Day 2 - Street Food Walking Tour in Palermo

Teatro Massimo with "Ghost Nun" Steps

This was our first full day in Palermo and we took a walking tour of the city. I found the tour on the Internet last minute and the guide, Fabrizio, was quite good. He met us at our hotel and we walked with him for 20 minutes to the start of the tour. His English and my Italian were about on par so he and I spoke in Italian. Easier for him and I like to practice. Fabrizio was full of entertaining stories. He told us that the Teatro Massimo was built on top of what used to be three churches, including a cemetery where some nuns were buried. He said to be careful walking on the steps going into the theater because the ghost of a nun will trip you. I’m not sure if he believes these stories but he likes to pass them on.

Vegetables at Capo Market

The main focus of the tour was a visit to the street markets in Palermo and a tasting of the local street food and Fabrizio has chosen the Capo market for the tour. There was a light drizzle at the beginning of the tour and he called ahead to make sure we had seats under an awning. The market is smaller than I had imagined but it was full of exotic fruits, vegetables and seafood. We start with a tasting of "sfincione", which is a type of thick pizza. Okay, but not as good as the pizza last night. Fabrizio explained a lot of things. What the Sicilians call broccoli is our cauliflower and our broccoli is sparacelli in Sicilian dialect. This is different from mainland Italy where broccoli means broccoli.  Also Sicilian zucchini is light green about 3 feet long. If you look closely, you can see all three in the photo.

Pani câ meusa

We sat at a table in the market and sampled traditional Palermo street food - "Panelle" (fried chickpea flour), "crocché" (potato croquettes), and "arancine" (deep-fried stuffed rice balls). Fabrizio regaled us with anecdotes about the food which emphasized the dislike the Palermitanos have for Catania (soccer rivals) and the French (for obvious reasons).  Jeanne liked the croquettes best but I liked the arancini. As a special treat, you could optionally try “pani câ meusa maritatu.” This is essentially a sandwich made with calf spleen and other internal organs served with cheese. Two Aussies and I took them up on the "fear factor" challenge and split a sandwich. Everyone else passed. It wasn’t the worst thing I have ever eaten but it has kind of a rubbery texture that is off-putting. After I had eaten part of mine I noticed the Aussies were done.  I asked if they had eaten all of theirs and they said “No mate, there's a bin back there.” That’s where the rest of mine went. At the end of the tour we said goodbye to our fellow tourists over a "cannolo" and walked back to our hotel. About 5 miles round-trip.

We ended the evening with a nice dinner at the Osteria Lo Bianco near our hotel, a place that Fabrizio had recommended.  Jeanne had Scaloppini with lemon and I had Pasta Sarda and Fritura Misto (mixed fried fish and calamari). Everything was great.