Palermo is anything but boring. The city elicits many emotions at the same time. It has bags of character. The only city I have felt the same about is New Orleans; both with its multicultural inhabitants, a penchant for fried food, atmospheric architecture and a general sense of excitement. Palermo, even has signs for moffoletta (known as muffuletta in New Orleans, a sandwich on a round, flattish loaf of bread stuffed with cheese and sardines or anchovies or in New Orleans these would be substituted by pickled vegetables and salami).

Our children insisted on a horse and carriage tour of the old town. The decision was a stroke of luck as we got a great feel for the city and covered a lot of ground quite quickly. Palermo has been ruled by the Phoenicians, the Romans, the Arabs, the Normans, the Spanish and the French Bourbons each leaving their mark and whose influence is evident throughout the fabric of the city. We discovered majestic architecture at every turn, extraordinary town squares like Piazza Marina, parks, the port, marina and open air markets such as Ballaro, Vucciria and Il Capo.

We passed many corners with chestnut roasters, stacked loaves of bread sprinkled with sesame seeds being sold out of car boots (on Sundays the bakeries were traditionally shut so enterprising entrepreneurs from the countryside fill the demand) and stands with crates of cactus fruit. Some parts of Palermo more closely resembled a South African township than anything in Europe. Although street crime in Palermo is rare. This irony is the same as I have experienced in other places with an institutionalised mafia.

Without this grey cloud of mafia hanging over Palermo, it might better be known as the Paris of the Mediterranean. It has 300 churches, some hidden behind an unsuspecting door in the street and others like the cathedral, a breathtaking landmark. We only visited 10 churches but each was uniquely spectacular.

A visit to the Norman Palace (Palazzo dei Normanni), particularly the first floor to the Cappella Palatina is a must to see the awe-inspiring mosaic interior with biblical themes. Take the audio guide to fully appreciate the details of the palace. If you walk out to the right and follow the wall around and then cross the avenue and down the stairs to the left into Via Colonna Rotta you will find Pasticceria Cappello. The pastry shop has excellent gelato and pastries but is best known for its torta sette veli – a chocolate cake with 7 layers of different types of chocolate. Further along Via Colonna Rotta turn right into Via d’Ossuna to eat at a local restaurant, I Cascinati.

Heading down Corso Calatafima toward the port, you pass under the Renaissance style Porta Nuova and then the imposing 12th century Cathedral to your left.

On your right is the Teatro Argento which puts on puppet shows every evening. The owners have been making homemade intricately designed puppets weighing up to 12 kilos and putting on shows for five generations, since 1893. They showed us their elaborate puppets but the show was not entirely suitable for our very young boys. We will be back when they are older.

Corso Calatafima has now turned into Corso Vittorio Emanuele. Keep walking up to the intersection with Via Maqueda to see the Quattro Canti, a square with 18th Century baroque buildings divided into 4 sections. This is the starting point for horse and carriage tours.

Continuing on foot and turning right onto Via Maqueda, pass Piazza Pretoria to get to Piazza Bellini to see the 12th century Martorana church and the Moorish 12th century San Cataldo church. Inside the Martorana are amazing Byzantine mosaics. Pasta reale or frutta martorana is a traditional Sicilian sweet made from marzipan and decorated to resemble fruit or vegetables and is an iconic Sicilian confectionary. Its origin is the Benedectine convent of the Martorana.

Doubling back and continuing down Corso Vittorio Emanuele is a Maestro del Brodo, a restaurant featuring Sicilian specialities, to the left. Further down on the right is Via Paternoster. Take a right here to reach Piazza San Francesco and find the veritable Palermo institution, Antica Focacceria di San Francesco, featuring the city’s famous street food such as sfincione alla palermitana (a thick soft pizza topped with anchovy, onion, tomato and caciocavallo cheese),  pane con la milza (spleen sandwiches), arancini (rice croquettes with stuffing options meat sauce or chicken giblets), panelle (chickpea fritters sometimes served inside a sandwich), cazilli di patate (potato croquettes), crocche di bechamel (bechamel croquettes),  caponata (sweet and sour aubergine with onions, capers, olives, celery and tomatoes), sarde a beccafico (sardine rolls filled with breadcrumbs, raisins, capers and pine nuts), anelletti al forno (a crowd pleasing favourite, particularly amongst children, and consists of anelletti pasta with meat sauce, peas, hard boiled egg, cheese and bechamel).

