There are many different Sicily Spectrums, but one of the island’s most latent and interesting is that which flows between the rustic and the refined. The latter is represented most prominently by Monzu cooking, the baroque style born in the courts of the Bourbon-derived kings who ruled the island from 1816-1860, during the Kingdom of the Two Sicilies era. Sitting a ways off at the rustic end of this continuum, arancini(e) nonetheless connect back to this aristocratic tradition of large-format rice dishes, which are really banquet-scale versions of the same portable concept, subsuming an entire meal within a single showy presentation. These are also closely linked to the Timbales mentioned above. Another prime example is Gatto de Riso, with the word “Gatto” (cat) seemingly pointing to a loosely related class of savory potato pies.
So you can see how worthwhile it is to place the entire range of molded rice dishes, ball or otherwise, in proper perspective. It’s also worth considering how similar these are to Kibbe, another Arab-inspired snack whose footprints stretch far outside the MENA region. Beyond Italian, Sicily’s most significant influences are Moorish, established during the island’s 250 or so years spent as an Emirate, under the Aghlabid and later Fatimid dynasties. Even after Norman conquest in the 12th century, these influences remained strong due to the close proximity to North Africa, especially Tunisia. The famed Italian gastronome and writer Alberto Denti di Pirajno theorized that Arab chefs originally created arancini/e as they experimented with pilaf, which makes sense considering the above connections. The priceless Baghdad Cookery Book, a 10th century tome chock full of enlightening recipes, also has a recipe for meatballs known as “Naranjiyya” (also a word for orange), dipped in egg yolks and fried so they take on the color of the fruit. What a long, strange trip it’s been since then.
In fact, these are all types of Pezzi: a general term, meaning “pieces,” which classifies any stuffed bread product sold from a Rosticceria, intended to be scooped up as a la carte, grab-and-go items. Other family members include Schiacciata, Spiedino, Ravazzata and Cudduruni (“stuck together”). Schiacciata (“squished”), which designates a bare, Focaccia-esque flatbread in Tuscany, serves in Sicily to cover a much broader family of baked breads into which diverse ingredients are smushed. Significant variants include ones from Modica (tomatoes, cheese, eggplant), Ragusa (“lasagna bread”), Naso (tomatoes, cheese, peppers), Syracuse (broccoli, sausage, onions) and Catania (cauliflower, cheese, olives), which seems to isolate the phenomenon to the eastern edge of the island. These also show up in the US, with one prominent version in Middletown, CT, although that branch of the family is now possibly extinct.
There is of course enormous overlap between these items, which have all evolved enough as to infringe on each other’s territory, but it’s fun to imagine the Rosticceria as a second home for all sorts of bready regional specialties, now gathered together, in the capital city or elsewhere. To bring things back to the American pizzeria, the clearest American descendant of many of these items remains not the calzone but the Pinwheel, which likely connects back to Rosticceria tradition through some mysterious intermediary whose name we may never know.
The latter (named after the province of its birth, known also as Fuate) is actually closer to a stuffed pie than a topped bread, which explains why it is alternatively designated as a type of Impanata (Mpanata in Sicilian dialect). Even the intermediate eater will recognize the linguistic connection here, which places these hearty dishes on another international continuum, that of the Empanada. The Sicilian version of these bears strong connections to the original Galician one, a pie later split up into discrete handheld portions for miners to eat on the job. This handy snack may also have Arabic influence in its DNA, a fact which helps stitch together the Spanish and Sicilian styles. The Sirucusan spin on this dish is vegetable heavy, as is the one from the area near Agrigento, but many retain the fishy Galician focus, from this swordfish number to Cammarata’s sardine and artichoke one. This is one of those phenomena, it seems, where every town likely has a historic variant based on their specific local crops and ingredients.
Some of these, like the one from Modica, still retain Focaccia in their name. This may have something to do with the fact that, like many of the terms made amorphous by the island’s churning culinary whirlpool, Focaccia simply refers to the oven (the Latin “focus,” or hearth) which cooks it. The same word eventually spawns off into items as diverse as the Provençal Fougasse, the Turkish Pogača and the Greek Bougatsa, which means that the Sicilian term also has the innate has the potential to span a wide variety of hearth-baked breads, some filled and/or topped, some simply baked as is.
