The Sicilian Experience

Mt Etna: a new spectacular eruption

2011-07-19T01:24:00.000-07:00

She, the mountain (à muntagna as we call it in Sicily), woke up again.
A new spectacular eruption took place last night.
Watch it out!

"In Sicily, an Appetite for the New" by Marian Burros, The New York Times

2011-06-06T03:45:00.000-07:00

The following article by Marian Burros was published on March 30, 2005 on The New York Times. Six years later, Sicily is the new culinary destination and its chefs (we can add several more to those listed in the articles) are ambassadors worlwide of Sicilian culinary tradition and lifestyle.

"SICILY is fast becoming the next culinary destination as its imaginative chefs deconstruct generations of grandmother's cooking, reinvent the island's tradition of sweet and sour combinations and serve local ingredients in lighter and more creative ways.

"Our passion for food and palate are different than it was in the 10th century," said Corrado Assenza, the chef and an owner of Caffè Sicilia in the gorgeous hilly Byzantine town of Noto. Mr. Assenza, the fourth generation to run the cafe, is among the most creative practitioners of the new Sicilian cooking, glazing capers with honey, turning bergamot into marmalade.

"We need to have new traditions to be in touch with our land, new kinds of combinations of ingredients, new fragrances," he said. "One side of our tradition is that the best recipes are made with the best ingredients. The other side applies to thinking with the modern brain what the food means today."

So the eggplant Parmesan of my childhood has become an eggplant flan with Parmesan fondue and velvet tomato sauce at Il Mulinazzo, a restaurant with two Michelin stars in Villafrati, just outside Palermo. The elegant French quenelle has been reinvented as fish gnocchi at the Sheraton hotel in Catania. Chocolate sauce, traditionally served with rabbit, is now gracing pork at Il Duomo in Ragusa, and basil has been given new life as a filling for chocolates and a flavoring for sorbetto at Caffè Sicilia.

This tipping point in Sicilian history, culinary and otherwise, is described in Nino Graziano's cookbook, "My Sicilian Cooking" (Bibliotheca Culinaria, 2003). Mr. Graziano, one of the foremost practitioners of the new Sicilian cooking, is the owner of Il Mulinazzo.

"After the dark years in which the island was associated only with the Mafia, people have begun to associate it with something positive," Mr. Graziano wrote. "Rather than ask who was killed where, tourists are now more likely to inquire about a particular grape variety, the late ripening peaches or a rare cheese. We have extraordinary ingredients at our disposal, transformed by artisans and not by agribusiness."

And some of the island's young chefs, having traveled the world, now realize how blessed they are at home. They are harvesting wild ingredients like fennel and saffron, there for the taking in the hills and fields.

"A few years ago you couldn't pay people to harvest the almonds," said Faith Willinger, the Italian food expert, writer and cookbook author, who lives in Florence. "Now Sicilians realize theirs are the best. Like the oregano, the capers, the grapes - everything is so vibrant. The vegetables are amazing because they are grown on volcanic soil."

These new chefs are also bridging the gap between peasant cooking and that of the monzù, the French-trained chefs the aristocracy employed in the 19th and early 20th centuries. Monzù is Sicilian for monsieur.

There are at least a half a dozen places like Il Mulinazzo where the food reflects this innovative cuisine. When I visited Sicily at the beginning of the year, we made it to only four, whetting my appetite to someday go back and try the rest.

I found chefs who are putting together foie gras with pine nuts and basil sauce, and raw chopped tuna with olive oil flavored with green oranges.

The menu at Il Mulinazzo has many French touches: Mr. Graziano worked for several years in France. But the dishes highlighted on the menu are taken from the Sicilian tradition, like purée of fava beans enriched with scampi, ricotta and extra virgin olive oil. The earthiness of the beans and the sweet creaminess of the ricotta play off the ocean flavors of the scampi.

On New Year's Eve the tasting menu at Il Mulinazzo took its cue from the plainest of peasant ingredients, artichokes and potatoes. But the potatoes were coarsely mashed, the influence of Norman rule, Mr. Graziano said. And the luxurious Beluga caviar topping was an international addition.

In the beginning, Mr. Graziano said, it was difficult to convince people to abandon the old ways, long and slow cooking in vast quantities of olive oil, seasonings applied with a heavy hand. But as time passed, the message got through. On New Year's Eve at Il Mulinazzo everyone in the handsome, festive dining room, with the exception of our table of four, was Italian.

At Il Timo, the restaurant in the Sheraton hotel in Catania, Saverio Piazza, the executive chef and food and beverage director, has created what he calls fish gnocchi, borrowing from haute cuisine and recalling a quenelle or mousse of fish paste poached in a broth. His featherlike gnocchi are made with butter, flour, butter and sea bass. They are served in a sauce of scampi, tomatoes and garlic.

Mr. Piazza says outside influences, including Japan, have increased the popularity of raw fish in Sicily, where restaurants in coastal towns serve it just hours old. "The traditional way was fried tuna with onion sauce with vinegar, a type of sweet and sour," he said. "The first raw fish to be served were the neo nato, newly born anchovies or sardines. Little by little we got to swordfish carpaccio. Now there is prosciutto of tuna."

Mr. Piazza loves to play with uncommon combinations of spices and vegetables, often using them as a base for simply grilled or sautéed fish. He infuses eggplant with cinnamon and serves it with sea bass; red mullet rests on a bed of zucchini sautéed with cardamom. "I close myself in the office, and I imagine the taste," he said.

One of these sessions produced eggplant marmalade made with sugar and bay leaf and served in a tart shell topped with a lemon twist.

Ciccio Sultano, whose Ristorante Duomo has a Michelin star, was one of the first local chefs to be noticed abroad for his reinvention of Sicilian dishes and for returning lost ingredients to contemporary cooking.

Always playful, he serves shrimp and squid fried in a delicate batter of semolina. It comes to the table wrapped in a paper cone, like French fries.

"I like people to be entertained, to have fun," Mr. Sultano said. "My work is to rediscover and identify the lost flavors of traditional cuisine and to renew them, inserting them into a modern and innovative context, while at the same time remaining true to the historical significance of the territory."

His dish of octopus, pork and citron seems unlikely until you taste it. The octopus is boiled and ground "like a salami," he said. The pork is prepared like headcheese, but with orange and lemon, giving both the seafood and the meat similar textures. The accompanying salad of citron, onions and parsley contrasts with and lightens the richness of the octopus and pork.

But the most daring experimenter with the strong sweet and savory elements in Sicilian cooking is Mr. Assenza of Caffè Sicilia.
As we sat in his wonderful old cafe, housed in a 1749 building, he plied us with example after example of his startling honeys and jams, cakes and preserves. "Using a combination of ingredients," he said, "you pass from low use of sugar to high use at the end of a meal."

For example he marinates raw fish in honey suffused with extra virgin olive oil and orange, lemon and saffron, and then serves it with lemon granita. And he pairs oysters with almond granita and what Mr. Assenza calls chili pepper candy, hot peppers glazed with honey.

The combinations are fascinating and endless, and at times they seem improbable. But one bite changes all that, astounding and delighting the palate.

One of Mr. Assenza's gems is a basil marzipan filling for chocolate. The brilliant creations of his mad genius - dozens of marvelous little boxes filled with jars containing honey-glazed capers; honey combined with wild fennel, saffron, white pepper or bergamot - line the shelves behind the glass counters of the cafe.

"This is my link with the Sicilian tradition of sweet and acid," he said. "We have the best ingredients and we honor Sicily by amplifying the quality of the ingredients."

Brian Wingfield contributed reporting for this article.

Snow, sun sea. What else? Winter time in Taormina

2010-02-15T22:23:00.000-08:00

A view from the terrace of the Grand Hotel Timeo in Taormina.

Vortices, saltpans, windmills and a Relais

2010-02-02T09:32:00.000-08:00

Most of my clients are very demanding but this was one of the most bizarre requests I’ve ever had in my 14 year-career in the event industry. The easiest thing was to ask her what exactly she meant. Forget it, Doriana, she is not that kind of client. You have to see it for yourself.
I don't have qualms about admitting my ignorance. Three key-words: life-coaching, vortex and Sicily. Then, an inspiration. God bless friends!

“Life coaching is a future-focused practice with the aim of helping clients determine and achieve personal goals. A vortex is a centre or a source of energy a certain territory is able to give off.” Gerry, psychotherapist, summed up with his great gift of clearness, indulging soon after into a passionate phone-class about both subjects, for my skeptical ears. A real eye-opener one into a new world! If Sicily has thirteen places included in the Unesco World Heritage list, those reported as vortex sites are even more!

The next step was to design an event for a group of 20 Californian VIPs. They wanted everything. Two weeks in Sicily, life-coaching, astrology sessions (!), a cosy and warm boutique hotel with a touch of design and style placed right in the middle of one of this vortex areas, a true immersion into Sicilian life, cultural daily-trips, time for private meditation, time for shopping, goof food and great wines. Ok guys, what a life-coach for? Better have a psychoanalyst!
I could imagine myself dressed as a fortune-teller, predicting their future and having great fun, if only I had a typical Mediterranean look. Unfortunately, I’m more a Norman kind, blond and blue-eyed. No way to act, back to my usual job.

I accepted the challenge.

Vortices. The list was impressive. Unusual places, magic and mysterious ones, all sharing a strong energy potential. Some of my favourite places were mentioned, this was surprising and explicative at the same time. Can you tap the energy potential of a place? Can you feel something seizing you right there at the stomach? Fear? Calm? Exuberance? Strenght? Exhaustion? Weakness? No matter if positive or negative, it’s that energy. It’s that vortex.

I focused immediately on Mothia, a tiny island being part of the wetland area of the Stagnone Wildlife Reserve. Western Sicily, an area I love. A sort of ultimate frontier in the island.

Driving north along the SS 115 coast road between Marsala and Trapani you find yourself in the bleached landscape of the saline (saltpans) and shimmering heaps of sea salt, considered the best in Italy and a big business for the area since the 12th century. Here the land is flat and featured only by vineyards estates, saltpans and the small mulini (windmills) once used to grind the salt. Mothia and the Stagnone islands lie undisturbed opposite the glittering Saline of Ettore and Infersa and the Salt Museum housed in an old windmill.

Connected to the mainland by a Phoenician road which can be seen below the shallow waters of the lagoon at a depth of about 1 mt, at the beginning of the XX century Mothia was bought by Joseph Whitaker, archaeologist and heir of an English family who moved to Sicily and grew richer thanks to the production of the Marsala, a delicious local dessert wine. Intrigued by the unusual fragments of pottery found during excavations, he built a villa and spent decades assembling a unique collection of Phoenicians finds that now appear in the homonymous Whitaker Museum placed in this tiny island.

Small private boats lead you from the pier surrounded by the saltpans to Mothia. Try to visit the area close to the sunset. The silence reigns obstinate, deafening at times, ennobled by the singing and annoyed only by the engine of the boats. Close your eyes, free you imagination and evoke ancient and bold times. The famous naval battle between the Romans and the Carthaginians back in 249 b.C. which we could only image been massive and spectacular. The last intense gleams of the sun sinking below the horizon infuse courage, instill hope, give power to quiet.
Feel the history. Feel the energy. Feel the romance.

Proceed driving north along the coastline and you enter the area of Trapani. You feel you are in the middle of nowhere, no road signs, only sporadic modest built-up areas, uneven byroads. Look for Nubia, the area just opposite the Egadi archipelago. A sixteenth century tower still stands proudly behind my transitory port of destination, as a record of the cruel Saracens' attacks.

