Where to eat farinata in Oneglia

You catch it from the smell, before you even see the sign. You walk past one of those old shops, tiled in white, and that scent of chickpeas and hot oil reaches you, the kind that smells like nothing else. Inside, in a wood oven that's been burning since the grandparents got married, there's a round copper pan as wide as a bicycle wheel, and inside the pan the farinata is turning golden.

It's the chickpea cake, the Ligurian street food par excellence: chickpea flour, water, oil and a little salt, nothing more. A humble thing, the kind born to feed people, and that turned out delicious instead. You mix the batter, leave it to rest a few hours, skim off what rises to the top, then pour it thin into the copper pan and slide it into the scorching wood oven. Out comes something golden, soft inside and crisp on top, eaten warm, in slices, with a grind of pepper over it.

Farinata fresh from the copper pan: golden, soft inside and crisp on top.

Around here, though, farinata has a name of its own. In Imperia we call it frisciulata (or frisciolata, depending who's telling you), and it isn't only a matter of dialect. Ours has a twist they don't know in Genoa: into the batter, or scattered on top before baking, go thinly sliced spring onions. A small thing that changes everything, because the onion wilts in the oven and gives a sweetness that pairs beautifully with the chickpeas. If you see it flecked with green, you're in the right place: that's our farinata.

And the word "sciamadda", which you read on the signs, tells the whole story of how it's made. It seems to come from an Arabic word meaning "flare": because farinata, in the end, isn't baked by the heat of the oven, it's baked by the flame. You throw in a bundle of kindling, the wood catches all at once, and that burst of flame gives the surface its crust and its colour. It's a gesture handed down in Oneglia for generations, and the sciamadde have remained the keepers of this way of eating in the street.

Inside an old sciamadda in Oneglia: the marble counter, the vintage radio and the oven at the back.

How you eat it, I'll tell you straight away, because it matters. Warm. Cold farinata is another thing entirely, it loses that damp softness that makes it irresistible. So go when it's just out of the oven, have it cut into slices and eat it right there, with your hands, standing up if you like. The pepper on top is not up for discussion. And if you come across the version in bread — a slice of farinata tucked inside the focaccia, what we call "farinata nel pane" — don't let it slip past: it's the most Ligurian snack there is, carbohydrate inside carbohydrate, and nobody here finds anything odd about it.

If you're at Stella sul Mare and want to try it properly, you've got two addresses in the heart of Oneglia worth your while, and a third if the mood takes you in the evening.

The first is A Sciamadda, at the far end of the carugio du Mù, that is Via Costanzo, a couple of steps from the covered market. The name itself is a statement of intent. Here Andrea Carli carries on the family tradition with a wood oven that dates from the nineteenth century and farinata that comes out of the copper pans as it always has. It's the right place to understand where all of this comes from. And while you're there, stop too for the stuffed anchovies and the stockfish, which are another serious matter.

Then there's U Papa, in Piazza Doria, an osteria going since the early 1900s. Here too the centre of everything is the wood oven, and out of the oven come farinata, piscialandrea and focaccia. It's small, with straw-bottomed chairs, and it has that air of real Liguria you can't buy. One thing, as an honest man from Oneglia: their farinata is seasonal, they mostly make it in autumn and winter, so if you go in summer call ahead first, so you're not left empty-handed.

And if you get hungry in the evening and want a slice without much ceremony, there's Pizza e farinata La Pejla: the sign already tells you what they do. Golden farinata and pan-baked pizza, and that's that.

One last thing. Farinata in Oneglia is a close cousin of focaccia, and indeed the places where you find one often overlap with those where you find the other: if you fancy going deeper into the focaccia chapter and savoury breakfasts in Oneglia, there I tell you where to dunk it in your cappuccino. And if you head down to the port, along Calata Cuneo, among the little bars and the fried-food stalls you'll always find something hot. The farinata, though, go and look for it in the wood oven: that's where it's at its best.