A sensory experience through history
Sicilian cuisine is a true sensory journey, a unique experience through the island's history and cultural influences, with Greek, Arab, Spanish, Neapolitan, and French elements.
Palermo's cuisine is particularly rich, with its meat, fish, or vegetable recipes and its baroque desserts.
Among the first courses, we remember: pasta con le sarde (bucatini boiled in saffron, seasoned with sardines, wild fennel, raisins, pine nuts, breadcrumbs); anelletti al forno (a baked pasta dish, stuffed with ragù, peas, eggplant, cheese, béchamel, etc.); pasta con i broccoli arriminati (with boiled cauliflower, raisins, and pine nuts); pasta con la zucchina fritta (pasta with fried zucchini); pasta con i tenerumi (soup with leaves of the vermicellara zucchini).
Among the main courses: sarde a beccafico (sardines stuffed with breadcrumbs, raisins, and pine nuts), involtini di pesce spada (swordfish rolls), falsomagro (a veal roll stuffed with ham, cheese, hard-boiled eggs, etc.), arrosto panato or cotoletta alla palermitana (veal cutlets breaded only with oil and breadcrumbs and cooked in a pan with a drizzle of oil), involtini di carne (meat rolls).
Among the side dishes: caponata, melanzana a cotoletta (eggplant cutlet), carciofi ripieni (stuffed artichokes), zucca fritta in agrodolce (sweet and sour fried pumpkin); la frittedda (peas, fava beans, artichokes).
Among the desserts: cannolo, cassata, gelo di melone (watermelon jelly), frutta martorana, sfince di San Giuseppe, iris fritta or al forno (fried or baked iris pastry), cuccìa.
Street Food: Inexpensive food sold on the street, at stalls, once served to refresh porters and laborers exhausted by fatigue. We remember: pane con le panelle (sandwich filled with chickpea flour fritters) or crocchè (fried potato croquettes); vastedda con la meusa (soft bun stuffed with beef lung and spleen fried in lard, seasoned with cheese or lemon); sfincione (a kind of very soft pizza, topped with tomato, cheese, and breadcrumbs); stigghiole (lamb intestines cooked on the grill); quarume (boiled beef offal in broth); insalata di musso (salad of beef tendons).
Palermitan Rosticceria: arancine (rice balls, stuffed with ragù for the meat version, or béchamel and ham for the butter version); calzoni fritti or al forno (fried or baked calzones, a brioche filled with ham and mozzarella), rollò (brioche with frankfurter), crostino (similar to mozzarella in carrozza, stuffed with ham and béchamel), rizzuola (brioche filled with ragù), ravazzata (brioche filled with cheese, ham), spiedino (similar to mozzarella in carrozza, stuffed with ragù), mattonella (a puff pastry dish filled with ham and mozzarella, cut into various rectangular pieces for sale).
The Pastries of the Monasteries: In ancient Palermo, cloistered nuns prepared exquisite sweets that they sold at the "ruota di San Vincenzo" (wheel of Saint Vincent). Where to taste conventual pastry sweets: Dolceria I Segreti del Chiostro, inside the Monastery of Santa Caterina, Piazza Bellini, Palermo.
For info: www.isegretidelchisotro.shop