Fresh ricotta is a big thing here, and one of those that I will miss most. It’s basically impossible to find it at home in such pure form, or even to approximate that clean, unpasteurized milk taste yourself. The fried ricotta reminded me a bit of the Campanese Carozza, (Mozzarella in a Carriage) which has another local counterpart in “Eggs in a Carriage,” where eggs and bread are draped in Tuma cheese. Tuma, which appears frequently around these parts, is less a specific cheese style than a stage in the preparation of pecorino. It refers to the product pulled after the step in the process before salting occurs, and is a fresh, soft cheese that must be consumed quickly before it spoils. We had it served mostly in straightforward fashion, on a salumi board and sprinkled on a salad, but it also shows up in prepared dishes like Carrubelle (aka "Silversmith's Cheese", the Sicilian version of Welsh Rabbit) and Cannoli di Tuma. The latter is a reminder that not all Cannoli are sweet (the word just refers to “tubes”, think “Cannolini”), this one served with cheese and meat, kind of like an unsauced enchilada.
But back now to Panelle: the common man’s delicacy supposedly originates as a sub for fried fish (poverty-skirting subs are a theme here), and although it’s probably served that purpose at some point, it more likely grew out of the North African fondness for milling chickpeas. The pane in Pane e Panelle is often Mafalda, a coiled, sesame-seeded bread shaped to resemble a snake. Panelle serves as the feminine sibling to Crocchè, which are also known as Cazzilli (“little dicks,” to put it in the salty lingo favored by the locals). These are croquettish fried potato balls that, in their phallic form, are shaped into little tubes, sometimes further fortified with cheese and ham. They can also be eaten on a sandwich.
Finally, there’s a product known as Rascatura, or “scrapings,” which is produced from dough left over from making crocche and panelle, formed into nuggets and also fried. Like its parents, Rascatura can also be placed on a sandwich for easier consumption. All of the above pair nicely with:
Babbalucci: Snails served with an olive-oil sauce of celery, garlic and parsley, a (once?) popular street food that, in my limited experience, stands among a vanishing old guard of niche, scrap-sourced snacks, which are in the process of being edged out by doughy, cheesy confections. I did a good amount of walking in Palermo, and spotted a surfeit of trendy shops doling out all manners of Arancine, but nobody selling this. See also the next item on this list (and a few others further on). Then again, maybe I was just in the right place at the wrong time.
Cippolini: In America, this word signifies a specific style of disc-shaped onion. In Palermo, it’s another old-school street food with a less meat-focused bent, fresh spring onions charred on a streetside grill. These onions also make an appearance in Stigghiola, swaddled inside a whorl of lamb guts cooked on a skewer along with garlic, parsley and lemon. Some notations mention a leek instead of a scallion, and it’s impossible to tell if this is an issue of translation or another consequence of culinary variety (probably the latter). The name Cippolini, meanwhile, recurs in a Catanese pastry stuffed with onion, tomato and oregano. Other uses of such offal include this concoction, as well as another street food known Quarume (or Caldume). For a less gamey venture into grilled meats, there’s the local Messinese spin on braciole. For a more gamey one, there’s Frittula, a preparation of lamb or calf offal served on a sandwich or loose in a paper cone, comprising shreds of meat, cartilage and bone deep fried in lard.
Muffulettu: In New Orleans (and increasingly elsewhere in the U.S.) this name points to a specific sandwich, of mortadella, salami, ham, provolone and Swiss, topped with a complex compound Giardiniera, usually prepared in bulk format and cut into slices. The root word meanwhile (on which Wikipedia has some unconvincing etymological theories), still visible on shops all around the island, and spelled decisively with the Sicilian dialectical “u” at the end, indicates the original bread after which the sandwich was named. According to this article (which Wikipedia cruelly deems an “inadequate source”), it’s traditionally eaten on St. Anthony’s Day, upon which bread, Muffuletti or not, is certainly consumed in ritualistic fashion. Bread is one of those bottomless topics that I do not have the time to get into here, but while we’re on the subject, this ritualistic form of presentation is pretty interesting as well.
Polpo Bollito: Boiled Octopus, available in Palermo and country styles. There’s also something known as “Walled Octopus”