Postcards from Italy – Our First Day in Sicily

Photo above: The view from our hotel room in Bagheria, Sicily.

We spent most of a day traveling from Rome to Bagheria, Sicily, a few miles east of Palermo.  That’s where we joined a food and wine tour group led by Chef Walter Potenza from Cranston, Rhode Island (http://www.chefwalter.com/ ).  Our friend Laurie, with whom we had made two earlier trips to Europe, knew Chef Walter and had suggested we sign up for the tour. Several other friends from earlier trips were part of this tour group, and we had a loud reunion on the bus from the airport to the hotel. We will spend a week with this group, traveling around the north and east coasts of Sicily, sampling the wine and cuisine of the island. 

Let’s start with some wine

On our first full day in Sicily, we began late morning with a visit to the Duca Di Salaparuta winery (https://www.duca.it/en/ ).  The winery was originally founded in 1824.  They produce three brands of wine – Duca Di Salaparuta, Corvo and Florio.  It was a modern facility, with a simple, striking design.

We took a tour of their cellar and saw several rooms of wooden barrels of different sizes. The largest barrels held 25,000 liters of red wine. 

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Then we went to tasting room. The winery had laid out a beautiful plate of meats and cheeses to accompany our tasting of three of their wines – Corvo Bianco (white), Corvo Rosso (red) and Florio Donna Franca (a marsala dessert wine). 

We tasted the white, then were instructed to take a bite of the salmon on toast and take another sip. The second taste was much smoother than the first, highlighting how the taste of the wine changes when paired with food. The red was medium-bodied. They characterized it as an inexpensive, “daily” wine. The marsala had a rich amber color and a bit of caramel taste. We’re not big on sweet wines, but this one was different, and we bought a bottle to take home. The tasting room had an entire wall of windows that looked out over the Mediterranean. All in all, a great way to start the tour. 

Visiting the Ballaro Market

After the winery visit, we drove into Palermo and took a walking tour of the Ballaro Market.  This is one of three major open-air markets in Palermo. Vendors set up stalls – some right in front of their regular shops – to sell meat, fish, vegetables, cheese, bread, olives and other foods.  There are also vendors selling clothing, household items and shoes. Oh, and souvenirs. Throughout the trip we notices that almost any open public space would have several people selling cell phone cases, cigarette lighters, scarves, belts and small wooden pinocchio toys.

We had been told that many of the vendors would shout to attract attention to their offerings, but we only heard one or two singing out. 

We stopped to admire the variety at several fishmongers’ stands.  Everything from the smallest sardines to whole salmon were on display. 

Several stands sold octopus. We heard one vendor calling out “Pulpo!” (Octopus!) as he chopped them into bite-sized pieces which were served on small plates with toothpicks.  We were not tempted, though a few people in our group rushed to get some.

In Search of Gelato en Brioche

The market occupies several city blocks.  We kept going for a while, always wondering what interesting thing we’d see around the next corner.  But after about 90 minutes, we left the market to find lunch. (No pulpo or its cousins for us today.).  We walked for a few blocks, but didn’t find anything that appealed to us.  Then Mary suggested we look for the place that Mimi Sheraton said had the best gelato en brioche – a sort of ice-cream sandwich.  (See Our Guidebook, page 193.)

Google Maps showed us that Gelateria Ciccio Adelfio (Corso dei Mille, 73, https://www.gelateriadaciccio.it/public/en ) was just six minutes away.  We happily changed course.

Once in the gelateria, it took several minutes to decide on the flavor.  Actually, it took several minutes for me to look at every tub of gelato in the place and become completely overwhelmed by the choices.  At that point, Mary stepped in and said, “The answer is always chocolate!”.

The gentleman behind the counter cut a brioche bun almost all the way through, opened it like a clamshell and piled two big scoops of chocolotto in the middle.

The gelato was a treat, with a deep, rich chocolate flavor.  We ate it first with small plastic spoons, while sitting at an outdoor table.  After a couple minutes, we each tore off a piece of the bun and were initially disappointed.  It tasted like a plain old hamburger bun. But it got better as we went along and the bun soaked up more of the sweetness of the gelato. 

As I said in an earlier postcard, any day that ends in “y” is better with gelato! 

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What indulgent treat have you had lately? Leave us a note in the comments below.

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