THE DOOR IS OPEN. PULL UP A CHAIR.
A Taste
of Sicily
Pull a chair into the shade. There is orange on the platter, aubergine in the pan and something green for later. Four recipes for a Sicilian-inspired table, with the doors wide open.
THE COURTYARD ISSUE
FOUR NEW RECIPES
ONE VERY BRIGHT TABLE
Imagine a courtyard with room for a table. Terracotta underfoot, a lemon tree leaning into the light, a door painted the blue of a very good swimming pool. The cloth need not match the plates. Put the salad down where people can reach it and let the afternoon take its time.
The menu follows four ingredients into four different moods. Orange makes a sharp, juicy beginning. Aubergine turns a bowl of tomato pasta into the main event. Swordfish offers another route, with lemon and capers to pass around. Pistachio ends things in a small, generous cake. One salad, a choice of mains, something sweet. Enough cooking to make the table feel considered; enough room to enjoy sitting at it.
Somewhere between the kitchen and the garden
First, find a little shade
A meal outside begins with a practical decision: where will everyone be comfortable? Follow the shade, then bring the table to it. A jug of water, a stack of plates, something to wipe up the orange juice. Choose a broad platter for the salad and a bowl deep enough to turn the pasta without losing a piece of aubergine. A bright ceramic rim can do all the decorating a dish needs.
Citrus belongs to the island’s wider landscape as well as its cooking. The plain around Palermo is known as the Conca d’Oro, the Golden Valley, a name linked to its citrus groves. We borrow the garden feeling for this table: green leaves, yellow fruit, a little disorder. You can borrow it too, even beside an open kitchen window. A few branches in a jug and the smell of a freshly cut lemon are enough to start.
The first platter
Orange, with a salty side
Peel an orange over a bowl and save what falls. That juice is the beginning of the dressing, joined by olive oil and red wine vinegar. The fruit goes on a broad platter with fine fennel, black olives and a little red onion. Sweetness meets brine; crisp fennel interrupts the soft orange. There is no single perfect forkful. The pleasure is in finding the next combination.
Choose juicy sweet oranges, or blood oranges when they are in season. Slice the fennel thinly enough to bend, keep the prepared ingredients separate and dress just before serving. Taste an olive before reaching for the salt. Then set the platter between people rather than making four neat little arrangements: this salad is good at being passed around.
The pasta course
Norma comes to the table
Pasta alla Norma originates in Catania, with tomato, fried aubergine, salted ricotta and basil at its heart. It is a short list with a lot going on. The aubergine softens in hot oil and takes colour around the edges; the tomato finds its way into the pasta; the cheese brings a final salty crumble. Red, purple, white, green. Dinner supplies its own colour scheme.
Dry the aubergine well and fry in batches, giving each piece space. Finish the pasta in the tomato sauce with a little cooking water, then fold the aubergine through gently. Save some for the top so it stays visible. Basil arrives towards the end, ricotta salata just before serving. Bring the bowl out while the pasta is hot. If there is to be fish afterwards, make this the smaller first course: set the pasta recipe to two servings and divide it between four plates.
A little shade. A very bright table. No particular hurry.
The other way to lunch
A lemon-bright fish course
Swordfish gives you a different centre for the meal: firm fish, a hot pan, a dressing that makes the plate worth chasing with a piece of bread. Our version takes lemon, olive oil and oregano as its salmoriglio-inspired starting point, then adds capers. That addition is ours. Their small, salty bursts sit happily beside the lemon without asking the fish to disappear beneath a sauce.
Make the dressing before cooking so you can give the pan your attention. Pat the steaks dry, follow the recipe’s heat and doneness guidance, and check the thickest part rather than relying on the clock alone. Spoon the lemon-caper dressing over the fish while it is hot and bring it straight to the table. The orange salad can come alongside. If pasta was the first course, leave the fish uncooked until that course is finished: it deserves its own few minutes in the kitchen.
A little green, a little sweet
Save a corner for cake
Pistachio has a place of its own in Sicily’s food culture; Bronte, on the slopes of Etna, is particularly associated with it. Here the nuts become a small olive oil cake with orange zest. This is our own recipe, made for this menu. The crumb is softly nutty, the green gently muted. A spoonful of cold orange ricotta beside the slice brings the meal back to where it began, with citrus.
Make the cake first. It needs at least 60 minutes to cool after baking: 10 in the tin and another 50 on a rack. Keep the orange ricotta refrigerated until it is wanted. The 16 cm cake makes four wedges, so there is no need to turn dessert into a second project. Scatter the chopped pistachios, cut the slices and bring out the coffee. By now the tablecloth may have a mark on it. That seems entirely reasonable.
The afternoon can wait
Leave the chairs where they are
Choose the kind of meal you actually want to cook. Salad, one main and cake is a good lunch for four. Both mains become a longer meal if you reduce the pasta to four small first-course portions, then cook the fish for its own course. There is a plan below, but it is there to take work out of your afternoon. Read the recipes, settle the portions and let the useful preparation happen before anyone sits down.
The rest is about the table. Keep water within reach. Pass the salad. Offer the fish dressing on the side. Bring the cake out whole, with a knife and four plates, when somebody is ready for it. An outdoor meal need not be elaborate to feel different from an indoor one. A moving patch of shade, a colourful bowl, the kitchen door left open: small things can make a very good afternoon.
BRING THE ISLAND HOME
A little order.
A long afternoon.
Choose your main, leave room for cake, and cook at your own pace.
First, the cake
Read the four recipes, choose your main and check portions. Bake the pistachio cake, then cool for 10 minutes in its tin and at least 50 more on a rack. Prepare the orange ricotta and refrigerate until needed.
Prepare the bright things
Peel and cut the oranges, slice the fennel and prepare the salad ingredients. Keep them separate and undressed. Make the fish dressing if swordfish is on your menu.
Cook the centre
For Norma, prepare the tomato sauce and fry the aubergine, then cook and finish the pasta. For swordfish, follow the recipe’s pan and doneness guidance. For both, serve the small pasta course before cooking the fish.
Dress, finish, pass around
Dress the salad just before serving. Finish the pasta with basil and ricotta salata, or spoon the warm lemon-caper dressing over the fish. Clear the savoury plates, then serve four wedges of the cooled cake with cold orange ricotta.
THE USEFUL BITS
Good things to know.
Choose your main
Pasta or swordfish makes a complete meal with the salad and cake. For both, use the recipe portion control to set the pasta to 2 servings, giving four small first-course plates, then cook the swordfish at 4 servings.
Let the oranges choose the season
The salad works with sweet regular oranges or blood oranges when in season. Taste the fruit and the olives before seasoning. Capers and ricotta salata bring their own salt to the other dishes, too.
Finish close to the table
Make the cake first and allow at least 60 minutes for cooling after baking. Keep the orange ricotta refrigerated and prepared salad components separate. Dress the salad at serving and cook your chosen main when everyone is ready. Follow the individual recipes for storage and doneness.
Sicilian notes: Pasta alla Norma · Palermo’s citrus landscape · Bronte pistachios
THE TABLE IS YOURS.
Stay for
the afternoon.
Keep the last slice of cake in the shade, pour a little more water and leave the chairs where they are. The recipes have done their part. The afternoon is yours.
Find your next dish ↗