The landscape surrounding the Antiche Saline has something unusual and magic at the same time. Contrasts are evident. More saline built during the Arab domination standing out imperturbable. Again, their silence is deceiving, intimidating and peaceful. Salt twinkles regularly piled up along strips of land coming afloat from the sea. Hard labour, skillful hands, salt is still cultivated manually.

"Antiche Saline is a small boutique hotel, once an ancient baglio, a rural building whose architecture is typical of western Sicily. The estate belonged to the Platamone Marquis and was restored in 2005 into refined relais thanks to accurate works of restoration” tells the manager. Young and proud, he conveys a sincere and open character, confidence without arrogance. Good for me and my clients.

Vineyards, orchards, a stretch of bare land and then the sea, blue, crystal and calm. The outlines of the islands of Favignana and Levanzo appear back on the horizon, exciting curiosity and imagination.

The colours of the Antiche Saline are typically Mediterranean, white, blue, ochre. Exteriors and interiors are bright, places are suffused with light. Rooms are warm, sober and comfortable, some on the first floor with a better view over the saline and the sea.

Taverna Paradiso (Paradise Tavern), the name of the restaurant, persuades foodies into sampling dishes of the local Trapanese cuisine. Cous cous is a savoury heritage of the Arab domination in this part Sicily for two centuries in the aerly Middle Ages. The Arabs changed Sicilian agriculture and cuisine. Food for thoughts. The wine list shows the best wineries of the area, the most important in Sicily for wine production. Wine for thoughts.

The swimming-pool looks forward to share in, donating relief during the torrid summer days and a comfortable chaise-long to listen to the music of nature and silence.

At the sunset, when the sky turns polychrome, red, orange, purple and blue the relais lives its magic moment and during warmest months salt reflects all colours, creating poetic plays of light. In this fairy-like atmosphere, I feel light years away from our frantic and raving modern life. I wish I could join my life-coaching VIPs.

Vortex. I feel it, I found it.
Vortices. A new way for travelling?

********

Mothia & Withaker Museum
Isola di San Pantaleo - Riserva Naturale dello Stagnone
Tel. + 39 0923 712598
Opening time: 9-13 and 15-one hour before the sunset
Entrance fee: Eur 6,00 per person, inclusive the boat transfer from/to mainland

Relais Antiche Saline Hotel ****
Via Giuseppe Verdi - Località Nubia
91027 Paceco (Trapani) - Sicily - Italy
Tel +39 0923 868029

Baroque nights

2009-11-25T10:16:00.000-08:00

“Are we going by vespa? There might be no parking there” Vincenzo says while deciding which shirt to wear. He knows I love moving by my vespa. A car is an option for me for long distances or when storming. We also are late for our funky birthday party at centro storico (1).

Late November and we are still blessed with mild weather. Not much traffic. We are driving slowly, enjoying a warm breeze over our faces. As we approach its historical center, the black lady appears with its lava stone Baroque-style palazzos, the ruins of its Greek and Roman theatres emerging from the decadent atmosphere of the narrow streets, built after a Mt Etna devastating eruption and a disastrous earthquake wiped out most of the town in 1669 and 1696. For our Baroque-style, we have been listed on the UNESCO World Heritage list. I’m afraid we do not fully understand the importance of such an honourable mention, nor our politicians use it to enhance our touristic potential. Our indolence is stronger than our shrewdness.

“Audrey Hepburn and Gregory Peck are just arrived, guys!” Jerry shouts out hilariously, looking at us arriving on the back of my vintage-style moped-saddle. Somehow, we remind him of the Oscar winning movie Roman Holidays starring Gregory Peck and Audrey Hepburn riding a vespa in Rome.

The best part of driving a vespa is you can easily free yourself out from our heavy traffic and park wherever you need. So, I’ve parked just down the scalinata Alessi, where the Niewsky, our party venue, stands halfway along the flight of steps. One of the few real institutions in town, a very unusual place for a birthday party, it matches our freakish guest of honour well.

“This place still retains the same Che Guevara-Buena Vista Social Club-smoky-shabby atmosphere it had in late ’80s” Enzo notices while greeting old and new friends. It was back on 1986 when Saro, its out-and-out communist owner, opened the Niewsky, the first pub in town, giving rise to a new trend of reclamation and renewal for our centro storico. In a short period of time, the youth seized the area, clubs and restaurants invaded smoothly the sleeping Baroque buildings. Nightlife rescued our streets from blight and crime, the local movida was so intense and vibrant to be compared to the Madrilenian one. This was the primavera Catanese, a sort of permanent spring which gave the city and its people pride and identification for about a decade.

It’s Thursday night and both the Niewsky and scalinata Alessi are packed with people. Indoors, men and women around their ‘40s having their organic dinner, no Coca Cola, only red wine sipping. Outdoors, students camping out along the steps drinking beers and mojitos. Our Baroque nights speak a blend of European languages; Italian, Spanish, English, French. The Erasmus exchange project among UE universities for students’ mobility is the tangible heritage of our primavera Catanese.

Memories flow back to my Erasmus experience in Rotterdam in ’93 and I feel like suffering from Peter Pan’s syndrome of eternal youth.

Gripped by misrule and impasse today, Catania goes through a very difficult period. But its nights still throbs with life.

(1) Centro storico = historical centre

The second life of Bellomo Gallery

2009-11-09T02:33:00.000-08:00

No doubt, Sicily is a true open-air museum with its Greek temples and theatres, Roman and Byzantine mosaics, Medieval-style villages, Baroque-style palazzos and towns, Art-nouveau decorations.

For this, you'll be somehow disappointed if you expect to find a tons of art museums throughout the island as this seems to not to be a priority for our politicians who definitely lack of a far-seeing long-term strategy in terms of cultural politics.

But we do have fine pearls to show and the Bellomo Gallery is one of them.

Take a walk in Ortigia, the Baroque-style historical centre of Syracuse, get across the scenographic Piazza Duomo, dazzling light and airy, a triumph of limestone prevailing in its monuments, the imposing Cattedrale and the noble palazzos defining the square. This square has been several times the perfect set for famous shootings.
Proceed to the Badia di Santa Lucia, a small church, once a nuns' convent, now hedging in temporarily Caravaggio's Bury of St. Lucy.

Finally, head towards Via Capodieci 14. The Gallery of Palazzo Bellomo stands here, brought back to its second life thanks to long works of restoration.

Luigi Messina, its enlightened director, is one of those rare exemplary in Sicily public administration of pleasant and passionate men who just care about what he does and the way this has to be done. He is so proud of the museum's new life, you cannot be infected by his enthusiasm, energy and own volition.

I can't say what it is more interesting, if the Palazzo itself, a building dating back to XIII-XIV century, being the most comprehensive architectural masterpiece in Syracuse of the age of Frederick II, or the Medieval and modern art collection it offers to amateurs.

Antonello da Messina's Annunciation is absolutely the highlight. Its partial restoration has revived that predominant and eye-catching cobalt blue as well as numberless small important details which enriches the painting and mark it out.

But the Gallery offers more. A sequence of refined pictorial collections of the XV century, but also silver and gold pieces, historical clothes, fabrics, ceramics, weapons, carriages.

No bookshop nor cafè at disposal for visitors at the moment. Burocracy in Sicily is slower than everywhere else in the world, we trust sometime in the future the museum will be provided with them. Cultural marketing is a process we still have to metabolize in Sicily.
Its admission fee fixed at Eur 8,00 per person might be maybe too much, I heard people complaining there is no right balance between price and the offer.

Despite to that, we would like to believe the Bellomo Gallery is meant as a concrete step forward to try to turn our art patrimony from a heritage of the past into a real investment for the future of the territory and its population.

28 dead people, 9 missing. We are all guilty.

2009-10-10T10:48:00.000-07:00

(Ansa)

This morning, the Cathedral of Messina gave hospitality to the solemn funerals of 21 of the 28 victims of the severe rainstorm which caused a lethal landslide in Giampilieri, a suburb south of Messina, and involved the small town of Scaletta Zanclea and several other tiny villages named Altolia, Briga and Molino built on the slopes of the Peloritani Mountains, along the Ionian Coast in Sicily.

A girl of 5, young brothers of 22 and 23, elderly people in their 70s and 80s, a Romanian lady, this tragedy affected all families, all ages.
Sorrow, despair, anger, flood of tears. Friends, relatives, we are crying for one of our beloved.

Representatives of the Italian State all standing out in front to say goodbye to the victims: the Prime Minister, the President of Regione Siciliana, Ministers and members of the Parliament, their face contrite and grieve in front of the cameras.

This has been called "the announced tragedy" as many in Sicily and Italy, as announced were the dead people after the earthquake which destroyed the town of L'Aquila several months ago, as announced were the victims of the Vajont in 1969.

(Ansa)

We are all guilty.

We citizens are guilty, as we are too used to live ignoring rules, laws and duties.
We are too used to elect politicians who honestly care nothing about their citizens, their territory, the real need of the communities they represent. We are too used to let these people trampling on our rights, ignoring undertakings, pursuing and achieving goals which often seems to be closer to their own interests then to those of their communities. We are too used to accept abuses of power of any kind. We simply forgot to be an active part of the society and we acts as powerless, becoming spectators of ourselves and our lives.

(AP Photo)

Politicians are guilty.
There are many ways to carry out one's own role and task. They simply have chosen the worst one, voluntarily misinterpreting their mandate and all duties belonging to it. Many of them are well-meaning, straight men. Others are not trustworthy, they are not up the job people have given to them. But we keep electing them, our eyes blind, our hands over our ears, we don't dare to open our mouth. Except when a tragedy arrives and breaks violently our silence.

(Ansa)

The State is guilty as most of the time the our State is simply absent.
Laws and rules are not applied. Faults and negligence are not verified. Penalties are not undergone. This State seldom foresees a strategy of preventive measures.
This is the State of the unpunished and unpunishable people, except for the poor ones.

(Ansa)

28 dead people, 9 missing. We are all guilty, waiting for the next national tragedy.

For not to forget

Watch videos on Utube

Scaletta Zanclea: the disaster on Utube

Make couscous, not war!

2009-09-29T02:38:00.000-07:00

When food acts as a powerful mean of cultural integration the outcome is an explosive mixture of food, music, live shows, wine tasting, artists, local people and people from everywhere all joining together to "make couscous, not war".

The chosen place for this colorful and tasty melting pot was San Vito lo Capo, Western Sicily, close to Trapani and Erice area, a seafaring village with blue and crystal clear sea waters and a beautiful white beach, an ideal place to extend your holiday and enjoy the relaxed atmosphere of an early fall vacation.

Five days entirely devoted to King Couscous, a dish rich in history and open to the future, synthesis of cultures, symbol of opening, broadmindedness and cross-culture contaminations.

Chefs from Ivory Coast, France, Israel, Morocco, Tunisia, Palestine, Senegal and Italy challenged each other to prepare the best couscous of all, no matter if fish-based or meat based or with vegetables, no matter if traditional, exotic or with a haute-cuisine touch. Italy won, but this is of minor importance.

What was really striking was the atmosphere of real feast and joy you felt everywhere, anytime.

At the Gastronomic Village where you could chose among four different couscous houses: the San Vitese one, to taste the local version; the trapanese and Maghreb one, to taste couscous from Trapani; the Mediterranean one to be delighted by couscous made by countries overlooking the Mediterranean Sea and the worldwide one to enjoy exotic versions from all over the world. You ate, you drank, and ate and drank and never had enough. It's always like this every year, since the first edition of the event, and every year is always better.

