Eating our way through Sicily
Aaah Italia! And specifically, Sicily! I believe we booked this flight back in Indonesia, when I was eating MSG-heavy rice and chicken and dying for some cheese and wine and cured meats. I’m happy to report that Italy did not disappoint!
The streets? Sun-kissed. The food? Simply delicious. The vibes? Whenever you walk out your door you can find someone sipping an Aperol Spritz. And the cannoli? OH MY GOD.
Italy may be our favorite country in Europe (though before now I’d only spent a weekend in Rome). The challenge is that Italy is extensive — both geographically and culturally (did you know that Italian as we know it wasn’t spoken by the entire population until the 1970s?). For vacation-day-limited Americans, it’s impossible to do it justice in the standard 2-week trip; we’ve determined that the best way to see Italy is in concentrated bursts. Unfortunately months here would explode our budget, so we opted for two weeks only in Sicily. We moved pretty quickly from city to beach to town to hill town (it’s a small island, so our longest train ride was ~3 hours), stopping in Palermo, Cefalu, Taormina, Syracuse, Ragusa/Modica, and Catania.
Fun fact: when Americans think of Italian culture and food, they’re often thinking of Sicilian culture and food. A series of economic crises in the late 1800s fueled immigration to the US, and out of the 4.5 million Italians who immigrated from 1880 to 1930, one out of every four was Sicilian.
Food highlights of Sicily
Cannoli
Before coming here I though I didn’t like cannoli. I lived in Boston for too long, so of course I’d tried the heavy/kinda lumpy/a little soggy North End best-of-cannoli (I’m sorry to all the Bostonians I’m currently offending). Not my jam.
But then we arrived in Palermo, the literal Cannoli Capital of the World. We thought, ok well we should get one at least here because it’s Their Thing, then we can move on to other desserts. Reader let me tell you, I ate cannoli on 8 out of my 10 days in Sicily. It’s light and creamy, a little bit tangy and freshly filled (literally, you pick your shell and filling and they do it right in front of you!), and goes perfectly with an afternoon americano. We tried traditional, pistachio, and chocolate, and they are all so good!
Pizza
We arrived by train around midday in Ragusa, an ancient hill town in central-south Sicily. We discussed getting food first then walking around to explore the city, but of course got sidetracked by beautiful views and photo ops, to the point that I was getting dangerously close to hangry. We were also nearing the Italian dead-zone of food — so many restaurants close at 3pm to reopen at 7:30 or 8 for dinner, leaving us late starters to starve! We walked to the end of the hill/peninsula (it’s not on water but it feels like it could be), saw a restaurant with people sitting outside and barely glanced at the menu before saying sure fine yes this works.
We ordered a pizza and a beer to split — Norma (roasted eggplant, ricotta, mozzarella, and basil) and Messina (Sicily’s standard lager) — and it was one of the best pizzas we’ve ever had. (Sidenote: we consider ourselves something like pizza aficionados, having orchestrated two weekend-long pizza tours of New York, and trying “the best pizza” whenever there’s an opportunity.) This pizza crust was incredibly flavorful and somehow light and fluffy but substantial enough to support the toppings with a crisp undercarriage (lol that’s some pizza lingo for you). The toppings were fresh, the cheese was creamy, and we were in love.
Piadina
Did you know that they have Italian quesadillas?!? (My deepest apologies to all Sicilians and Mexicans for that.) The piadine is a flatbread sandwich, prepared with dough cooked fresh on a griddle and typically filled with a variety of meats, cheeses, and vegetables, and it is awesome. We got them at a little café next to our room in Syracuse, and they were so good! My favorite involved bresaola (lean dried salted beef), artichokes, grana padano (cheese), and rocket salad.
Arancini
I feel like we’ve all had these as passed appetizers at weddings and networking events: little gummy cheesy deep fried risotto balls. The real thing is like that, but also so much more. They’re huge (think fist-sized), lightly saffron-flavored, and filled with so much cheese you may think you died and went to heaven. Our favorites were in Taormina, flavored with spinach and pistachio.
Frutti di Mare
“Fruit of the sea?” Che romantico! I love calamari more than most, and our Sicilian experience did nothing to quell my passion. Sometimes an appetizer, sometimes served in a paper cone as a snack, always delicious. This fine example of the genre (from Palermo) included calamari, shrimp, cuttlefish, anchovies, and octopus, and was so delicately battered and perfectly cooked you could really taste each individual frutti.
Obviously this was a brief overview of some of the things we ate in Sicily before we move on to posting about Malta! Click here to watch my little video recap of so much more!
What am I reading?
Just finished: Caliban’s War (James S.A. Corey)
Currently reading: The Wolf Den (Elodie Harper)
Up next: Children of Dune (Frank Herbert)