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What to Eat in Palermo | Page 2 of 2

Italy

Arancini: Sicilian Fried Rice Balls

Arancini are fried balls of saffron-tinted rice, filled with meat ragù or something else and rolled in breadcrumbs - the best-known street food in Sicily. Palermo makes them round and calls them arancina, Catania makes them pointed like Etna and calls them arancino; the island has been arguing over a single letter for decades. And the oldest Sicilian dictionary lists them as a dessert.

Italy

Cannoli: Sicilian Pastry Tubes with Ricotta

Cannoli are crisp fried tubes filled with a cream of sheep's milk ricotta, the best-known sweet of Sicily. The name comes from the reed the dough was once wound around, the history from legends about a harem in Caltanissetta and from convent pastry shops. They are filled only just before they are sold, otherwise the shell goes soft - and that is exactly how you spot a good pastry shop.

Italy

Stigghiola di Vitello: Sicilian Grilled Veal Intestines

Stigghiola di vitello is thin veal intestine wound around a skewer and grilled over charcoal, street food from Palermo that today belongs to all of Sicily. Off the grill it gets cut into pieces, salted, finished with a squeeze of lemon and eaten with your hands, with nothing on the side. The name traces back to the Latin word for a little gut, the history to the "fifth quarter" - everything left at the slaughterhouse for the poor.

Italy

Stigghiola: Sicilian Grilled Lamb Intestines

Stigghiola is a Sicilian street food made from cleaned lamb or kid intestine, wound around a spring onion and parsley and grilled over charcoal. It's part of quinto quarto cooking, the fifth quarter, and it's grilled all over the island - in Messina it's called tajuni. It's served hot, with nothing but salt and lemon, most often in the evening at a stall you find by the smoke.

Italy

Cartocci Siciliani: Fried Yeast Tubes Filled with Ricotta

Cartocci siciliani are fried tubes of yeast dough, rolled in sugar and filled with sweetened ricotta studded with chocolate chips. They are cannoli's Palermo cousins, bought in the morning at a bar or a bakery to go with coffee, and in Palermo they also go by the name Macallè - after an Ethiopian town, though nobody knows why. Today you'll find them all over Sicily.