Palermo is a city in southern Italy, the capital of both the autonomous region of Sicily and the Metropolitan City of Palermo, the city's surrounding metropolitan province. The city is noted for its history, culture, architecture and gastronomy, playing an important role throughout much of its existence; it is over 2,700 years old. Palermo is in the northwest of the island of Sicily, by the Gulf of Palermo in the Tyrrhenian Sea.
Cannoli is a Sicilian pastry consisting of a tube-shaped shell of fried pastry dough, filled with a sweet, creamy filling containing ricotta cheese. Its size ranges from 9 to 20 centimetres. In mainland Italy, it is commonly known as cannolo siciliano.
Sicilian cuisine is the style of cooking on the island of Sicily. It shows traces of all cultures that have existed on the island of Sicily over the last two millennia. Although its cuisine has much in common with Italian cuisine, Sicilian food also has Greek, Spanish, French, Jewish, Maghrebi, and Arab influences.
Frutta martorana is a Sicilian marzipan sweet in the form of fruits and vegetables from the provinces of Palermo and Trapani.
Tripe is a type of edible lining from the stomachs of various farm animals. Most tripe is from cattle, pigs and sheep.
Offal, also called variety meats, pluck or organ meats, is the internal organs of a butchered animal. The word does not refer to a particular list of edible organs, and these lists of organs vary with culture and region, but usually exclude skeletal muscle. Offal may also refer to the by-products of milled grains, such as corn or wheat.
Tripe soup or tripe stew is a soup or stew made with tripe. It is widely considered to be a hangover remedy.
Arancini, also known as arancine, are Italian rice balls that are stuffed, coated with breadcrumbs and deep-fried. They are a staple of Sicilian cuisine. The most common arancini fillings are al ragù or al sugo, filled with ragù, mozzarella or caciocavallo cheese, and often peas, and al burro or ô burru, filled with prosciutto and mozzarella or béchamel sauce.
Panella is a Sicilian fritter made with chickpea flour and other ingredients, usually including water, salt, pepper, olive oil, and finely chopped parsley. They are a popular street food in the city of Palermo and are often eaten between slices of bread or on a sesame roll, like a sandwich. Called pane e panelle, these sandwiches are usually served with a slice of lemon to be squeezed over panelle. They have become very popular among Sicilian Americans in Brooklyn, New York, specifically in Gravesend and Bensonhurst. In Brooklyn, panelle are commonly used in sandwiches with ricotta added to them on vastedda.
Pagliata is a traditional Roman dish primarily using the intestine of a young calf (tripe). As it has only eaten milk, the resulting dish is similar to cheese in a sausage casing.
Frittola is a traditional Sicilian street food from the Palermo region of Italy. It is similar to the frittole from Reggio Calabria, but seems to use calf parts instead of pig.
Biscotti regina or reginelle are small Sicilian biscuits, coated with sesame seeds. They are typical of the province of Palermo but are also widespread in other Sicilian provinces. These cakes taste halfway between sweet and salty (savoury).
Vastedda is the traditional Sicilian bread used to prepare the pani câ meusa, a sandwich of veal spleen. It often also includes caciocavallo and ricotta toppings. Vastedda is most common in the city of Palermo.
Pani câ meusa, also spelled pani câ mèusa, is a Sicilian street food. Its Italianized name is panino con la milza. It is a dish typical of Palermo and it consists of a soft bread topped with sesame, stuffed with chopped veal lung and spleen that have been boiled and then fried in lard. Caciocavallo or ricotta may also be added, in which case the pani câ meusa is called maritatu ; if served without cheese, it is called schettu ('single') instead. It was created by Jewish butchers in Palermo, Sicily. It is sold mainly by street vendors in Palermo's main markets, such as the Vucciria and the Ballarò.
Pieds paquets or pied et paquets is a local dish and culinary specialty of Marseille and Sisteron but also commonly found in much of Southeastern France. It consists of sheep's feet and stuffed sheep's tripe stewed together.
The stigghiola, also known as stigghiuola, is a Sicilian food typical of the streets of the city of Palermo. It consists of guts which are washed in water and salt, seasoned with parsley and often with onion and other pot herbs, then stuck on a skewer or rolled around a leek, and finally cooked directly on the grill. The dish is generally prepared and sold as a street food. In Ragusa, the dish is baked in a casserole and is known as turciniuna.
The Ciaculli massacre on 30 June 1963 was caused by a car bomb that exploded in Ciaculli, an outlying suburb of Palermo, killing seven police and military officers sent to defuse it after an anonymous phone call. The bomb was intended for Salvatore "Ciaschiteddu" Greco, head of the Sicilian Mafia Commission and the boss of the Ciaculli Mafia family. Mafia boss Pietro Torretta was considered to be the man behind the bomb attack.
Sekba or sometimes called bektim is a Chinese Indonesian pork offal stewed in a mild soy sauce-based soup. The stew tastes mildly sweet and salty, made from soy sauce, garlic, and Chinese herbs. It is a popular fare street food in Indonesian Chinatowns, such as Gloria alley, Glodok Chinatown in Jakarta, Indonesia.
Callos a la Madrileña is a stewed tripe dish, cooked slowly for hours over low heat, that is a speciality of Spanish cuisine associated with the city of Madrid. Traditionally pig or cow tripe was used but modern recipes use lamb or even cod. It includes pig snout and trotters, black pudding, sausage, ham, and soup vegetables like carrots and onions. When prepared correctly the broth is rich in gelatin and the tripe becomes very tender after the slow cooking process. The tripe can be browned before the cooking liquid is added, with trotter's, oxtails and other ingredients for the soup like ham, chorizo and smoked paprika. It is common to serve this stew with the morcilla blood sausage, a tapas dish typical of the region of Castile and León.
