I Came, I Saw, I Cooked (and Ate!)

Helen, Toni and Sallie

My friends Toni and Sallie from the American Women’s Club signed up to take a week-long cooking and Italian language course in Sicily and persuaded me to join them. Needless to say, they didn't have to twist my arm too hard for me to agree to go with them! The three of us flew to Palermo, Sicily’s largest city, and spent two days touring the city on foot before taking the bus to Tripani, where we met the 11 other students who were attending through Medborgarskolan (Adult Education) in Stockholm. 

View from our bedroom window

We arrived at the beautiful Baglio Oneto Resort in Marsala Monday night. On Tuesday morning we began our Italian lessons. Sallie and I were in the beginner group and Toni was in the advanced group. My Italian instructor Louisa was excellent. Most of the words we learned were types of food, like aceto & olio (vinegar & oil) and cooking terms, like tritare (chop finely) and mescolare (stir), which helped us with the cooking classes in the afternoons. 

We had three mornings of Italian instruction and two afternoons of chopping, peeling, pouring olive oil and sautéing, then adding flavor by squeezing lemons and adding seasonings from open containers with our fingers with an Italian-only speaking chef. Hand gestures count for a lot! 

The chef and our cooking class

We all got to choose which of our supper dishes we wanted to help prepare. The first session I helped prepare peperoni ripieni (stuffed peppers) with bread crumbs, olive oil, onions, pine nuts, raisins and capers. They were delicious! The other dish I helped prepare was insalata di polpo (octopus salad), made from chopped cooked octopus, grated carrot, grated celery heart, olive oil, salt and pepper. Did I mention we used olive oil? The chef brought out a live octopus, but fortunately, we didn’t have to cook it and started with 3-4 cold, cooked octopi. Our appetizer was actually good! It wasn’t as rubbery as I thought it was going to be.

We also did some sightseeing around Marsala and Erice. One day we drove to some Roman ruins then hiked about 45 minutes to the top of a mountain and back. An hour later we were sitting in a seafood restaurant at 2:45 for lunch. There were seven courses! The first 2-3 were octopi (see recipe above), fish, fried cuttlefish and a couple of other cooked fish morsels. Then came two kinds of pasta with delicious sauce, then some cous cous with olive oil and bits of fish mixed in. The next course was fresh fruit and then finally dessert: chocolate chip cheesecake! We also had red and white wine. I paced myself and didn't eat any bread and olive oil before the "real" food came out and took only small portions, but I was really full at the end. I decided to skip dinner that evening. 

Toni made mini cassate siciliane
(sweet  mix of ricotta and fruit in a
 marsipan casing)

I can’t understand how Sicilians stay slender when their diets are so full of bread, sweets and olive oil. It must be all the walking and climbing up and down they have to do. Maybe olive oil eaten in Sicily doesn’t have any calories.