At the Couscous Lab, true culinary workshops led by Sicilian Master Chefs. We was particularly amazed by the one focusing on Alaska couscous made with salmon. It was introduced in Sicily by returning Trapanese emigrants who sought their fortunes far away from home in the cold Alaska lands. We really learnt a lot. Master Chefs were Pino Cuttaia, Ciccio Sultano and my very good friend Carmelo Chiaramonte, a spotlight chaser and a great chef. We enjoyed workshops very much.

At the Expo Village, a colored market, a lively souk, a good chance to discover the identity of the eight countries entering the competition through their handicrafts and people.At the Al Waha, the lounge area nearby the sea, its name meaning "desert oasis", a chic and trendy place where contaminations among music, tastings and relax take places.

At the Live Shows where music prevails with a different artist every night for contaminations of sounds, tunes and visions from all over the world.

Despite the weather was not that indulgent for most of the time, people were not intimidated and participated heavily especially during the weekend. From 12.00 am to 24.00 people coming widely from Sicily, Italy and even abroad shifted here and there trying not to miss anything: a dip into the crystal sea, strolling around the booths trying to discover that unique ethnic gadget, tasting wines and food, enjoying meeting friends sipping a glass of whatsoever and listening to the artist on stage that night.

That's what we did. The seven of us all together or each on his or her own, distracted by everything on our way along the weekend, holding forth on culinary questions, on that unusual ingredient, on how we liked or not this or that couscous, on our personal version of the dish, all of us being pretty good cooks with a sane sense of friendly rivalry. We had a good laugh.

We met people from UK, France, Germany, Ireland, Sweden, Spain as well as representatives of the 8 official countries.

George and Liz, from Richmond, south-west London (I lived in Richmond during my teens!) were truly amazed by the huge quantity of people, food and were impressed by the common sense of sharing and participation.

We all sensed how integration was naturally felt and not forced; food was only a very good and tasty excuse.

Isola delle Correnti, south Sicily, southern than Tunis

2009-09-16T16:28:00.000-07:00

September 13th. 30°C in Sicily. Still hot and sunny. The perfect day for a last September swim. Lazy as we usually are on Sunday mornings, we decide to drive south Sicily, to the very southern beach in Europe, southern than Tunis.

Left Catania area, we drive towards Syracuse first. The landscape starts changing and limestone of Syracuse area slowly takes the place of the dark lava stone of Catania area. We drive immersed in a countryside where carobs, olive-trees and vineyards are all around. We pass by the town of Pachino, famous for its homonym cherry tomatoes. Here, the landscape is shaped as an unbroken plastic wave, for the greenhouses so largely diffused to cultivate this tasty vegetable.
An attentive eye immediately realizes the panorama is different from the rest of Sicily. Pretty similar to north Africa. From a geological point of view, here the plate is the African one.

The road to Isola delle Correnti now runs along the coastline. We can see the old massive tuna-fishing building, still charming but closed to the public, and in the distance the natural wildlife reserve of Capo Passero island.

It's a bright day, colors are vivid.

Before arriving, a quick stop to the small fishermen village of Portopalo for another black and strong wake-up espresso. A village with no highlight, except for its surrounding nature, fresh fish and strong red wine. Local people are sunburnt, slackened by the long summer, chilling out at bars for a cool corner and a drink. It's midday, no shade.

A couple of minutes later we reach Isola delle Correnti, ready to enjoy our last Sunday at the beach. Houses are here and there, nasty ones, and some shacks, side by side to greenhouses. It looks like a battlefield.
Isola delle Correnti is the extreme tip south of Sicily, namely the Island of Stream, dividing the Ionian Sea from the Mediterranean one.

A small fortress dominates the whole island and soon my mind flies back to ancient times. Who lived there? Walking on a stretch and here you are to visit and imagine.

It's a suggestive place. If the Mediterranean Sea is rough, just turn the corner and the Ionian Sea is unexpectedly calm. Winds reign unopposed. You can only obey and follow the stream.
It's the paradise for wind-surfers and the paradise for sandy beach lovers.

The beach is still wild, one of the fewest in Sicily. Golden sand dunes offering wild fragrant herbs, pine-needle are all over and so seaweed remains.

The sea is transparent, light blue and still warm. Caribbean style. Caribbean Sicily.
It's silent, you can only hear the sound of the nature, the sea, the wind, the waves.
Few people around us, summer survivors, tireless fellows.

Time goes slows. Problems are far enough for today. It's September, last close of summer.

Sicily or how to survive when travelling The Godfather’s land and experience the best of it

2009-09-08T01:01:00.000-07:00

If your are taking this title seriously and what you expect is to have a serious survey on how to survive on what you expect to be the mafia land, I’m sorry you will be disappointed.
If you are taking this title seriously and what you expect are useful tips and tricks for discerning travelers in Sicily, you’re on the right way.

Bias
Prejudices about Sicily are still alive and die hard. If you think yourself as a traveler, Sicily is the perfect destination to get a challenged about. Mafia? Yes, it’s true, it’s our major problem and no, you will never meet a true mafioso on your way, real life in Sicily is not Michael Corleone’s . Don’t mistake mafia with ordinary delinquency, the same you will find everywhere else in the world.

Culture and places
Sicily, the world in an island? "… A landscape in which it is possible to find what on earth seems to be made to seduce eyes, mind, imagination…". Guy de Maupassant was very impressed by Sicily during one of his Grand Tour in Europe.
A culture shaped by centuries of dominations. We had the Greek, the Phoenicians, the Romans, the Barbarians, the Arabs, the Normans, the Swabians, the Angevins, the Spanish and their Bourbons. Each of them left in Sicily their heritage, their way of living, food, architecture skills, and each of them contributed Sicily to be the place where the world met and till meets. A holiday in Sicily is a journey to the roots of the world, a journey to a rich source of nature, history and culture, melted into a small triangle of land in the centre of the Mediterranean Sea. Greek archaeological parks and open-air theatres located in impervious and strategic positions, Imperial age villas widely decorated with precious mosaics, Arab gardens, Norman castles and cathedrals with gorgeous byzantine decorations, opulent Baroque-style historical centers and noble palazzos: thanks to its cultural and architectural Babel Sicily is the view of time.

People and folklore
Mourning-dressed women and short moustache men? Ah, that’s one of my favorite bias! Sicilians are blond, red, black, brown-hair, short, tall, dark and blue-eyes, beautiful women, handsome men, fashion-addict or shabby youth. If you travel inland and visit remote villages it may happen you to meet old mourning-dressed and wrinkled women with a black head scarf or old moustache men lolling out at the main square reserving you a piercing and questioning glance or a frank smile. Sincere local folklore waiting for a shot. Sicilians are daring and wits like the Muslims were, elegant and knowledgeable like the French, resolute like the Spanish. A bit of every civilization still lives in us.

Thanks to this heavy past of dominations, Sicilians are open, generous and nice people. They are skeptical, surly, sometimes rude, definitely parochial people, certainly not well disposed to queue and respect rules of any kind, truly disorganized by nature and, at the same time, able to voice a smart cleverness, adaptability and a talent to solve the most tangled problems. As we are lazy bones, we seldom turn this talent to everyday life, unless we are really fed up with something and our private life is somehow strongly involved. Sicilians are people of strong contradictions in the land of contradictions.

Bear in mind that “let’s meet at noon” does not necessarily mean noon "sharp”: we do have a wide-ranging concept of time, so we tend to be never on time. Sicilian mind is flexible.

Heavy traffic? Remember, when driving the rule seems to have no rule. So, unless you would like to turn on you travel into a real surviving camp along Sicilian roads, be careful about the idea of renting a car to drive on your own. Road signs are optional so, get ready to make a GPS your very best friend for the rest of your journey. Don’t be upset if double parking or park on sidewalks is so common: we like to challenge people’s patience and get them fit with a daily gymkhana (local folklore or civil chaos?).

But if walking or driving your car you simply ask about directions or you are in trouble, be sure you’ll find generous people ready to help you one way or another. Speaking no English (most of the people still don’t) is not that important, they know the way to let you understand the point. Sicilians are theatrical people.

Be open, flexible and generous and you’ll make the most of them.

Food and Wine
Be on a diet? What a fool you are thinking to watch your weight while in Sicily! Here, food is serious topic. If you are a foodie-kind of traveler you’ll risk an overdose.

Blessed with a fertile land, a mild climate and a shining sun, Sicily produces a large variety of top quality raw materials and staples which give rise to an incredible range of delicious dishes, unique specialties and savory table delicacies. Sicilian cuisine is the perfect resume of centuries of culinary traditions and cultures. The Arabs left us the fish-based couscous you should taste only in Trapani area and as well as a large use of honey in confectionery, the sweet and sour, saffron, spices and raisins. The French gave us sauces, gateaux and their refined elaborations. The Spanish, their sumptuous presentations, salads and frittata (tortilla).

Then, the Monsu came, the French chefs cooking for the Bourbons and the local noble families who elaborated their Sicilian haute-cuisine style.

You can eat everywhere, anytime.

Bars serve a lot: typical pastry items for your breakfast out are the ravioli (a sweet pastry filled with ricotta cheese and drops of chocolate), cornetti filled with nutella, white or chocolate cream or jam, fried iris filled with cream or soft graffe with sugar dusting on the top. From spring to fall, you cannot miss the queen for breakfast, the frivolous granita (a kind of creamy sorbet made of several tastes such as almond, pistachio, coffee, mulberry, peach, lemon, chocolate) served rigorously in a transparent glass con panna (cream) e brioche. Catania offers the best throughout the island.

Not to mention the terrific tavola calda, our quality fast-food, a large selection of snacks like arancini, pizzette, cartocciate and scaccie which are a useful alternative to a proper meal. A world to discover.

Street-food is quite common especially in Palermo area where you can meet folks selling suspicious local dishes such as pane ‘ca meusa (bread filled with spleen) or stigghiola (entrails). Leave out your prejudices, street-food is safe and tasty.

Dining out at typical trattorie is a joy for food beginners and refined connoisseurs. Whether you like it or not, you will be thrilled by hundreds of appetizers and starters, dozens of different types of pasta, fish dishes and sea-food, meat tasty morsels. No matter where your personal taste leads you, caponata and parmigiana are absolutely the Sicilian cooking -must.

Desserts deserve a chapter apart; you cannot be your way back home without experiencing cannoli and cassata.

Sip a glass of wine from our quality native grapes such as a Nero d’Avola, Inzolia, Cataratto, Nerello Mascalese, or wash your meal with a Sicilian Chardonnay or a Merlot.

When in Catania, stops at a chiosco and order a seltz, limone e sale, a mandarino al limone or a chinotto and deal with a new soft-drink experience.

Stroll about local markets: polychrome and rowdy - that’s our Arab attitude, but don’t think to bargain – you’ll be right in the pulsing heart of the town, plain people immersed into their everyday life. Just mind your wallet and never forget your camera!

Nightlife
Going out at weekends? Sicilians enjoy life and local movida is intense and vibrant.

Catania is the nightlife queen. Catanesi people think there is always a good reason to chill out, seven days a week, twelve months a year. No agenda, they usually improvise. No matter if you are single, gay or who your fellow traveler is, get a Lapis and see what’s on.

Palermo is fine, too, but Palermitani tend to have that snobbish attitude to live a close party friendship with respect to the Catanesi who love receiving new friends with open arms.

Ease off, you're in Sicily! Buon divertimento!

