leaves.
Watch outSwish and pat dry gently — bruise or crush the leaves and the rose loses both its shape and its crispness.
- 310 min
Hard-boil eggs (or quail eggs) for 9 minutes, cool under cold water, peel and quarter.
- 48 min
Warm the cooked borlotti beans through and, if using, fry diced pancetta or pork cracklings until crisp and drain on paper.
- 53 min
Open each head like a flower on the plate, halving any large ones.
- 62 min
Whisk extra-virgin olive oil with a little wine vinegar and salt, and spoon it over the leaves.
Watch outDress only just before serving — the leaves go limp fast once the oil and vinegar hit, so plate and eat while they're still cool and crisp.
- 73 min
Arrange the egg, warm beans and cracklings around the rose and serve at once, while the leaves are cool and crisp.
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