What are the typical regional dishes to taste in Sicily, what not to get lost in Catania, the street food of Palermo and all the other Sicilian cities, from desserts to first and second courses of meat and fish.
That Italy is the best place to eat all over the world is now a well-established fact. The real added value of Italian cooking is the variety, given by the regional cuisines that offer different typical dishes linked to tradition. It could be said that each region represents a chapter of Italian cuisine. Yet when it comes to Sicilian cooking, rather than a chapter, you should refer to an entire encyclopedia, because the variety of dishes and products is so vast that you never stop tasting and discovering.
Unmissable dishes of Sicilian cuisine
For this reason speak of what to eat typical in Sicily it is not exactly an easy task, because the list is so long and distributed that it risks not being exhaustive enough. I have to make a selection and speak only of the most famous and particular dishes, of those that cannot be missed during a trip to Sicily.
I would like to go a little against the tide and start from the end, or sweets. Sicilian pastry is among the most loved and known all over the world. The cannon and cassata they are also very famous overseas, and you can eat them everywhere, but try them in Sicily, made with fresh Sicilian ricotta, strictly sheep's milk, and you will notice the difference. The cannoli among other things, despite being a rather simple dessert, has several variations throughout Sicily: in Palermo for example ricotta cheese it is enriched with chocolate chips and then garnished with candied fruit; in Catania it is garnished with chopped pistachios; in Syracuse it is tasted simple. In short, try all the variations and you will discover how small details can make the difference.
Street food
When it comes to Sicilian cuisine, one cannot fail to mention street food. Few years ago Palermo has been elected European capital of street food and a whole series of typical dishes that we have always eaten and that are part of our gastronomic culture, have suddenly become famous and sought after even beyond the strait. Here too you could make a list that never ends, however if you want to be on the safe side you can't miss the arancine, classic with meat or with butter, or in the many and more modern variants with a thousand flavors; u pani ca 'meusa (bread with spleen) typical of Palermo, a sandwich stuffed with beef entrails, such as spleen, lung, trachea and cartilage.
Do not be impressed by the ingredients, the taste is fantastic, whether you eat it in the straight version (literally unmarried, i.e. with a sprinkle of lemon), or in the version married (married, or with ricotta). Bread with panelle and crocché, or rather fried chickpea flour pancakes and potato croquettes; and it sfincione, or the Sicilian version of pizza, same dough but higher, and covered with tomato, anchovies, onions, horse cheese and breadcrumbs.
First dishes
Among the first courses the most classic are: the pasta with sardines, very good, typical of the feast of St. Joseph but is eaten willingly all year round, with a fundamental ingredient which is wild fennel; there pasta with arriminati broccoli (although broccoli is not exactly broccoli but cauliflower) with raisins, pine nuts and saffron; baked anelletti, pasta on Sundays, parties, picnics and Sundays by the sea, even if not very suitable given the difficulty in digesting it. It is topped with a meat sauce, peas, fried eggplant, hard-boiled egg and bechamel.
Then you do; there pasta with macco di fava beans, or a cream obtained from dried broad beans and wild fennel; there pasta alla norma, with tomato sauce, fried aubergines and a generous sprinkling of salted ricotta; pasta with swordfish, fried aubergines and mint, a masterpiece of goodness; pasta with tenerumi, that is the tender leaves of the courgettes that you cook become a soup perhaps not very summery but of unbeatable goodness; and the cous cous, typical of Trapani, especially based on fish. Unmissable!
Seconds of Sicilian cuisine
And between the seconds? Spacing between meat, fish and vegetables we have: Palermo-style meat rolls, filled with breadcrumbs, onion, raisins and pine nuts; sarde a beccafico, delicious sardine rolls with the same filling as the Palermo-style rolls; sardine meatballs, both simply fried and with sauce, mouth-watering; ghiotta swordfish, with tomato, capers, onion and olives; there caponata, which needs no introduction; Pumpkin Sweet & Sour; Eggplant Parmesan; I must continue?!
