Italian street food: the 9 finest sicilian specialities
How many times a day do you eat on the run, while you’re at work, during a walk with friends or while you’re visiting the historic center of a city?
You can call it a picnic, a packed lunch in the mountains, a take away: every “quick” meal takes on the appearance of “street food”. But in the meaning that we all know today, street food not only characterizes the informal and fast consumption of food on the street, but has also become an excellent opportunity to taste real gastronomic delights from all over the world.
The goal is to eat a meal quickly, but also to satisfy a last minute whim.
Today, street food is also linked to the concept of delivery or take-away food, and it must be said: there is no renouncing, nothing to envy to a classic lunch at the table. Street food embraces different cultures and became part of our lives many years ago, even before the advent of fast food. If we talk about Italian street food, then, we cannot not talk about Sicilian street food.
Ready to discover the 9 best Sicilian street food specialties?
Italian street food: “Have a good trip in the flavor”
There should be this writing at the entrance of every Sicilian city and village, ready to welcome the enthusiastic crowds of visitors who every day come to Sicily from all over the world.
Yet Sicily does not need any presentation. Walking through the streets one is inevitably enveloped by a whiff of perfumes and spicy aromas, by a light blanket of smoke coming from the meat on the fire and by the cries of the street bakers.
“Street food” is a neologism of English matrix, but its meaning has much more ancient origins, in fact it does nothing but adapt to a culture already well rooted for centuries: that of “street food”. Greeks and Romans brought it and the Arabs enriched it with their culinary traditions of Persian origin, which are still part of the great Sicilian gastronomic repertoire. We inherited from them the culture of meeting in the street, appreciating what has always been part of us: art and love for food.
Yes, it is a real journey into taste! Its multiculturalism has made it a rich land, where street food has become the symbol of taste and gastronomic abundance all over the world, an unstoppable and endless modus vivendi.
All the shades of Sicilian street food
When you arrive in a Sicilian city you can’t help but smell the intense scent of spicy aromas, the fumes of street food and the loud voices calling out to passersby. You always stop to taste something. Impossible not to.
So tourists find themselves surrounded by new fragrances and unusual customs, intrigued by new forms and flavors never tried. They stop to admire the linear shapes of Catania’s bombs, of the “lunar” cartocciate or the bizarre aspect of the cannolo, the king of Sicilian sweets. The colored shop windows and the commercial counters are overflowing with tempting products: steaming calzones, krapfen, fried cod, sfincione, cassatelle filled with sweet ricotta just out of the oven. And even roasted chestnuts in autumn!
In the main Sicilian cities the streets are always full of street vendors ready to serve panelle e crocché, pani ca’ meusa, frittola, stigghiola and whatever else. Well, yes, to make any nutritionist’s skin crawl, but what a taste!
Impossible to resist. And then off to taste for the first time the delicious sicilian lemon granita or the sweet almond granita. Continuing without ceasing to amaze, bite after bite.
The 9 finest sicilian specialities of street food
In Sicily, street food has become a symbol of tradition and culture, not only gastronomic. Especially in the city of Palermo, it is impossible not to linger on the countless outdoor “localetti” and traveling carts that welcome passers-by with succulent “take and eat” dishes.
Even the most famous restaurants now serve street food to tourists at all hours of the day and night. For some time now, thanks to the high multicultural level, we can also count kebabs among the products of regional street food.
We have mentioned many, but we have chosen only the best 9 Sicilian specialties that (maybe) you don’t know and that from Trapani to Syracuse honor street food. Let’s discover them together!
Pani ca’ meusa e stigghilola di Palermo
Probably, Palermo is considered one of the international capitals of street food. If one thinks of Sicilian street food, the markets and street vendors of this wonderful multicultural city come to mind.
Here, street manciari is a daily occurrence and, although the dishes are mainly meat-based, the panorama of Palermo’s street food is so vast that no one stands idly by!
‘U pani ca’ meusa (bread with spleen) is one of the most popular street foods, together with stigghiole, lamb or veal guts cooked on the grill after being rolled around an onion or threaded on a skewer like a serpentine. Once ready, they are cut into pieces and seasoned with salt and lemon juice. The smoke of the “stigghiolaro” pervades the streets and, for meat lovers, it is a real wedding invitation.
Pani cunzatu of Trapani
One of the most loved dishes by tourists (and not only) is the pani cunzatu of Trapani. “Pani cunzatu” means “seasoned bread” and it is now spread all over Sicily even if with different variants.
It is a “poor” dish, made with few but tasty ingredients. The secret is in the bread, homemade and crunchy, which is seasoned with anchovies in oil, tomatoes, Sicilian primosale cheese, oregano and extra virgin olive oil. A real treat!
Pituni of Messina
In Messina, instead, there is a dispute between “pitone” or “pituni” and “pidone”. A debate similar to the one between arancina and arancino, but which leads to the same result: a tasty and irreplaceable street food.
‘U pituni is similar to a calzone, fried in oil or baked in the oven, and stuffed with the same ingredients of focaccia Messina: escarole, tomatoes, anchovies and tuma (or other cheeses).
Cipollata and cartocciata of Catania
Not only arancini, pizzette, fried bombs, sfoglie and paté, big triangles of half sfoglia stuffed with ham and provola cheese, but also the “cipolline“, half sfoglia stuffed with ham, cheese, tomato and cooked onion, and the “cartocciate”, stuffed with mushrooms, eggplants, and cold cuts.
While in Catania there is a street food dish known as cipollata catanese, prepared with horse meat, bacon and spring onions, in Palermo this dish is known with the name of “mangia e bevi“.
‘Mbriulata of Agrigento
The ‘mbriulata is a typical product of Aragona, in the province of Agrigento. A dish prepared in ancient times by Sicilian housewives for their husbands who worked all day in the fields.
The ‘mbriulata is made of a dough of salted bread dough rolled up and stuffed with olives, onion and minced pork.
Cucche and pastizzetti of Syracuse
We all know Syracuse’s scacce, but there are two other dishes that consecrate the street food of this province.
Cucche, also called “cucche da ancucchiare” (to “put together”), are small strips of pasta usually stuffed with cheese and sausage, but also with other condiments.
Their origin is also humble. Cucche, in fact, were prepared with what was left over of the homemade bread dough.
Pastizzi, also called pastizzette or pastieri, are small bundles of pasta stuffed with lamb meat and rice. A typical dish of the province that can be tasted, cold or hot, for Easter or any day of the year as street food.
Sicilian street food: a discovery in every bite
Those who do not live in these places could perhaps compare Sicilian street food to American fast food. Nothing could be more wrong. Probably if you wanted to make a comparison based on a strictly caloric parameter, you could be right. In Sicily, however, the culture of street food is part of a real lifestyle, which has little to do with multinationals and junk food.
Street food in Sicily is a purely cultural factor, a “modus vivendi”. It’s something you can hardly part with.
This is why we like Sicily. With its colors, intense scents and strong flavors. Anyone who knows it is kidnapped and from that moment it is impossible to forget it.
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