Today on day 3 of our Sicilian Food Tour we visit the island of Ortigia and the famed town of Noto both on the east coast of Sicily. We visit the bustling stalls of Ortigia’s Saturday market to the golden limestone streets of nearby Noto. We finish with a local seafood feast with plenty of Sicilian specialties!
Ortigia, also known as Città Vecchia is historically the centre of Siracusa or Syracuse and Sicily's oldest recorded settlement founded in 734 BCE. Ortigia is joined to the mainland of Sicily by two short bridges. It is a popular town as it has everything from ruins, Baroque buildings, bustling markets with fantastic food with sea views all around.
I am rather besotted with lemons. Which sort of fits the theme as Sicily is too. Sicily's Syracuse lemons are famous for their high levels of juice, citric acid and oil. The Sicilian lemon is also distinguished by the thinness of its albedo, the white layer between the peel and the pulp. And in Sicily lemons adorn ceramics, tablecloths, teatowels, soaps and of course limoncello is made out of them.
We arrive at Ortigia's busy Saturday markets or Mercato di Siracusa and the first thing I fall in love with is a lemon adorned tablecloth. There are myriad sellers selling a similar range of patterns on cotton tablecloths. There's even a lemon dress that I try on too. Pine cones are a symbol of prosperity and here they come in different colours but also as trinket boxes.
We walk around the markets taking in the sights and the smells. Vendors sell "Violet" eggplants. These squat eggplants have purple markings and a purple star at the top. There are capers in different sizes, huge mounds of fresh tomato paste sold by weigh while dried fruit attracts bees who hover around the sweet fruit. Pistachios adorn cheeses and delicious biscuit samples are proffered by sellers.
We hit the fish market where €3 buys you a single oyster and a glass of wine. There are glistening fish, spiky chestnuts and sweet tropea onions are displayed on a rope. These are known as "La regina rossa" or the red queen by Italians as they are so sweet.
We stop at Fratelli Burgio, a haven for food lovers. A display of food is so beautific that all we can do is stare. It is a modern day cornucopia of cured meats, cheese, fat slabs of lardo, artisanal chocolate and of course their famous panini. The friendly guys behind the counter pose for pictures and videos.
Carm hands us one of their sandwiches. It's simple, just fresh bread liberally sprinkled with crunchy sesame seeds and filled with thin slices of mortadella. It is sandwich perfection in its simplicity. There's no butter or sauce, just that wonderful combination of fresh baked bread and mortadella.
After shopping we walk the streets of Ortigia that are mostly closed for pedestrians. Siracusa Cathedral was built on the ancient temple of Athena. There are fashion stores and the main set of ruins right near the markets called the Temple of Apollo built in 600BC. Syracuse was founded in 734 or 733 BC by Greek colonists from Corinth and Tenea, with Archias serving as their leader and coloniser and you can see the Greek influence in Ortigia. The architecture in Ortigia is mostly from the eighteenth century due to the 1693 earthquake that destroyed almost all previous buildings. There are also fascist era buildings in medieval neighbourhoods. We watch brides and grooms having their photos taken in these pretty streets.
One of Syracuse's most famous former residents is Archimedes who has two museums dedicated to him and who lived most of his life here. A lovely souvenier is a Stomachion puzzle that is a set of 14 pieces that he devised that can have 536 combinations to create a square. The name Stomachion is because the game can often give people a stomach ache.
We stop at the waterfront for a spot of lunch where we try octopus sandwiches and squid ink cannolo filled with baccalau and limoncello spritzes before heading to our second destination, the town of Noto, a UNESCO world heritage site.
White Lotus viewers will remember Noto from some scenes from the series and it's easy to see why this location was chosen. We walk through the royal gates to get to the centre of Noto. The baroque architecture from the early 18th century is breathtaking, particularly at sunrise when the busy city is quiet. One of the reasons for Noto's beauty are the buildings made out of the local golden limestone that gives the city a radiant glow. Noto is called “il giardino di pietra" or the garden of stone” by locals. Many of the baroque balconies feature goose breast iron railings that bulge out - these were said to accommodate the dresses that women wore in the 18th century.
We stroll the streets, watching a bride and groom get married at the church. The whole town, including us, watch the spectacle cheering and congratulating the couple.
Then we come across the famous steps of Noto. The art on these colourful steps change as they are actually stickers (some advertising businesses) but there are a couple that provide a great place to get a photo. To find these steps, look to your right when walking along the main thoroughfare and you can see the colourful art peeking out from a distance a couple of streets away. It took us a few goes to find these as we were too besotted by everything we saw.
Afterwards we head to Caffe Sicilia on the main thoroughfare for an afternoon gelato and granita as well as one of chef Franco Assenza's cakes. Carm tells us that the chef was featured on Chefs Table and is known for adding unusual elements to his cakes. We try one of the cakes, a bergamot cake with bergamot marmalade and a finish of white pepper. Alongside this we also try their trio of gelati: mulberry, lemon and almond with a brioche and coffee before making our way back to the bus to take the drive home.
After a short break we head out to dinner. Tonight's dinner is local at Fichera Ristorante which is very busy this Saturday night. This restaurant has a range of seafood dishes and pizzas. Carm has arranged for a range of local Scoglitti dishes.
For entrees there is an octopus and green olive salad. We squeeze the green skinned Sicilian lemon over tiny fried calamari and enjoy a prawn topped bruschetta with a delicious sauce similar in flavour to muhamarra dip.
The pastas are a Pasta Con le Sarde or sardine penne and a wonderful paccheri with tender, tiny mussels and prawns. It's so delicious that I go back to three helpings.
I've been looking forward to trying a local specialty called Rotalana which is pizza dough filled with speck, grana padano cheese, mushrooms, ciliegino or tiny cherry tomatoes. This is similar to a calzone although different in shape. The dough is so soft and the fillings melt in the mouth. It's times like this that I wish I had a second stomach so that I could eat more.
And to finish it off a lemon sorbet with limoncello drink that puts the perfect ending to a day out in Sicily.
So tell me Dear Reader, did you watch The White Lotus season set in Sicily? Do you travel to try food that you can't get at home?
NQN and Mr NQN travelled to Europe as guests of Vietnam Airlines and NQN was a guest of Sicilian Food Tours but all opinions remain her own.
Sicilian Food Tours
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