Regional comfort foods are always interesting – they usually come as a result of the blending of cultures and are a sense of pride and loyalty. Here, writer Betsa Marsh helps us get to know what food Cincinnati is known for – eight comfort food specialties you can’t miss trying when you visit. 

Save this list of Cincinnati food specialties to Pinterest so you know what to order. Graphic by RealFoodTraveler.com.

Hungry for more? Let this book be your guide while you’re in Cincinnati.

Sun’s up, coffee’s brewing. Let’s roll out a day of comfort specialties in Cincinnati.

Maybe scramble some eggs and grill up a slice or two of goetta, a Queen City blend of pork and pinhead oats.

For lunch, a plate of hometown chili, spaghetti, cheese and onions, spiraling its own spicy, spiky aroma.

Dinner? Maybe some ribs with molasses-y sauce and a big scoop of Graeter’s ice cream.

Oh yeah, Cincinnati’s an eatin’ town, and no one spends too much time counting calories when it comes to comfort food.

Cincinnati is an old river city, founded by European settlers in 1788. Waves of English, Scots, Germans, and Greeks moved into this southwest corner of Ohio, the first state carved from the Northwest Territory. Each successive immigrant arrival brought its own customs and comforts, and many remain on the menu today.

Cincinnati, Ohio. Photo courtesy Pixabay.

8 Cincinnati Comfort Food Specialities:

GOETTA

This loaf of pork, a little beef, and steel-cut pinhead oats can be fried up 24/7, but it’s often a breakfast choice. Eckerlin Meats in Findlay Market, part of the Over-the-Rhine neighborhood near downtown, recently won the best breakfast sandwich in Ohio from USA TODAY, with a layering of goetta, egg and cheese.

Some Pittsburghers say goetta is just like their scrapple, but Cincinnatians counter, “Yeah, but we use the best part of the pig, while you use…” You might want to get out of the way before they finish that sentence.

Eckerlin Meats is one of dozens of purveyors in the 1855 Findlay Market, Ohio’s oldest surviving municipal market house. A butcher offers to slice some fresh goetta, a blend of pinhead oats and pork. The shop recently won the best breakfast sandwich in Ohio from USA TODAY, with a layering of goetta, egg and cheese. 

What food is Cincinnati known for?:

CHILI

Greeks, who freely admit they don’t make chili back home, arrived in the New World, came to Cincinnati and inexplicably rustled up big vats of chili—adding spices like cinnamon, cloves and cocoa that make Texans stampede out the door in horror. In Cincinnati, Greek chili was born in 1922 at Empress.

Nicholas Lambrinides followed from Kastoria, Greece, in 1949, and named his first restaurant for the view, Skyline Chili. There are dozens of locations across the city.

Gold Star Chili has locations around the region, too. And at any of them, you can hear newcomers say “Okay, what’s up with the five ways?” Cincinnatians can recite this from preschool (save our Pinterest Pin, below, to help you remember it):

1-way: Plain chili

2-way: Over spaghetti

3-way: Over spaghetti topped with cheese

4-way: Add chopped onions

5-way: All the above plus beans.

 Chili parlors, redolent of cinnamon and cloves, are around every corner in Greater Cincinnati. The meat, atop spaghetti, can be stopped with cheese, onions or beans. Photo courtesy Camp Washington.

Craving Cincinnati chili at 4am? Camp Washington Chili stands ready to serve, a staple in the city’s old meat-packing district since 1940. Owner John Johnson and his wife Antigone immigrated to the US in 1951, and he’s been stirring a 60-gallon pot of chili every day—except Sunday—ever since.

Everyone knows about the Cincinnati chili five-ways, but in the early-morning bar rush, Camp Washington customers have been known to order two eggs over medium on top of their chili. Someone else asked for goetta as a chili topper. You can’t make this stuff up.

Camp Washington Chili earned the James Beard Award in 2000 as an “American Regional Classic” for its timeless appeal and commitment to quality food.

Save this article to Pinterest so you know how to order Cincinnati Chili. Graphic by RealFoodTraveler.com.

Hungry for more? When not eating, check out Swing House in Cincinnati.

RIBS

Of course, our meat smokers in Cincinnati don’t roar nonstop like those in Texas, Tennessee or even Kansas City, but we love our ribs. The sauce is gooey, tomato-based stickiness that we’ll slather on anything.

Montgomery Inn is the traditional comfort stop. The Gregory family has been smoking ribs and smothering them with sweet barbecue sauce since 1951. People have made pilgrimages to their restaurants and shipped the ribs around the world.

