The Ultra Crispy Cacio E Pepe Bites You'll Find At The 2023 NYC Wine & Food Festival

The 2023 New York Wine & Food Festival is coming to the city from October 12 to 15, and those who are lucky enough to be in attendance will get to sample a delectable array of dishes from world-renowned chefs and culinary personalities. But if you're a fan of cacio e pepe, you're in for a true treat.

Forsythia, a Roman restaurant on the Lower East Side, is bringing its cacio e pepe suppli to the festival, as Chef Jacob Siwak announced on Instagram. The suppli is filled with cacio e pepe risotto and mozzarella di Bufala, which are breaded and fried and served on a bed of pecorino crema. As Forsythia previously explained on Instagram, "Our cacio e pepe suppli has the perfect crunch on the outside with a creamy and cheesy texture on the inside ... can you think of a better combination?!" No, we cannot — especially when the fried balls are big enough that you can cut them in half and elicit strings of cheesy mozzarella as you drag each side apart to share with a friend — or to have all to yourself.

If you're wondering what suppli typically are (and if you're comparing them to the more well-known fried rice balls in the States, arancini), you won't be surprised to learn that arancini and suppli are very similar. However, arancini are typically larger and rounder than suppli, which tend to be small and oval-shaped. While arancini originated in Sicily, suppli comes from Rome — so it makes sense that Forsythia, a Roman restaurant, went with this choice of a rice ball. And while arancini are often stuffed with saffron-flavored rice, tomato sauce, meat, and vegetables, suppli typically includes just rice, tomato sauce, and mozzarella, giving you that signature cheese pull when broken apart.

The cacio e pepe suppli at Forsythia, however, is entirely the restaurant's own creation. Forsythia started as a popup during the pandemic, as the owners had to pause the restaurant's construction at the time. The popup is where the cacio e pepe treats were born, and initially, they were just one of the establishment's many suppli flavors. But it quickly became clear that they were a customer favorite. "That one became so immediately popular and resonated with people so much that when we opened up the space on Stanton, it was our signature dish right when we came out of the gate," Siwak told Resy.