It was started in 1834 by chefs to the court, the Alaimo brothers. The Focacceria sits on a beautiful little piazza with the church San Francesco d’Assisi opposite. To the left of the church is the Oratorio di San Lorenzo beautifully decorated on the inside with statues and paintings depicting the lives of St. Francis and St. Lawrence.

Heading back to Corso Vittorio Emanuele and walking towards the port to Piazza Marina (a beautiful town square with fine buildings, a garden, a fountain and an 800 year old banyan tree) one finds the city’s best pane con milza sold at Franco U’ Vastiddaro.

Pane con milza (veal spleen and lung sandwich with lemon juice and/or caciocavallo and ricotta cheese) has been a quintessential Palermo street food for over 1200 years. In the year 800 the butchers were paid for their service with the “5th cut of veal”, the part between the spleen and the lungs. These were boiled and sold as sandwiches in Piazza del Caldimanu. In 1851, the Antica Focacceria began to sell the focaccia maritata / pane ca’ meusa (meaning married)- a combination of the focaccia schietta (focaccia filled with ricotta and caciocavallo cheeses, called such as it is “white like a bride”) and pane con milza. Today you can order a pane con milza schietta (meaning single”, served with lemon juice) or maritata (with cheese and lemon juice).

Cross back across Corso Vittorio Emanuele to Piazza Fonderia and turn left into Via Cassari. Keep walking down this road until you get to Vucciria market, which used to be a colourful food market full of character but has turned into a market for bric a brac and tourist souvenirs. I had arranged in advance to do a Sicilian cooking class in a home in the Vucciria market with Patrizia of Siciliandays. We made Sicilian sweets such as cassata (the homemade version which is a tart filled with sweetened ricotta with chocolate and candied fruit rather than the elaborate sponge cake-encased ricotta covered in marzipan, icing and candied fruit), buccelata (a pastry ring cake of Arab origin filled with chopped nuts, dried fruit and honey), sfinci del San Giuseppe (feather light doughnuts served with honey, sugar and hundreds and thousands or filled with sweetened ricotta cream) and biscotti regina (shortbread biscuits rolled in sesame seeds).

At the end of the market turn right to get to Piazza San Domenico to see the Oratorio del Rosario del San Domenico (beautifully decorated with sculpted stucco cherubs and paintings by Van Dyck and Pietro Novelli). Nearby is a good local restaurant, Mangia e Bevi.

From Piazza San Domenico head up Via Gagini and turn right onto Via Valverde to see the Oratorio del Rosario di Santa Cita (a Baroque masterpiece with the left side depicting the highlights of Jesus’s life and the right side depicting the low points. The portrait gallery at the end is where attendants would leave their arms (guns, knives, etc.) before attending the church service.)

Heading back to Via Gaggini and turning left onto Via Bara all’ Olivella, cross over Via Roma and Via Maqueda to Piazza Verdi to see the impressive Teatro Massimo where operas are performed. Follow Via Volturno off the piazza and turn left at the end to find the market il Capo.

The colourful market of Il Capo demonstrates the richness of Sicilian agriculture and cuisine- spices, dried fruit like figs and raisins (both the large ones from Malaga used in desserts and the small sultanas used in savoury dishes), pistachios, their light greenish yellow broccoli, gleaming aubergines, an array of biscuits, a bounty of fish including the impressive swordfish, almonds (both the normal ones and the flavourful flat almonds from Avola and Noto used in desserts), fresh ricotta, melons, artichokes, garlic, cactus fruit, Sharon fruit/persimmons, citron, dried broad beans, oregano, wild greens, ancient grains, sheep’s cheeses, chocolate (Sicilia was the first place to receive chocolate from the new world and continues to follow their cold production method today), olives (green brine-cured, black dry salted, black unsalted and flavoured olives), oranges, pomegranate, fennel, aubergine (both round and oblong and dark and violet), tomatoes, anchovies and sardines.