Golf, food, wine and Europe's largest active volcano: a weekend out at Palmerston Golf Etna & Spa

2009-08-19T08:40:00.000-07:00

To inaugurate our so eagerly awaited summer break from a very hard month (and a very hard year!) we (some friends, Enzo and I) decided to spend a weekend on Mt. Etna, the largest active volcano in Europe. Close to home, about 30/40 minutes driving, a beautiful area that of Castiglione di Sicilia, located on the north-east side of the volcano, a Medieval village which still retains a certain charm in its old centre. An area where vineyards and wineries shape and define the landscape, surrounded by black cold lava flows and hazel groves, which make this part of the volcano one of the most interesting in Sicily for its oustanding wine production. A natural setting like no other.

Dominated by the white cap of the 3300 mt central crater of Mt. Etna, stands the imposing figure of the Palmerston Golf Etna & Spa - recalling somehow the old massive lavastone farms so widely diffused at the foothill of the volcano - surrounded by vineyards, orchards and hazel groves and facing on the back some awful uncompleted villas which sadly brutalize the gentle and overbearing view.

There was a specific reason for chosing the Palmesrton Golf Etna and Spa during those days from August 8th to 10th: on the occasion of St. Lawrence some nice events were planned in the area as the hotel management was organising a wine and food tasting on Aug 8th while the Municipality of Castiglione di Sicilia the annual "Calici di stelle" on August 10th.

Is there anything better to start your holidays enjoying nice folks, delicious food, drinking quality wines and gain all this thanks to a special offer the hotel decided to place on the market trying to revitalize their August attendance?

At arrival, the staff at the lobby gave us a warm welcome and the key of our room on the first floor (the hotel has two). Equipped with just two travelling bags, we kindly refused the help of the bellboy and run to our room as I cound't wait to relax at their Temple Spa. Our room was comfortable enough but not that large, with a small terrace and enchanting view both over the top of the volcano and a nearby vineyard abrutptly interrupted by those awful uncompleted villas (and which should be part of the hotel once finished to attract passionate golfers and business men).

Furniture is a bit disappointing but the interior decoration is embellished with quality curtains and superbe original paintings and drawings by Maria Leonardi Pennisi, a local painter and one of the owners of the estate). The whole hotels shows more than 700 of her paintings and I'd loved to buy one but - poor me - none was available.

Chilling out in the calm and sober-styled Temple Spa was exactly what I really deserved and desired most.

Despite the lack of useful and professional information given by the person in charge on duty, we indulged for 3 hours doing all our personal try-outs of all those therapies and treatments included in the fee which grants your access to the Spa: colour therapy and aromatherapy showers, hydrotherapy pool with jacuzzi, sauna and hammam, a zone for relaxation with chaise longues, magazines, herb teas and infusions. We only missed to try massages as the only masseuse on duty was fully booked and - shame! - we did not in advance.

Restored from all this, I was ready for our first gourmet date just that evening right there at the hotel, so no effort to reach the lawn where everthing was settled for a perfect tasting event, its evocative title being "2009 Taste Routes: wine, oils, flavours": a rich seventeen course buffet menu (yes, 17! Just to count some: from typical summer soup with peas and broad beans, to, home-made macceroni pasta with a strong meat ragout, to a selection to Sicilian cheese deliciously matched with honey, jams and wine jellies and more ... two variants of cou-cous, one with vegetables and one with meat as a tribute to our Arab heritage, then tagliata di tonno, a sort of thinly sliced grilled tuna steak with sweet and sour red peppers as side-dish, plus ... a dainty black pork from the Nebrodi Mountains on the spit, and three different type of desserts among which my favourite one, a Malvasia wine aspic with sweet-smelling local peaches and again ... a final surprise for all the bystanders a sumptuous chocolate tasting which was definitely th knockout blow for all of us! ), all rigorously local ingredients, each dish matching a great Sicilian wine for a total of 15 different wineries representing the best wine-making Sicily can offer. The food and the selection of wine was superb, I cound't eat all 17 courses but the whole group did and this was the final response. The service was not that great, actually needed a bit more of coordination and staff.

A very professional jazz trio refined the atmosphere with the right music and the right voice, a gentle woman with a vibrant and emotional touch. It was one of those rare events where the right people is exactly at the right place and everyone truly enjoys each minute of it.You could easily breathe the feeling of full satifaction and total pleasure delivered by participants' attitude, no matter if they were 9 or 90 (two kids od ten shared our table and my God! They ate all courses with such a qualified appetite to dliver now and then their personal and fun opinions as authorities on food! I was truly amazed and a bit envoius they had space enough for everything and I didn't ... or coundn't!).

I coudn't exempt from congratulating the management for such a pleasant evening and promise not to miss the next one on 2010.

The next day was entirely devoted to hanging out at the pool (why no bar there ...we waited for one hour before the bartender delivered our drinks), except for time devoted to meals.

Breakfast was not you would espect from a 4* hotel which would like to attract skilled travellers from all over the world both in terms of quality, quantity and presentation of food, expecially if compared with the night before.

We had lunch at the club house of the golf course as the hotel restaurant was closed. A' la carte menu was really basic, dishes not always well-cooked, wine was terrible and quality of service sufficient. But, prices were adequate and the atmosphere very relaxed.

Somehow it may sound clashing with positioning the managment aims to and clients' expectations but all in all you fell comfortable and make no effort to adjust yourself quite easily.

Now, folks, do you think my friends there at the Palmerston Golf Etna & Spa, the hotel manager Filippo Catania and the sales manager Federica Eccel, will continue to talk to me?

Lunch with two Norwegian girls in an Albanian speaking village in Sicily

2009-07-19T08:58:00.000-07:00

We met Kjersti and Susann at the end of June at Trattoria San Giovanni in Piana degli Albanesi, western Sicily. It was lunchtime. We popped in during a weekend entirely devoted to visit wineries, farms and relais de charme around Palermo countryside. Kjersti and Susan were sitting on a table in the terrace enjoying their typical home-made Sicilian meal, happily satisfied. We sat in a table nearby while Gina, the owner and co-chef of the trattoria, was trying to talk to them in Italian with a certain Tuscany inflexion, the two girls keeping smiling at her nodding politely in assent but with their eyes wondering "what?", the opposite table with three local gentlemen speaking a strange dialect, no way to understand it even for us, native-Sicilians.

That's how we met the two happy Norwegian girls having their two week holiday in Sicily, who happened for chance at the trattoria while driving south to visit Corleone (I guess for its appeal related to The Godfather trilogy and everything connected with the mafia, poor us!)

Those were funny circumstances. Except the two girls, none spoke Norwegian. They did not speak Italian, Gina - the affable owner - did not speak English but somehow they could understand each other. We speak English so we could enjoy a nice talk with Kjesrti ans Susann providing them with some tips for the rest of their fly and drive voyage in Sicily. We did not speak that strange language the gentlemen nearby were spoken but they could speak and understand Italian.
So, what language were the gentlemen speaking? Believe or not, ancient Albanian! They were Piana degli Albanesi natives. This is a small town in the countryside of Palermo where an Albanian community lives and still maintains its native language, although mixed with some Sicilian influence, since the end of the XV century when they arrived in Sicily after the invasion of the Balkan peninsula by the Ottomans. Along its street you can read road and traffic signs both in Italian and Albanian so I learnt that the Italian word Municipio (Town Hall) becomes Berska in Albanian.

For those travelling in Sicily, Piana degli Albanesi is worth a visit mostly during Easter time for its fascinating and picturesque Ortodox Easter procession with traditional Albanian costumes attracting visitors from all over. In Piana, you can easily see people eating a cannolo, as this typical Sicilian kind of pastry, an engaging and surpirisng dessert filled with ricotta cheese, is absolutely the quality trademark for this village. So, keep in mind to have one while visiting (and one is more than enough!).

Piana degli Albanesi is also famous for several important events in the history of Sicily and Italy and alas! for the sanguinary massacre at Portella della Ginestra by a gang of bandits lead by Salvatore Giuliano: on May 1st, 1947 they killed a mass of defenceless people celebrating Labour Day. The story of the bandit Salvatore Giuliano is very interesting and is worth more investigation for being him the first promoting the independence of Sicily. But this is another story.

Lets' keep back at our main one. Don't forget to have your meal at Trattoria San Giovanni welcomed by Gina and Vincenzo, wife and husband, running together the place with their home-made cuisine rich of Sicilian flavour and ingredients. This amiable Tuscan lady moved to Piana degli Albanesi 45 years ago, to follow her love for Vincenzo. Isn't this such an old-style romance?

As first course we had superbe home-made fresh pasta dishes: panzotti di ricotta al finnocchietto selvatico con pomodoro a pezzi, melanzane e ricotta salata (panzotti pasta filled with ricotta cheese favoured with wild fennel with rustic tomato sauce, fried aubergines and salty ricotta cheese) and tagliatelle al pistacchio (tagliatelle pasta with pistachio sauce). They use an extra-virgin olive oil which is so smelly and pure you can enjoy it simply with their fresh bread.

As second course we had involtini di melanzane arrostite con mortadella, sottilette e foglie di alloro (roasted aubergine rolls filled with mortadella cut and cheese and flavoured with laurel leaves) and salsiccia locale arrosto con finocchetto selvatico (local roasted sausages flavoured with wild fennel).

What a delight for our senses! The whole meal was so simple and so perfect in taste you could not ask for anything else. There is no need for haute-cuisine or Michelin star restaurants when you experience such a local delicious food!

Parmigiana di melanzane? Typical Sicilian!

2009-06-29T02:11:00.000-07:00

Yummy, yummy! It's time of one of my favourite dishes, eggplant Parmesan, also known as parmigiana di melanzane.
Despite its name, the word "parmigiana" does not derive from that of the Parmisan cheese but is the Italianization of the Sicilian dialectic word "parmiciana" which are the slats of wood composing the central part of a shutter and overlapping in the same manner as the slices of eggplant in the dish. It seems that parmigiana is a heritage of the Greek and Arab dominations in Sicily as it recalls the Greek moussaka and the Arab tiani.
It's way of cooking differs from area to area so, as usual, I post my family recipe.

Ingredients
serves 4 pax

4 medium/big size eggplants
200 gr pulped tomatoes
1 small onion
1 clove of garlic
2 eggs
100 gr of mortadella (or ham)
basil
salty ricotta cheese (or Parmesan)
extra-virgin olive oil
salt

1. Slice eggplants about half a centimeter thick (you should slice them lenghtways), pour eggplants in layers into a bowl filled with cold water covering each one with salt and let them rest for about 30 minutes. Then, stir and let them rest again for about 10 minutes on a dishcloth.

2. Use a frying pan, pour some olive oil and start frying the slices of eggplants on both sides until they get brown. Let each slice dry on a blotting paper.

3. Prepare the tomato sauce: cut the onion and the garlic finely up, pour some olive oil into a pan and brown them, then add pulped tomatoes and let everything cook for about 15 minutes until it thickens. Add salt and basil as you like.

4. In a oven-proof dish start arranging the fried slices of eggplants in layers and be careful not to place one on another if possible. Pour some tomato sauce along the first layer spreading it evenly and grate some salty ricotta cheese (or Parmesan). Add a new layer of eggplants and cover them with slices of mortadella or ham. Proceed with layers alternating one with tomato sauce and ricotta cheese/Parmesan with another with mortadella or ham until you reach 4 or 5 different layers.