Want to skip the bib? Try a pulled pork barbecue sandwich or Ribs King wrap.

The BBQ smokers of Cincinnati are often packed with ribs, which are then topped with a sweet, tomato-based sauce. Photo courtesy Montgomery Inn.

PIZZA

LaRosa’s Pizzeria is the Tristate’s ubiquitous hometown pizza parlor, a reliable, family-friendly place for pizza, sandwiches, and lasagna. Buddy LaRosa opened his first pizzeria in 1954 with his Aunt Dena’s recipe.

Dewey’s is another favorite across the region. It’s always hard to choose: Are you craving Greek feta and olives or goat cheese, artichokes and pesto?

Part of the fun is watching the cooks sling your pizza crust high—it takes a while, this process, so don’t come in a hurry.

The house salad with toasted pine nuts, dried cranberries and goat cheese under balsamic vinaigrette is a pizza’s best friend.

STEAK

Since 1981, Jeff Ruby has built an empire on steak across the city. His restaurants, such as The Precinct and Carlo & Johnny, specialize in dry-aged roasts and steaks, along with classic toppings: béarnaise, cognac peppercorn sauce, foie gras, or Point Reyes bleu cheese butter.

Hungry for more? Learn about some fashionable ways to explore Cincinnati.

What other foods is Cincinnati known for?: ITALIAN

At Via Vite, the view alone might seal the deal, looking out over the treetops to Fountain Square, but Chef Cristian Pietoso cooks up a storm to go with the vista.

Cristian is part of the Pietoso family, now in its second generation feeding Cincinnati. His parents Nicola and Maureen Pietoso own Nicola’s in Over-the-Rhine. Cristian takes his menu personally: “My grandma’s peperonata, Chef Cristian’s potato puree.” He uses the recipe for Nicola’s signature Bolognese sauce.

Nearby, Sotto cranks out luscious ribbons of pasta every meal, just waiting for olive oil and sauce. Don’t skip the bagna cauda antipasto, an addictive dipping oil for veggies with anchovy and garlic. Sotto’s sister restaurant, Boca, is just upstairs, an occasion spot serving refined Italian.

The pasta makers at Sotto crank out luscious ribbons of pasta for every meal, which are just waiting for olive oil and sauce. 

MEXICAN

Nada, near the Aronoff Theater is ready with a business lunch, pre-show dinner or post-curtain cocktail. In the taco realm, there’s pork belly, caramelized cauliflower or baja fish. For the larger plates: ancho-rubbed mahi, carnitas tamal or steak fajita.

On a more casual note, the menu at Tortilleria Garcia is straight from the Garcia family cookbook in Mexico. Pop inside and watch your tortillas patty-caked before your eyes.

Nada slims down its tacos on lettuce. The downtown Mexican spot takes its menu from tofu to pork, cauliflower to steak. 

Hungry for more? Learn more about the popular Graeter’s Ice Cream brand.

Cincinnati Comfort Food Specialities: ICE CREAM

Oprah may have crowned extra-rich Graeter’s as her favorite ice cream, but Cincinnatians since 1870 have embraced it as their own, moving right from mother’s milk to Graeter’s.

Louis Graeter started spinning egg custard, milk, sugar, cream and vanilla in a French pot freezer in 1870. It’s a hefty 14% milk-fat, true to the original recipe.

No matter how old we get, it’s still a thrill to burrow down into a dish of Graeter’s raspberry chocolate chip and excavate a slab of chocolate as big as Texas—or is this one as big as Alaska? Just let it melt on your tongue and the day suddenly seems all better.

Aglamesis’ has loyalists, too, for its eggy French-style ice cream, sweetened with honey and sugar. The shop’s chocolates are hand-dipped, and the opera creams may be some of the best Cincinnati souvenirs you’ll ever buy.

It’s worth a stop at the original 1913 Aglamesis in Oakley, a dreamscape of an ice cream parlor. It’s so perfect, with Tiffany lamps and marble-top tables, that Bon Appetit called it one of the last, authentic ice cream parlors in the country.

The current owners, descendants of the original Greek immigrants Thomas and Nicholas Aglamesis, can’t find an older ice cream and candy shop in Ohio. This is the spot to settle in, like a century of Cincinnatians before you, and savor the city’s frosty heritage.

Graeter’s ice cream has been a Cincinnati comfort staple since 1870. Black raspberry chocolate chip is one of its perennial best sellers.

Craving more Cincinnati specialties? Visit and discover them for yourself. 

— Story and photos by Betsa Marsh, except where noted

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