SICILIAN FOOD


Holidays are not just kitesurfing, you must also eat. And since we are in Italy, it is worth sinning on this topic, because no one can deny the Italian talent in the kitchen.
Perhaps even one of the reasons why you chose an Italian spot is the desire to pamper yourself in this field.
Below The Sicilian Food – our subjective overview of dishes and snacks typical of the region, both sweet and savory.

CANNOLO

Cannolo should be on the flag of Sicily. You should eat cannolo at least once during your stay in Sicily, period.

It’s crispy pastry rolled up and filled with sweetened ricotta cheese, often with the addition of orange peels, crushed pistachios, chocolate chips or candied cherries.

You can find Cannolo in every Sicilian café. Cookies are usually quite large (around 15 cm long), which makes them a perfect dessert for two, but you can also find them in a mini version, a few centimeters long.
According to the author of the article, you should go for a larger one, because the small ones have too hard pastry and are devoid of all the additions, which  make cannolo interesting.

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ARANCINA

This is typical Sicilian street food. Good snack during the day, but also works like a kebab – a night, fast, post-party hot meal.

These are breaded rice balls resembling oranges, that gave the snack its name. Typically cheese is added to the rice which makes the ball sticky. Inside, we have a choice of ragu filling (meat and tomato), spinach + mozzarella, ham + mozzarella, ham + pistachios and more fancy variants, available less often.

Arancina is not enough for dinner, but a lot for a snack, it will fill you for quite a long time.

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INSALATA DI POLIPO

This one cannot be missed when dining in Sicilian restaurants. It can be ordered separately, e.g. as a side dish, but is very often added to other items, such as a seafood mix. It has an olive-vinegar-lemon flavor and consists of pieces of octopus, shrimp, squid, parsley, carrot and celery.

It’s fresh and crunchy thanks to the celery and soft thanks to the seafood. Served cold, perfect for warm evenings.

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SPADA (swordfish) and TONNO (tuna)

These two huge fish do not have an easy life if they swim near Sicily. They are ubiquitous at fish markets and almost every restaurant has them on the menu in various variations – marinated in olive oil and herbs, stewed, baked or served as grilled steaks (a must!).

Tuna will be more common in spring and early summer, swordfish in late summer and autumn.
A properly grilled tuna steak will have a raw strip inside. The steak is often coated with pistachios, cut into strips and served with caramelized onions.

The swordfish steak will be thinner and well done, although it should not be dry. Usually it is served only with a lemon wedge.

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COUSCOUS

Western Sicily is the capital of European couscous. It came here from North Africa and Arab countries.
In every traditional house in the Trapani region, couscous is served by the mums and grannies for special family occasions.
Most often served with seafood and fish sauce, but it can also be sweet.

If you like couscous and are visiting Sicily at the end of September, be sure to visit San Vito Lo Capo, where the huge international three-day Cous Cous Fest takes place.

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EGGPLANT

Eggplant plays an essential role in Sicilian cuisine and sooner or later, even involuntarily, it will end up on your plate. And it should if you want to explore Sicilian food properly.

Caponata (picture below) is a salad made of vegetables stewed in olive oil, mainly eggplants. It also includes celery, zucchini, pine nuts, olives and capers. It is a sweet, sour and spicy mixture of flavors and aromas. Served hot or cold, often as an addition to meat and fish.

Parmigiana is an eggplant casserole. In the classic version, eggplant slices are soaked with olive oil, then layered with Sicilian Caciocavallo cheese and cooked. The whole thing is immersed in a thick tomato sauce with fresh basil leaves.

Pasta alla norma is the pasta of this region. The basis is, of course, eggplants, as well as grated tomatoes, ricotta cheese and basil.
Of course, for many newcomers spaghetti ai frutti di mare will be the first choice of pasta. Then make the Sicilian pasta alla norma the pasta of your next choice.

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GRANITA

Commonly associated with Italy, granita originally comes from Sicily. In the past (before electricity) ice was imported from the slopes of Etna volcano, and then sugar and lemon juice were added.
Currently, it is made with various fruit juices or coffee. It’s not ice cream, granita has a looser and grainy texture, but it’s not a sorbet either (by the way, lemon sorbet is a classic after-dinner dessert).