5. Beat the eggs and cover with it the last layer of eggplants. Preheat the oven at 200°C for about 10 minutes, then put the parmigiana into the oven for about 30 minutes until the eggs get a brown ring.

6. You can serve it warm or better let it rest and serve cold. Before serving, you can decorate it with some tomato sauce, flakes of ricotta cheese/Parmesan and basil.

Tricks & tips:
- use the long oval eggplant, dark purple in color, and be careful to choose the ones with the right consistency as they should be not too soft nor too hard
- to increase taste, you can add some mozzarella or caciocavallo cheese between layers
- grill the eggplants for a savour but light version of parmigiana but please, first cook it as per my recipe, you will taste (and appreciate!) the difference!

Buon appetito!

Frivolous granita? Something you cannot do without it

2009-06-07T09:26:00.001-07:00

Are you planning to visit Sicily? Are you a foodie-kind of traveler?

There is a list of local food and delicacies you cannot miss. Granita, arancini, cannoli and cassata are top on the list and if do not taste at least one of them you cannot proudly say "I was in Sicily"!

Let's start with granita, my favourite. What is funny to me is reading worldwide accredited and reliable guides writing that granita is made with ice and syrup. I suppose those writers have never been to Sicily or have never tasted granite in Sicily to talk and write nonsense.
It is true that in the past people used to prepare granita with snow and lemon juice, this was typical of Messina area, while Catania dignified the "minnulata" a granita made exclusively of almonds.
Born originally in Messina, granita is diffused all around the island. It is a kind of sorbet, the basic recipe includes water (not ice!) and sugar to which several ingredients are added to characterize its flavor: lemon, almond, strawberry, coffee, chocolate (it matches perfectly with the almond one), pistachio (try it in Catania area!), mulberries, peach, just to mention some.Bars and cafès rigorously serve in a transparent glass and you may ask to add some panna (cream) on the top or at the bottom of the glass (this is used in Messina area where they add panna both at the bottom and on the top of the coffee granite) and match it with a fragrant brioche. So, while in Sicily ask for "granita con panna e brioche"!

Granita is a true masterpiece of Sicilian cooking and the favourite piece for summer breakfast (don't be afraid to have a granita any time during the day, you will see local people have lunch with it or eat it at midnight!).
Believe me, it is absolutely a must, a frivolous titbit you will never forget!

In Sicily the method to make it is completely different from the north of Italy where they use to make ice, crush it and then add the flavour. Here, bars and cafes use a special machine with blades able to keep moving the liquid at a very low temperature so avoiding it to solidify. A high percentage of sugar in the liquid favours the preparation of a sort of cream which is the granite itself.

Now, you wonder, can we do home-made granita? Definitely yes!

Ingredients
Serves 4/5 people

½ a lt of lemon juice (use 8/10 organic lemons only)
½ a lt of water
500 gr of caster sugar
Grated lemon peel (1/2 organic lemons are enough)
A steel bowl

1. Grate the lemon peel and then squeeze the lemons to prepare the juice.
2. Boil the water and let it rest until tepid, then add sugar, lemon juice and grated lemon peel. Let it cool.
3. Pour it in the steel bowl and put it in the freezer. Stir the liquid every 20/30 minutes using a fork or a whisk so to avoid its solidification.
4. When the liquid becomes grainy, granite is ready. Serve it in transparent glasses with tea spoons and fresh cream.

Buon appetito!

P.S. The brioche recipe will be posted at soonest!

© Text and pictures by Doriana Briguglio

Sweet & sour Caponata

2009-04-30T09:22:00.000-07:00

Hello from sunny Sicily! Yes, spring is on and summer is coming soon. Weather is getting warmer and warmer and it’s time for my favourite vegetables and food. I can start dreaming about caponata, parmigiana, peperonata, granite and all those unique dishes that give Sicilian cuisine a unique savour.

For Sicilian cookery tradition caponata means summer, eggplants, magic and delicate equilibrium between sweet and sour, flavours that get mixed up without confusing. Don’t ask me what caponata means. I tried to find out but the etymology is not that clear. It might come from the latin word capare meaning chopping up ingredients to mix them in a kind of alchemic way of cooking. It might come from the Italian name of the cat fish capone which was originally used in the past in the haute-cuisine of the Monsu’, the French chefs cooking for the noble Sicilian families. Common people couldn’t afford to buy fresh fish, quite expensive even at those times, so they customized the recipe using fresh season vegetables. It is not a difficult dish, it takes only a lot of time to cook it properly, but I would suggest you how to save time without losing flavor. There are many versions of caponata, I will give you mine, a family recipe.

Ingredients
Serves 4 pax

2 medium-size aubergines

2 medium-size yellow and red peppers
1 big or 2 medium-size onions
the core of 1 celery
about 20g of capers
100g of stoned green olives
about 30g of raisins
about 20g of pine-seeds
2 bay leaves
2 tbsp of sugar
1 coffee cup of vinegar (balsamic is fine)
salt

1. Prepare the most important ingredients first: cut the aubergines in small pieces , use a bowl with cold water, pour the aubergines and let them rest for about 30 minutes , then stir them. Clean the peppers and cut them in small pieces, be careful not to leave any seeds. Cut the onions in small pieces as well as the celery and the green olives.

2. Use a frying-pan to brown each ingredient one per time: first the aubergines, second peppers, then onions.

3. Mix aubergines, peppers and onions and add all ingredients (except sugar, vinegar and bay leaves). Let everything cook for about 10 minutes giving astir now and then.

4. Add vinegar, sugar and bay leaves, give a stir and let everything cook for about 5 minutes.

5. Let everything rest and cool as it must be served cold.

Tricks & tips
- For a light version put all ingredients in a baking-pan and cook put in the oven for about 30 minutes at 240°C stirring every 10 minutes. Then, add vinegar, sugar and bay leaves, give a stir and let everything cook for about 5 minutes.
- You can also use zucchini as an additional ingredient.
- Caponata is usually a side-dish for meat and fish but, if you use no vinegar and no sugar you can also use it to season pasta (absolutely short pasta such as penne).

Buon appetito!

© Text and pictures by

Doriana Briguglio

Therapeutical oregano and pasta?

2009-04-15T08:31:00.000-07:00

During Easter holidays I had a couple of very good friends from Norway, we spent most of the time eating, you know :) … a welcome dinner at home on Friday, we went out for lunch and dinner on Saturday, family lunch for Easter day, and again what we call “scampagnata” (a day trip into the country) on Easter Monday, yes … definitely too much food!
I guess everything started on Sat morning when I brought them out for a walking tour downtown in Catania. We stopped both at the fish market and at the central marked and they were truly amazed by the mountains of fresh and dried oregano.
Then, eating here and there, they realized how much we use oregano when cooking and finally they asked that question. What about oregano and why do you use it so much? It was not only me surprised I mean, some of my friends there were really upset and looked at them as a sort of extraterrestrial phenomena!

I recovered and soon realized they were right somehow, we use a lot of oregano every day. I guess there are food and ingredients we take for granted and it is not so. It’s only us from Mediterranean countries or is anyone else in the rest of the world so crazy about oregano?
To tell the true they were a bit confused about oregano, they thought that oregano is the essential herb to be used for pizza only, they also confused oregano and wild majorana! They look very much alike, but sorry, they are not the same herb.
We urged to fill the gap and explain them how to use oregano when cooking, with some tricks and tips.
The oregano plant is a perennial which grows up to two feet tall and bears tiny leaves which lend a pungent aroma and strong flavor to a variety of savory foods. While its gentler flavor is sweeter and its aroma not quite as pungent, marjoram belongs to the same family (Laminaceae) as the oregano (Origanum majorana and origanum vulgare). Wild marjoram has leaves which are slightly hairy and more gray-green in color. When in bloom, the plant or oregano sports pink or purple flowers which are also edible. The leaves are used fresh from the plant or dried. Oregano is one of the few herbs that is stronger when dried than when fresh.
My granny used to praise its therapeutical properties thanks to its active principles, fat, mineral salts, proteins and vitamins: analgesic, antalgic, antiseptic, antispasmodic, anti-inflammatory and tonic. She used its brew to naturally cure cough, headache and rheumatic pains.

Back to cuisine, this is a fragrant and appetizing pasta dish, perfect to cook when your larder is almost empty or you have short time to spend in the kitchen or when you are just tempted by a good pasta dish.

Ingredients:
Serves 4 pax

400g of ruled penne pasta
extra-virgin olive oil
1 big onion
1 tbsp tomato puree
grated parmesan cheese
oregano
salt

1. Slice off finely the onion. Pour some extra-virgin olive oil in a frying pan and add the onion.
2.When it gets brown add a spoon of tomato puree and stir for a couple of seconds so to combine well the sauce, then add some oregano and taste as you go.
3.In the meanwhile, put a saucepan on to cook with water for the pasta and bring it to the boil. Add about 2 tbsp of salt and pour the penne.
4.Be careful to strain al dente then pour it into the frying pan stirring well the pasta and its sauce. Serve it in a bowl covering with parmesan cheese.

Tricks & Tips
* When using dried oregano, crush it in the palm of your hand before adding to the food. This helps release essential oils and revive flavor.
* Oregano can become overpowering and bitter if too much is used on foods with mild flavor. Taste as you go.

* Don't be afraid, try it out with salads, fish and meat!

My Norwegian friends went back home with half a kilo of dried oregano in their suitcases!

Buon appetito!

Easter delights for senses

2009-04-07T12:09:00.000-07:00

It would be easy to say I made these small cute pastries but it wouldn't be true. These are masterpieces of the ancient tradition of the Sicilian convents and are made by the gentle and skilled hands of old nuns whose recipes will maybe disapper with them.

My good friend Aldo Grasso, I've already posted about him and about his Enoteca di Sicilia, did a great job. He is a taste hunter who travels aorund Sicily to seek and find out stories and recipes of our culinary traditions. Easter travel is undoubtly the most interesting one made to discover that great cutural heritage hidden into the kitchens of the convents. Pastries and desserts of Holy week come from cloisters located mostly in Western Sicily: Mazara del Vallo, Alcamo, Erice, Agrigento, Palam di Montechiaro, Mistretta. These pastries are true masterpieces of the culinary art, some of them dating back to the Midde-Ages. Made basically of Sicilian almonds, sometimes filled with pistach or citron, they offer a perfect balance of taste, fragrance and sugar. Aboslutely hand-made, there is no space for industrial production.
For those of you who see themselves as taste hunters I strongly suggest to order these unique Sicilian delicacies, a great delight for adults and children!

Enoteca di Sicilia
Viale Africa 31
95100 Catania (Sicily, Italy)
T + 39 095 7462210
E enotecaregionale@tiscali.it

Picture & text © Doriana Briguglio

Easter or theatre?

2009-03-29T10:46:00.000-07:00

Is there any other place in the world where feast and theatre are strictly weaved together to celebrate the Holy Week? If yes please, I would like to know.

I've recently made a plan for some friends of mine coming from US and willing to travel to Sicily during Easter holidays. I suggested them to visit those villages and towns where those days going from Palm Sunday to Easter Day are plenty of both sacred and profane rituals. A very unsual journey into the hidden atmospheres of the Christian faith and the theatrical celebration of Easter.

I sent them some pictures and links about places and performances and ... they were shocked! Excited! Exhalted by the idea of actively participating to those celebrations both as actors and audience, as most of the local people do!

Every town and every village participates to Easter feasts with its own rituals deriving from usages and customs, from ancient traditions in which it is not always possible to find out origins and motives.