If you visit the Il Capo market don’t miss the Church of the Immaculate Conception with its richly decorated baroque interior and exquisite inlay.

There are also many lovely seaside areas and islands. We will go to San Vito lo Capo, Cefalu and Mondello and the island of Ustica when it’s warmer and report back.

85 mls olive oil
250 grams pork shoulder, from the neck end, rinsed and dried
240 mls white wine
2 onions, skinned, ends removed and finely chopped
1 onion, skinned, ends removed and finely sliced
2 garlic cloves, skin removed and finely chopped
15 grams (1 tablespoon tomato paste)
500 mls tomato sauce
1 bay leaf
300 grams peas
500 grams anelletti pasta
100 grams caciocavallo cheese, cubed
50 grams pecorino cheese, finely grated
15 grams breadcrumbs
1. Heat a heavy bottomed pan like a dutch oven. Add 60 mls of olive oil and the pork, turning to brown the meat.
2. Remove the meat from the pan and add 2 of the onions with 240 mls of water.
3. Cook for 10 minutes until the onions are soft and add back the pork.
4. Add the white wine, bay leaf, garlic, tomato paste, tomato sauce, salt and pepper to the pork.
5. Cook on low heat for 2 hours. If the sauce starts to dry out or scorch, add a bit of water. Let the meat cool, remove the bay leaf and discard. Chop the pork finely and add back to the sauce.  Stir to combine.
6. While the sauce is cooking, heat 15 mls of olive oil and the sliced onion in a sauce pan over medium heat.
7. When the onions are soft, about 15 minutes, add the peas, salt and pepper. Cook until the peas are cooked through, about 5 minutes. Remove from the heat and set aside.
8. Heat the oven to 200C.
9. In a large pot heat 5 litres of water with 50 grams of salt and bring to a boil. Add the anelletti and cook for 5 minutes less than the time on the package (about 20 minutes). (Note: If you are substituting a tube-shaped pasta, the cooking time will be much less. Check the suggested cooking time on the package but it will probably cook for about 7 to 8 minutes.) Drain the pasta and mix with half of the sauce.
10. Use 10 mls of olive oil to grease a rectangular baking pan. Sprinkle it with half the breadcrumbs shaking to ensure they are evenly distributed.
11. Add half of the pasta to the baking pan. Top with the caciocavallo, the peas and onions, 15 grams of the pecorino and the reserved sauce.
12. Spread the remaining pasta over the top and top with the remaining breadcrumbs and 35 grams pecorino cheese.
13. Cover with foil and bake for 20 minutes. Remove the foil and continue to bake until the top is golden about 10-15 minutes. Serve.

 

+39 3396500771

Arrange cooking classes in advance. She also does city tours, market tours with cooking lessons and lunch included, wine tastings and her husband sails a boat out of San Vito Lo Capo.

Elaborately decorated puppets. The shows often involve fighting so may not be suitable for young children.

Www.teatromassimo.it

Find a carriage on the corner of Corso Vittorio Emanuele and Via Maqueda. Bargain heavily before you get on (despite the written price) and you will most likely need to negotiate again when it’s over. We paid €60 and got an hour tour in the end and my husband felt we overpaid.

Note: many of the restaurants in the city centre are only open for lunch except for Friday and Saturday nights. Many close either Sunday or Monday so call in advance.

Pane con la milza (spleen sandwiches)- choose schietta (with lemon juice) or maritata (with ricotta and caciocavallo cheese)

+39 091 507 3943

A local eatery in the Vucciria market area highly recommended by locals.

Antica Focacceria San Francesco

Maestro del Brodo

Trattoria Primavera