Eat at the fish market choosing directly from the counter which fish will end up on your plate. The Adriatic puts itself in the window after the summer catch which lasts from early August until mid-September. A biological rest that ensures the reproduction of fish species and that makes the middle seasons the best times to enjoy expressed local fish specialties. In the Marches the trend sees the growth of the premises offering this formula, with an excellent value for money and great attention to the Marche recipes.

The Queens, in the Adriatic, are the mullets, those of small size, of "mud" or of rock, but also the shrimp, the cuttlefish and the squid. Then there are the local prawns, with their intense flavor, and above all the blue fish: sardines, mackerel and "suri", to be enjoyed in soups or grilled. Here are some tips on where to buy fresh fish, choose it from the counter and have it cooked at the time. The dream of every "fish eater".

The beauty and the beast in Fano: the brodetto "deliscato"

In the center of Fano, in Piazza delle Erbe where the weekly market is, since 2006 Daniele Bocchini has opened The beauty and the beast, a fish shop with a kitchen where you can eat at the table, both outdoors and indoors. The specialty is brodetto "alla fanese", the one made with the "tomato paste", the homemade concentrate that is never lacking in the Marche families. Bocchini was champion of brodetto and has traveled the world making known this local variant that strictly foresees the tomato concentrate and the nuance with vinegar. Here you can taste the real "soup of the sailors", a recipe born on boats, where bottom fish such as scorpion fish, race, monkfish or trolls end up, with the right proportion of local crustaceans and molluscs. Lying on the large pan they are cooked adding them gradually, depending on the consistency. The real novelty lies in the fact that the soup is presented without the bones, with the fish already filleted. In short, even without getting your hands dirty, you can enjoy a brodetto, as well as taste the "tuna in porchetta": fillet worked from fresh, cooked at low temperature and prepared with wild fennel, pepper and garlic, just like a real pork.

Ricci's fished & fried fish in Numana

A family of fishermen converted to street catering, along the central street that leads to the beautiful little square on the Conero. Francisco Ricci (but they swear to pronounce Francesco) he gave the idea to his family in 2016 and his son Fernando took the ball. The formula is the simplest possible, but also the most intriguing: I choose fish from the counter, I watch them while they are filleted and I eat them in a generous portion served in a box (the standard one of three hundred grams is recommended; the net weight is paid). All squid and prawns ask for them, but after the catch stops the varieties to be tasted are the most disparate: trigliette, anchovies and busbane, together with sole, dogfish and local prawns. The fishmonger's advice is to put in some nice crabs, which abound here, and are special. Whether you prefer it filleted or with bones, this marinade of fried fish can be combined with seafood cuisine from the Marche region: cuttlefish with peas, “panicchie” (shrimp) steamed and in winter stockfish and stockfish.

The stuffed olives are fish, from Pallottini to San Benedetto del Tronto

In the city with the most important navy of the Marche there is the fish market Pallottini, where you buy it or eat it at the table. There are two types of cuisine: lunch includes classic Marche seafood recipes, half-shell recipes, spaghetti with clams (which never fail), or tasty anchovy spaghetti. Excellent stuffed olives with fish filling for a cartoccio to take away. At dinner, however, the offer becomes more innovative. The deconstructed revisitation of the "cuttlefish with peas" is a must: it provides that the cuttlefish is lightly scalded and placed on a pea soup, while the tomato is proposed in small gelatinous pearls made with agar agar. Among the first there are also gnocchetti with clams and mazzancolle with lemon peels above. The menu is weekly and is served in the restaurant for forty seats next to the fish market, but you can also enjoy a simple fried foil at the moment.

"Pirate" aperitif with a rum flavor, at the old Civitanova Marche market

Needless to book. We eat what the sea offers. In this small and spartan fish market, you can enjoy an aperitif or dinner sitting in front of the counter. The sardines are strictly hot. There is no lack of exotic fascinations: the “marinated mullet” (Adriatic mud mullet) is cooked with a chopped onion of tropea with ginger and pepper. The brodetto here is barbed, but the real specialty is the "cannelli al rum" (razor clams cooked on a base of chopped vegetables and generously drowned in rum, with the result of a white sauce with a pirate flavor). Don't miss the mussels, but also the swordfish omelette (made with nothing less than pancetta and pecorino di fossa). There are ten places in all. The idea also comes here from a family of fishermen who went to the stove and Vincenzo Vallesi think of the menu of the day, but also of the fastest fish aperitif.