The list of those places is rich but I would like to mention some of the most interesting ones, those I find most picturesque and fanciful:

- The Holy Week in Enna with its climax on Good Friday

- The Procession of the Misteries in Trapani again with its peak on Good Friday

- The Devils' dance (Ballo dei Diavoli) for Easter Day in Prizzi, Palermo area

- The Judaeans' feast (Festa dei Giudei) for Holy Thursday and Good Friday in San Fratello, Messina area
- The Diavolata for Easter Day in Adrano, Catania/Mt Etna area.

Which of the above pictures refers to the above-mentioned feasts?

If you happen to imagine a travel to Sicily and maybe plan it, take into consideration Easter Week and enjoy with us our celebrations! Don't forget to celebrate with the right Sicilian Easter menu (I will post some recipes at soonest) and chocolate Easter eggs!

And in the meanwhile, learn how to say Happy Easter in Italian:

Buona Pasqua!

© Text and pictures by Doriana Briguglio

Torrone catanese at the market

2009-03-22T14:03:00.000-07:00

What do you usually do when you need to get inspired?

Ops, I'm not getting mad, don't worry, no knives :)

When I need inspiration I like wandering about Catania, aimlessly, just look at the people, the places and wait to be brighted with a brillant flash of illumination. Usually, it works. My camera is always with me, you'll never know!

I don't know why but these wandering often lead me to one of my favourite places in Catania: the market. Well, I should say there are two main markets who are worth to visit: the fish market (what a terrific place! I promise I will tell about it soon) and the "fera 'o luni", the central market where you can find almost everything, food, beverages, clothes, shoes, accessories, dress-materials, detergents, soaps of any kind. What do you need? Be sure you can find it there! Any traveller visiting Catania should stop at both markets: you will never forget the people, their shouts, the colours, the smells. You might be shocked or better delighted, in both cases a unique experience.

So, I was there last week and I was lucky enough to find something it is not easy to see: the torrone making.

What's the torrone? It's a kind of noughat made basically of almonds and honey and is very common in Sicily as a sort of dessert, sometimes even a sort of distraction, when you've got that yen to eat something or for pangs of hunger. It's part of the inheritance left by the Arab domination in Sicily (a lot of the Arab tradition is in our food and recipes).

I stood bewitched by the maker: his figure quite dramatic, a typical middle-aged Sicilian man of Mediterranean origins, his movements gentle and speed, his eyes dark and brilliant. I'd never seen torrone making before, I was ravished!

I asked him to give me his recipe to make the torrone at home. He was very nice !

1 kg of almonds
1 kg of sugar
4 spoons of honey
Some orange rind finely cut up
Olive oil
Half a lemon

1. Dip the almonds in hot water for a couple of minutes, peel them and then wipe carefully.
2. Pour the almonds, the sugar and the honey into a large pan and cook on a very low flame, stirring continuously to avoid sugar to stick.
3. Prepare the top, preferably a marble one, and wet it with some olive oil. Use a spatula and damp it with the lemon.
4. Wait until the sugar is melted, pour the mixture on the marble top and use the spatula to level it. When it is cold, cut it in reatnular pieces with a strong knife.

Buon appetito!

Regina Lucia - interior and food design in Syracuse

2009-03-12T13:11:00.000-07:00

A brand new restaurant in Syracuse, the Regina Lucia, located in Piazza Duomo: an excellent excercise of style for interior and food design in Sicily.

Syracuse is one of the most interesting and beautiful Sicilian town: it is a must-to-visit for everyone travelling around Sicily. I couple of weeks ago I was there with my husband to see what was new in town and Regina Lucia is definitely the most interesting news.

I said an excellent excercise of interior and food and design. The venue, more a multi-functionnal place than just a restaurant, is charming, the vaulted roof and walls of limestone dating back to the Sicilian Baroque-style period, late 1600, match perfectly with the essential and pure lines of the furniture.

The food tells about the territory, ingredients are fresh and local, the extra-virgin olive oil is delicious with the home-made bread. Each plate is quite balanced referring both to its flavours and its design. The chef is very young and very promising.

Let me tell you that the real plus of Regina Lucia is its staff: professional, corteous, smiling. Not very easy to find in Sicily.

And creative, yes they are. I'm allergic to a lot of things, I couln't eat any of the desserts listed in the menu. They came with a brand new dessert created last-second for me: a delicious just made almond torrone (kind of nougat) flavoured with lemon flakes and covered with segments of tangerins and chocolate topping! I was very honoured for this "Doriana's extravagance"!

Regina Lucia

http://www.reginalucia.it/

Piazza Duomo 6, Siracusa

T + 0931 22509

In Sicily, every Saint has got his/her pastries!

2009-02-05T09:04:00.000-08:00

I was at Enoteca di Sicilia a couple of days ago and my good friend Aldo showed me a typical pastry of the period named seno di vergine (virgin's breast). I've made a quick research and realized how in Sicily every Saint is strictly linked with some special pastry or dessert.

Today, the 5th of March the city of Catania celebrates her patron Saint: Agatha. To tell the true, the feast in her honour starts on the 3rd of March and goes on evey day, 24 hrs per day, ending usually on the mornig of the 6th. But, I will post more details about this incredible and huge sacred attraction.

The brown pastries is named seno di vergine, virgin's breast (I'll revert back with a specific post about it), the white one is more specifically St Agatha's breast. Both have the shape of a breast and accordingy are usually made in different sizes with the tipples made of pastry or candied cherry. The green ones are named St. Agatha's olive and made of marzipan.

To understand what is behind the pastries showed in the picture, first I have to tell you briefly about the life of St. Agatha.

She was of a rich and illustrious family, and having been consecrated to God from her tender years, triumphed over many assaults upon her chastity. Quintianus, a man of consular dignity, bent on gratifying his lust, imagined he should easily compass his wicked designs on Agatha's person and estate by means of the emperor's edict against the Christians. He therefore caused her to be apprehended and brought before him at Catania. On her appearance, Quintianus gave orders for her being put into the hands of Aphrodisia who, with six daughters, all prostitutes, kept a common stew. Quintianus, being informed of her constancy after thirty days, ordered her to be brought before him. The virgin told him that to be a servant of Jesus Christ was the most illustrious nobility and true liberty. Quintianus offended at her resolute answers, commanded her to be buffeted and led to prison and then to be stretched on the rack, which torment was usually accompanied with stripes, the tearing of the sides with iron hooks, and burning them with torches or matches. Then, enraged to see her suffer all this with cheerfulness, he commanded her breast to be tortured, and afterwards to be cut off. At which she made him this reproach: "Cruel tyrant, do you not blush to torture this part of my body, you that sucked the breasts of a woman yourself?

Gelo all'arancia! Does it sound good?

2009-01-29T10:57:00.000-08:00

You bet!
It sounds good, it taste delicious!

The arancia rossa (red orange) also named tarocco is one of the most delicious autochthonous cultivar in Sicily. It a typical winter orange, widely used for fresh juice.

It's also a perfect ingredient for a typical Sicilian gelo (sort of fruit jelly).

Preparing the gelo
serves 6/8 people

half a lt of orange juice
180 grams of sugar
half a squeezed lemon
17 grams of gelatine
pistach powder

1. Squeeze the organges to get half a liter of juice. Pour it into a bowl and add the lemon juice.
2. Prepare a syrup, boiling half a lt of water and adding the sugar, stirring well so to dissolve it.
3. Pour some water into a bowl, dip the gelatine sheets and let it soften for about 5 minutes. Then, wring it and add into the syrup. Stir until it is completeply dissolved.
4. Pour everything into the juice bowl, strir well. Pour the mixture into a pudding mould (better if made of alluminium or glass). Put it into the fridge for at least 2/3 hours.
5. When it gets a jelly consistency, put it in a double boiler (bain-marie) with lukewarm water for a few seconds. Then, turn it upside down using a plate or a tray.
6. Decorate with pistach powder, slice ad serve it.
You can also use whipped cream, fresh fruit, almonds or chocolate flakes to decorate it.

Buon appetito!

Green long onions, a winter type

2009-01-28T13:16:00.000-08:00

I mentioned the green long onions last Monday for Orange salad: healthy, fresh and fanciful. I said I was not sure you could find them out of Italy. It's better I post a picture, just to be sure you know exactly what we are talking about. It's a typical winter type of onion, our markets are full of it. Hope you can buy it at home as it is light and tasty. This picture was taken this morning at the main market in Catania. You cut the grey filaments, skin it from the external green part and use only the white one.

picture © Doriana Briguglio

Lemon juice: enhance taste and prevent from oxidation

2009-01-26T13:23:00.000-08:00

Use the lemon juice to rub peeled and sliced pears and apples

to be used for cakes, preserves or jams.

It will enhance their flavour and prevent them from oxidation.

Text and picture copyright by Doriana Briguglio

Orange salad: healthy, fresh and fanciful

2009-01-26T12:09:00.000-08:00

Typically Sicilian, it's healthy, fresh and fanciful! It's a winter salad!

My main regret is we can't have it during those Sicilian sunny and hot summer days when you need anything helpful to cool down and the temperature outside is about 40/42°C!

Preparing the salad
serves 2 people

2 medium/big oranges

4/6 black olives

half a medium fennel

half a red onion

(we call them "onions from Tropea" a small town in Calabria along the Tyrrenian coast or "cipolla Calabria")

OR 2 long green onions (I'm not sure if you can find it out of Italy)

salt

extra virgin olive oil

1. Skin the red onion, cut it upright into 2 pieces and slice it finely. Take a bowl, fill it with cold water, put one tsp of salt and then the onion. Let it rest for a couple of hours so to help the onion to get rid of its bitter taste.

You do not need to do it if you use the long green ones.

2. Peel the organges: cut the head and foot first, place the orange upright and peel it vertically so to remove the peel and the white part under it (the orange must be with no filaments. Then cut the orange in segments and then each segment into 2 or 3 parts.

3. Stone the olives and cut them in pieces.

4. Remove the external leaf of the fennel,put it upright and cut vertically and finely. Wash it carefully with a bit of sodium bicarbonate (1 tsp in fine, it helps to clean from any impurity).
5. Wipe the onion.
6. Mix all ingredients, dress with salt and extra virgin olive oil. Let it rest 30 minutes before serving it. Use the salad as side-dish with roast meat or fish.

Buon appetito!

Text and pictures copyright by Doriana Briguglio

Palermo & Panelle

2009-01-16T03:41:00.001-08:00

I love panelle!

It happens quite often for me to go to Palermo, both for business or go and visit friends.
I was in Palermo a couple of days ago. I like this city a lot and I shoudn't say that! You have to know that the two cities, Catania and Palermo, are ancient rivals. And I'm from Catania!

Palermo is an amazing capital, so full of culture and history and monuments and food!

Between a kind of Sicilian street food and a Sicilian fast food, when you say panelle you immediately figure Palermo. Panelle are one of those Palermitani specialties you can easily everywhere around the city. Traditionally food for poor people, nowadays panelle are widely meant as a type of starter or appetizer. They can become a quick and tasty snack for lunch when used to fill a sandwich.

I can't resist and everytime I'm in Palermo I buy some raw to bring, fry and eat at home.
I went and see a very good Palermitano friend of mine and asked his mum to give me her panelle recipe. It is not a very easy recipe but it s worth to try!

Panelle
serves 4 people

1 lt of water
350 grams of chickpeas flour
some fresh parsley
seed oil
salt

1. Salt the water and put it into a pan. Add little by little the chickpeas flour, stiring slowingso to avoid becoming lumpy.

