It’s tempting to think that Italian food is universal. Pizza, pasta everywhere. This is all a great myth. In truth there’s no such thing as Italian food. Just lots of very regional dishes many of which never find their way out into the outside world.

Here’s one speciality I doubt you’ll ever heard of. It’s nothing more than an onion, though if you come from the Calabrian town of <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tropea" target="_blank">Tropea</a> an onion is no merevegetable.

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Tropea is a beautiful seaside town on the western coast of Calabria, midway between Lamezia Terme and Reggio. Here’s a picture I took a while back to give you an idea. <a href="http://davidhewson.files.wordpress.com/2010/05/2595129361_1100184a3e_b.jpg"><img style="display:inline;border-width:0;" title="2595129361_1100184a3e_b" src="http://davidhewson.files.wordpress.com/2010/05/2595129361_1100184a3e_b_thumb.jpg" border="0" alt="2595129361_1100184a3e_b" width="604" height="454" /></a>

Pretty place, eh?

But what Tropea is most famous for in Italy is an onion. A red onion usually eaten raw. Buy red onions in Italy and if they say Tropea on them they cost more and, usually, taste better.

They’re sweet and special and even appeal to people who don’t like onions at all. If you go to Tropea you’ll see everywhere on menus ‘Insalata Tropeana’. This is little more than local tomatoes and onions in good olive oil and vinegar. When good it’s astonishing. Honest.

Last year I brought back some onion seeds from Tropea and tried to grow them back in the UK. Same plant. Same seeds. Didn’t work at all.

The last time we were in Calabria, some way south, we caught a train to Tropea. Should have been an hour or so each way. The trains on the way back suddenly stopped working so we had to faff around in town and then spend 100 euros on a cab.

While there I reminded myself of the Tropea onion fetish. You can buy red onion jam, sauce,  even red onion ice cream. They love the things. And yes, they are just incredible.

So if you find yourself in Italy and get offered Tropea onions my advice is: take them. I’m not a huge raw onion fan myself. But these really are something special.