In the Sicilian tradition, granita is eaten with brioche – a sweet, buttery bun (briosi). The dessert is called granita ca ‘briosi and is eaten on hot afternoons.

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BRIOCHE CON GELATO

Another dessert eaten during the day – brioche con gelato. Sicilians appreciate the combination of bun with ice cream. Especially chocolate and pistachio go perfect with a brioche. Don’t say anything until you’ve tried it.

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GENOVESI

These are fantastic shortbread cookies sprinkled with powdered sugar. Inside is a velvety sweet ricotta filling. It is best to eat warm and – according to the Sicilian tradition – for breakfast. They say that the best genovesi can be found at Pasticceria Maria Grammatico in Erice.

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CASSATA

This is another typical Sicilian dessert. It’s a cake that looks like a Christmas market. The more kitschy in appearance, the more traditional.
There is a sponge cake, often soaked in fruit syrup or liqueur, layered with sweetened ricotta, there is marzipan, frosting, candied fruits, nuts, sometimes also chocolate. Sweet, very sweet.

Usual Sicilian birthday cake.
Cassata is also available in miniature version.

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FRUTTA MARTORANA

It’s impossible to visit any Sicilian city without noticing the charming sweets in the shape of fruits and vegetables.
They look very realistic, only on a slightly smaller scale.

They are traditional marzipan sweets colored with vegetable dyes.
The tradition of their preparation was started in the Martorana monastery in Palermo, where nuns, before the Archbishop’s Easter visit, decorated fruit trees with hand-made marzipan fruits.

It is a Sicilian custom to put frutta martorana next to kid’s beds on All Saints’ Day.

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CHEESE

If you fancy cheeses and are confused in front of a booth with a large selection of cheeses, we recommend that you check out typical Sicilian specialties first.

This field is dominated by sheep’s pecorino siciliano (or tuma, tumazzu). Already in antiquity, it was considered one of the best cheeses in the world.
It has a very intense flavor, which is made even more spicy by stuffing the cheese with peppercorns (pecorino pepato).
Pecorino is white and medium hard (in the fresco pecorino siciliano version), but it also undergoes a ripening process, which makes it harden, it acquires an intense flavor and becomes suitable for grating (in the stagionato pecorino siciliano version).

Ragusano cheese from southern Sicily has been produced for 500 years, always from the milk of Modicana cows, exclusively raised in the provinces of Ragusa and Syracuse. The taste of the cheese is sweet, mild and soft. The darker the skin, the more mature and spicier the ragusano is. Ragusano affumicato is a smoked version.

If you see cheeses looking like balloons filled with water and tied with string – it’s caciocavallo (in the photo below).
The name means “cheese on horseback” comes from the tradition of hanging cheese on ropes on a wooden beam. The first mentions of caciocavallo appear around 500 BC. in the works of Hippocrates. It is made from sheep’s or cow’s milk and is white in color at an early stage of maturity, and is soft and mild in taste, becoming more yellow and salty over time.

Ubriaco di Zibibbo – is a semi-hard cheese made of cow’s milk. Interestingly, the cheese is matured in the regional Zibibbo wine. The taste is intense with strong wine notes, hints of honey and butter.

Ricotta (picture below) is inherently associated with Sicily. Fresh ricotta! And although Sicily is not the only place in Italy where ricotta is produced, while discovering Sicilian food, we discover how ricotta influences it.
It is a snow-white, unsalted, velvety cheese made from sheep’s, cow’s or goat’s milk. It is added to pasta, salads, grilled vegetables, fruits and of course desserts! Warm genovesi cookies filled with sweet ricotta are reason enough to visit Sicily.

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WHAT SICILIAN FOOD DO WE RECOMMEND TO BRING HOME FROM YOUR HOLIDAYS?

salt from the local salinas
regional cheeses
Marsala / Zibibbo wine
a jar of sweet pistachio spread
tuna products
frutta martorana

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