2. Put the pan on the ring and add the parsley, previously cut finely. Continue stiring until all water is soaked and the flour moves away from the pan.

3. Turn off the ring and slowly pour the flour on a moistened top (marble is better). With a wet spatula strecht it out so to get a uniform surface of about 3 mm.

4. Let it cool.

5. Cut the mixture into small squared pieces of about 9/10 cm per side (you can give them any shape you like but just remember to have small pieces), put them into a fryng pan plenty of hot oil.

6. When fine browned (both sides), put them out and lay them down on a plate covered with blotting paper. Salt and serve warm alone or in a sandwich. You can add some lemon drops: delicious!

Buon appetito!

Picture: "Palermitani Panelle" © Doriana Briguglio

Slow Food Presidia: 29 good, clean and fair reasons for travelling to and around Sicily

2009-01-11T07:32:00.000-08:00

I was surprised and incredulous the first time I I run up against a Chinese garlic at a famous local chain of supermarkets. "What the hell I have to do with a Chinese garlic?". Made in China, when I expected to find a Made in Italy or better a Made in Sicily, since we produce top quality varieties. I was really very disappointed. Nevertheless, it was late, I needed it and I bought it as I had no alternative. Let me tell you that I got really pissed off when cooking I realized that, apart from its pefect shape, it stinks. I threw it away.

It's like buying Chinese pasta or Chinese lemons! In Sicily! No way, at least for me.

During Christmas time, I went to Aldo at Enoteca Sicilia to buy some wine and I left with a with a typical treccia d'aglio, a plait of original Sicilian garlic from Nubia, a Trapani town district. It's named the red garlic, it is tasty and smells properly. I was happy and satisfied!

This aglio roso di Nubia (red garlic from Nubia) is part of the Slow Food Presidia in Sicily whose goal is to protect products at real risk of extincion, connected to a group memory and cultural identity, produced in limited quantities using traditional methods, of high quality and respecting environmental and social values.

Food tells a lot of a territory and its people's culture, it tells about its roots, its present time and its future.
Sicily has a heritage of specialty agrifood products rivaling with any in the world.
Slow Food (for those who still do not know about Slow Food it is a non-profit, eco-gastronomic member-supported organization that was founded in 1989 to counteract fast food and fast life, the disappearance of local food traditions and people’s dwindling interest in the food they eat, where it comes from, how it tastes and how our food choices affect the rest of the world) has focused 29 Presidia in Sicily (based basicly on bread, oil, cheese, vegetables, seafood) achieving an impressive result by promoting and coordinating dialog between small producers, helping to create a sense of social solidarity and contributing to local economic and social development.

Food might be a good excuse to travel or might be a chance for a proper travelling style.

If you are a foody kinda traveller you have 29 good reasons for travelling to and around Sicily. The map of the Sicilian Presidia reveals how diffused these produtcs are in the region and therefore how close still is the relationship between pastoral agriculture, biodiversity, tradition and economic development.

While visiting the top tourist Sicilian sites such as Taormina, Mt Etna, Catania, Aeolian Islands, Noto an Syracuse, the Valley of the Temples in Agrigento, Palermo and Monreale, Trapani and Erice, take a map of the Presidia with you and add a visit to local producers or restaurants using the Presidia products, just to mention some of them:

Red Garlic fron Nubia (Trapani), caper from Salina (Aeolian Islands), onion from Giarratana, cuddriredda (sort of bread) from Delia (Agrigento area), lentils from Ustica island, Interdonato lemon type, Maiorchino cheese from Novara di Sicilia (Messina area), almonds from Noto, black bread from Castelvetrano, peaches from Leonforte (Enna area), pistach from Bronte (Etna area), provola cheese from Nebrodi Mountains, sea salt from Trapani, black pork from Nedrodi Mountains.

Your travel will be enriched with tasty memories and unforgetable images of our island.

Buon viaggio e buon appetito!

Picture: "Red garlic from Nubia" © Doriana Briguglio

Zucchini, potatos & tuma cheese sformato

2009-01-07T11:32:00.000-08:00

Mine is preatty a big family. I have 17 first cousins from my father's side that makes more or less 45 if we consider wives, husbands and children. We are very close and now and then organize family reunions to spend time together.

Last Saturday I had about 16 out of 45 for dinner.

But this was not a planned one, we just decided on Saturday morning after a few quick phone calls to wish each other Happy New 2009!

My menu choice always starts opening the fridge: I had just bought some fresh green zucchini and I decided to use them somehow.

I imagined zucchini with potatoes, so I just had to figure out the best recipe and shape.
This is a brand-new recipe I want to share with you and just one of the 5 courses served that night.

Zucchini, potatoes & tuma cheese sformato

serves 8 persons (regular course)

3 zucchini, medium/big size
8 potatoes, medium size
tuma cheese OR emmental cheese (or any other kid of tasty stringy one)
1 egg
2 spoons of parmesan cheese
dried mint
parsley
extra virgin olive oil
salt

1. Use a deep pan to boil 4 whole potatoes. When you manage to easily slip the fork in, potatoes are ready. Strain them and let them cool.

2. Peel the potatoes and cut them in pieces and put them into a bowl. Mash them, then add the egg, parmesan cheese, parsley, a bit of salt and mix all together.

3. Wash and slice the zucchini (about 5 mm each), wash and slice the potatoes (about 5 mm each).

4. Use a pie-dish and make a first layer of about 1 cm with the potato mixture, so to have a close and regualr bottom. Add alternatively a layer of zucchini with a layer of sliced potatoes. Between the layers, remember to pour drops of extra virgin olive oil, dust salt and dried mint.

5. On top, add the sliced cheese. Bake into the oven at 180°C for about 20 minutes. Serve it warm.

Buon appetito!

Picture: © Doriana Briguglio

Cauliflower sformato: when your husband hates cauliflower and you don't!

2009-01-04T12:19:00.001-08:00

My husband Enzo hates cauliflowers.
To tell the truth he hates eating whatever is green colored, that means most of the vegetables, which is a problem for me since I really love them!

These are real problems for a couple! The only way to solve this kitchen issue is to find the right way to cook them and let him think he's eating something else.

What to do with cauliflowers? What Enzo really hates is their consistency. So, the easiest solution was to make a change to my mom's sformato di cavolfiore (cauliflower flan).

Preparing the flan (serves 2/3 persons)

1 big cauliflower

1 egg

5 spoons of Parmisan OR Grana Padano cheese

150 grams of fusing cheese (at your choice)

4/5 slices of ham

2 spoons of salt

extra virgin olive oil

2 spoons of breadcrumb

1. Wash carefully your cauliflower and cut it into several pieces, be sure to cut not only the flower but also a bit of stalk.

2. Use a deep pan, fill with water (water must cover every piece of cauliflower) and put the salt(taste the water now and then and adjust with more salt if neede). When it begins to boil, dip the cauliflower and let it cook until you easily manage to penetrate the stalk with a fork. Strain the cauliflower until it completely loses the water.

3. Put the cauliflower into a bowl and mash it with a fork. Add the egg and the parmisan and mix all ingredients. If the cauliflower has been correctly strained, you will get a thick consistency.

4. Use a small/medium pie-dish (the size actually depends on how big the cauliflower is) and with a serviette soaked in olive oil moist the the whole internal surface of the pie-dish. Then, do the same with the breadcrumb so to cover all sides.

5. Ideally divide the cauliflower mixture into two parts. Create a first layer of mashed cauliflower (about 2 cm), a second layer with the slices of ham, a third one with the cheese and a fourth one with the rest of the cauliflower.

6. With a fork creates your own decoration. Add some parmesan cheese on the top and bake it into the oven at 180°C for about 25 minutes.

Let it rest for a couple of minutes, don't tell your husband what dish it is and serve it preatty warm.

"Not bad, taste very good, I think I can eat it once again", Enzo said.

Yes, what a success!

Happy New 2009!

2009-01-01T06:29:00.000-08:00

Happy New 2009!

May this year bring serenity and prosperity to you, your families and friends!

Christmas Eve dinner

2008-12-26T04:11:00.001-08:00

orange salad

selection of typical Sicilian appetizers

Fourteen people at dinner for Cristmas Eve and two days for preparing all the courses.

Big families' reunions are a tradition for Christmas Eve as well as a table laid carefully and prepared for the feast with rich food.

The menu included:

a rich selelction of Sicilian appetizers:
eggplants fillets in oil

artichokes in oil

green and black olives

green olives filled with breadcrumbs and pecorino chesse

round chilly peppers filled with tuna fish

red chilly peppers filled with anchovies

cloves of sweet garlic in oil

cherry tomatoes in oil

a selection of Sicilian cheese and salami:

smoked provola cheese

(a type of cheese made from buffalo's milk from Ragusa area)

tuma cheese

strong provolone cheese

home-made salami from Sant'Angelo di Brolo

zuzzo (sort of pork in aspic)

ham and cheese mousse

two types of mignon crepes:

one filled with ricotta cheese and spinach flavoured with butter and

the other filled with bechamel and mushrooms

two types of typical Catanese scacciata

(a sort of covered pizza with fillings):

one type filled with tuma cheese and anchovies and

the other filled with wild vegetables and sausages

(these two prepared by my sister in law)

cauliflower croquettes

flavoured with bacon and cheese

dried cod croquettes

orange salad

with fennel and green onion

home made chocolate birthday cake

(it was my bother's birthday)

panettone and pandoro

During dinner, wine was red from Regaleali winery.

After dinner, together with dried fruit and nuts to munch (these are typical at Christmastime) Sicilian liqueurs and digestives made of fennel, tangerine, lemon and Moscato wine.

There was enough to feed an army!

P.S. I will post some of these recipes during the next days

Talks about wine: Zibibbo, the wine to make merry

2008-12-21T12:35:00.000-08:00

Let's start our talks about Sicilian wine from the Zibibbo (kind of muscatel wine), once named by Sicilians "the wine to make merry".

Brought by the Phoenicians to the Sicilian island of Pantelleria, the name Zibibbo comes from the Arab "zabib" meaning raisins. Pantelleria still is owns the biggest national production.

The prevailing use of the Zibibbo grape is to make wine or sun-dried as raisins. The wine is usually straw yellow with gold tints, very sweet, with a high alcohol content and a characteristic smell.

I would like to thank Aldo from Enoteca di Sicilia for being our guide to understand and appreciate this typical wine of Sicily.

"When we talk about Zibibbo, Aldo says, we refer both to the name of the vine and the wine we get from it. It is the perfect wine to match with typical Sicilian desserts which are greatly based on almonds suh as paste di mandorla (almond pastries) and cassata cake. Pantelleria as well as Marsala and Trapani are the areas devoted to the production in Sicily. Depending on the vintage time we have four types of different wines:

1. End of August harvest: the wine produced is a very fragrant and dry Zibibbo, a table wine perfect to macht with apetizers and fish-dishes, to drink at 12°/13°C.

2. September harvest: the wine becomes gold yellow, sweet, perfect to match with Sicilian desserts such as almond pastries, cassata and cannoli. To drink at 13°/14°C

I suggest to try "Zibibbo dolce" by Pipitone Spanò winery (about Eur 18,00).

3. End of September harvest: the grapes are dried in the sun on racks. The wine becomes passito, absolutely to drink alone at 13°/14°C.

"Vigna la Miccia" by Marco de Bartoli winery (about Eur 40,00) and "Kamma" by Murana winery (about Eur 40,00) are my favourites.

4. October harvest: the ripen grape becomes a more sweet muscatel one, amber in colour and aromatic. The wine is usually named Moscato di Pantelleria, perfect to match with dry desserts and pastries. To drink at 13°/14°C. It is impossible to find two similar passito wines, as bouquet and taste vary from wine to wine depending on the components. My list of top passito wines includes:

"Bukkuram" by Marco de Bartoli winery with a distinctive feature of apricot (about Eur 65,00)

"Martingale" by Murana winery, with its prevalent feature of dried figs (about Eur 70,00)

"Sangue d'Oro" by Carol Bouquet winery (about Eur 50,00)."

Good wines make people good-humored!

Sfoglio, a dessert from the Madonie area

2008-12-17T06:36:00.001-08:00

The Madonie Mountains are located not so far from Palermo holding some of the most distinctive and well-kept villages in Sicily, many on them dating back to the Middle Ages.

The recipe of the sfoglio goes back to the XIV - XV century a.C. when the nuns of the Santa Margherita Monastry, located in the village of Polizzi Generosa, used to cook it for their patron saint day St. Benedict.

Its main ingredient is the tuma cheese, being the first cheese deriving from the milk making.
Once it is cooked, you will never realise that cheese is really in the dessert and you will simply love it for its peculiar taste.

Preparing the puff pastry:
400 grams of white flour
200 grams of lard or butter
200 grams of sugar
4 yolks
3 Marsala wine spoons
(do not use any other spirit if you d not have the Marsala)
grated lemon rind
a bit of salt

Preparing the filling:
400 grams of grated tuma cheese
(if you do not find the tuma cheese you might use the ricotta cheese)
200 grams of sugar
25 grams of cinnamon powder
200 grams of plain chocolate
100 grams of candied pumpkin in small chops
2 beaten egg whites
icing sugar

Prepare the dough mixing well all ingredients, try not to knead it for long so to avoid the lard or butter soften it too much. When the puff pastry is ready, wrap it in a cloth and let it rest for about 2 hours. If it is possible, prepare the puff pastry one day in advance.

Grate the tuma cheese and add the beaten egg whites with the sugar, then the cinnamon powder, the chops of plain chocolate and of candied pumpkin. Mix well all ingredients and let it rest.

Roll out the puff pastry so to get two round pieces, one larger, one smaller.
The first, the larger, should be used to cover the pie-dish (better to roll out it straight on the greaseproof paper), the second to cover the filling.
Lay the puff pastry down with care on the pie-dish, pour the filling and cover it with the second puff pastry. Bake it at 180°C for about 40-50 minutes.

When it is cold, dust the cake with the icing sugar.

Tip: let it rest for 2 days before serving it. It will be delicious!

Picture: © Doriana Briguglio

Enoteca Sicilia - the wine with its soul

2008-12-17T02:22:00.000-08:00

Aldo is one of those people one should meet in life.

If you visit Catania I suggest to pop around his Enoteca di Sicilia ready to be overwhelmed by his infectious enthusiam.

Passionate, nice and friendly Aldo loves wines.

That's why Enoteca di Sicilia is not simply a wine shop. It is better a wine temple where knowledge, odours and favours reign undisputed.

Please, do not imagine Enoteca di Sicilia as one of those huge wine shops where you can find every kind of wine. Not at all! It is a small one room shop where Sicilian wines and wineries are selected exclusively for their quality production and not for the name of their brand.

You will be surprised by the numbers of small Sicilian wineries on the shelves, most of them producing just a few thounsands bottles.

But first, let me tell you that Aldo started to get in touch with the wine world during his studies in Greek philosophy, becoming a real passionate. Previously a history of art professor, during the '98 he decided that was not his way. In 2000 he launched the WWW - Wine Wednesday Workshops collecting friends and acquaintances around wine and food.

This is how the Enoteca Siciliana experience begun. Now it has established its reputation as the place where to taste and buy top Sicilian wines.

Since the very first beginning Aldo decided to select and suggest only Sicilian wines voicing great quality and impossible to find on the large-scale retail trade.

Sicily is the wine region par excellence. A perfect climate, a lot of sun and light give the vine in Sicily its best condition to ripen its bunches and give Sicily a great vocation to wine producing with wines of exceptional quality and of a very good relationship betweeen quality and price.

But, as Aldo says, there is a common trend to level any kind of wine to the consumer's taste.

"Each wine has its own peculiarities. Its diversity and its variety should communicate sensations, emotions, it should give a fund of sensory experiences always different one wine from then other. That's why as Enoteca di Sicilia, we have decided to avoid wines as copies of others, to escape from blazoned and prizewinner wines, from high-priced wines as false index of quality.

We said no to this market-oriented wine culture, indifferent to the territory and without identity.

We said and we say yes to those wineries exhaling the scents of an area, of a territory. Every winery has been selected according to careful criteria, above all a production from owned vines and wineyards. These wines may be different but all of them have their soul."

Enoteca di Sicilia is a great experience and Aldo is the perfect Cicerone along the wine routes of Sicily.

Federico (left) and Silvia (right) are his splendid children, helping Aldo to run Enoteca di Sicilia.

Enoteca di Sicilia

Viale Africa 31

95100 Catania (Sicily, Italy)

T + 39 095 7462210

E enotecaregionale@tiscali.it

Buccellato - the typical Sicilian dessert for Christmas

2008-12-15T12:21:00.000-08:00

The word Buccellato comes from the latin word buccellatum meaning half-eaten (or cucciddatu in Sicilian slang). It is a typical dessert for Christmas served all over the island. Cooked in the oven, it keeps for long and is used to eat it during all Christmas holidays. The home-made version may be covered with icing.

For the dough:
500 gr of wheat flour
500 gr of butter
200 gr of sugar
4 eggs
a glass of milk

For the stuffing:
300 gr of dried figs
200 gr of candied pumpkin in cubes
150 gr of walnuts
150 gr of raisins
50 gr of plain chocolate
50 of pistaches
150 gr of ground almonds
1 egg
2 cloves
cinnamon
ground black pepper

Preparing the dough:

Process the butter as a cream and add it to the flavour, the eggs, the sugar and the glass of milk. Prepare two pieces of dough, roll out them as a thick puff pastry and cut out two round shapes.

Preparing the filling:

Cut the dried figs in small pieces, cut roughly the pistaches, the almonds and the walnuts. In a bowl mix these ingredients with some slivers of plain chocolate, the raisins and the cubes of candied pumpkin. Add the egg, a bit of cinnamon, half a spoon of ground black pepper and the 2 cloves. Mix all ingredients to obtain a dense filling.

Cut the centre of the puff pastry with a round shape and put the filling on. Then, cover the filling with the second puff pastry so to get a ring. For accomplished cooks cut the pastry into several strips and create a sort of net to cover the filling.

Dust the buccellato with the chopped pistach and cook in the oven on a moderate flame for about 30 minutes.

When cold, add some candied fruit on top. Slice and serve it.

Buon appetito!

Cuccia cake - welcome to Christmas time

2008-12-14T09:58:00.000-08:00

The Cuccia is a typical Sicilian dessert which traditionally inaugurate Christmas time on the day of St. Lucy, the 13th of December.

500 gr of soft wheat
50 gr of fresh ricotta cheese
300 gr of sugar
100 gr of plain chocolate
1/2 a sachet of vanilla or cinnamon
pistachios or candid fruit
salt

The wheat must be soaked for 3 days and the water must be changed at least twice.
The day before preparing the cake, the wheat must be strained, then immersed into salty water and cooked on a low flame for 6/8 hours. Let it rest in the same pan all night long.

The day after, strain the wheat and put it in a bowl.

Then start preparing the ricotta cream: put the ricotta cheese and the sugar in a pan and cook it on a moderate flame, bring it to the boil and put it out. Make it cold and add the chocolate in pieces, the vanilla or the cinnamon and at last the wheat.
Finally, mix all ingredients, pour the mixture in a cake tin and let it rest for 3 hrs.
Serve it on a plate or on a small bowl and cover with pistachio or candid fruit.

About Sicily

2008-12-14T09:51:00.000-08:00

"… A landscape in which it is possible to find what on earth
seems to be made to seduce eyes, mind, imagination…".

These are the true words of a great writer Guy de Maupassant, who didn’t just imagine Sicily but really lived it.

I was born and raised in Sicily, I work in Sicily and I love and hate it.
This is a beautiful but so complicated island.
A holiday in Sicily is a journey to the roots of the world, a journey to a rich source of nature, history and culture, melted into a small triangle of land in the centre of the Mediterranean Sea.

I like to say that Sicily is The view of time.

Sicily, with about 5.200.000 inhabitants, is the most extensive region in Italy and the largest island in the Mediterranean and it is separated from the Italian peninsula by the Strait of Messina.

Sicily has always been a microcosm: a composite world in which people of different races, religions and languages have clashed and met in different periods of its history: the Greeks, the Phoenicians, the Romans, the Vandals, the Arabs, the Normans, the Swabians, the Spanish have created in the island a unique and multifaced development and interchange of civilization leaving a rich heritage in terms of culture, architecture, food, way of living.

Sicily is a land of great conflicts and contradictions. For its richness in beauty, nature, history, food I wish there was a corrsponding wealth in awareness, self determination, public consciousness, respect of the res publica, development.

Italians and mostly Sicilians are all around the world, many of them now descendants of the first immigrand of the beginning of the 20th century, others what I define the new de-luxe immigrants, people who decided to leave Italy and Sicily for top positions in the most advanced countries of the world.

This of mine is meant to be an ideal journey into space and time, to seek and to find flavours and colours, unique and unforgettable feelings and images.
This is an invitation to experience Sicily and enjoy everything this island can offer.

A new experience

2008-12-14T09:42:00.000-08:00

That's a new experience for me. I'm scared and excited about it.

I've always liked writing and to tell the true during my teens I thought I was going to be a journalist, a reporter or something like that. Then, life leads you somewhere else.

First of all I apologize to everyone for any kind of mistake you may find: I'm not a native English-speaker but I promise I'll try to do my best!

Why this blog? I travel since I was 14. I work in the travel business as I'm a event manager and I design, plan, organize and coordinate meetings and events. I meet thousands of people from all around the world. And, what is always surprising to me is the common opinion that Italy is a wonderful country: great food, superb wines, friendly people, gorgeous landscapes, rich in history, culture and monuments, a country where style and design are our king and queen and the motto (saying) "bella vita" is almost a religion.

That is true, but partially true.

One of my pastime is reading books about life in Italy and Sicily and most of all about Italian and Sicilian cuisine. What I find funny is that most of the time the authors are not Sicilian nor Italian even if they seem to know Italy and Sicily better that us. Expecially when talking about food, they seem to manage the secrets of our cooking even better than us.

That is sometimes true, not always true.

My commitment and my great pleasure will be to up-date you about Sicilian life through a true Sicilian point of view. It is a pure selfish need but also a way to claim the right to write and say about Sicily as a Sicilian.
I will introduce you to the Sicilian life through regular posting about food, wine, places, people and more.

I'm not a chef nor a wine maker, I'm not a writer nor a journalist. But I'm passionate about my country and I will be passionate in this new experience of mine.

And it is my opportunity to reach my teenager's dream! Thank's to technology, that's to Internet, thank's to the blogs!

Sometimes I will be the means as I would like to introduce you to great people I know: chefs, wine makers, designers, all good new and old friends of mine, to let you enjoy their Italian or Sicilian experience. Sometimes I will just write down my experience and share my thoughts with you.

So, welcome everybody, welcome to Sicily, welcome to The Sicilian Experience!