SPRING ABECEDARY
Pantelleria, tastes and smells of the island
- Between May and June, Pantelleria produces Pantelleria zucchini. They are round, small and very tasty, surprising in their sweetness and intensity of flavor. They are the key ingredient in many recipes and dishes. Above all, they are the green of the Pantelleria’s correct and complete diet. They also have a special bond with the preciousness of water and in the alchemy between soil, volcano, heat, dew, they manage in their smallness to gather from the earth what man needs for him to be well, but with flavors that are never trivial and taken for granted, that continue to surprise and awaken the taste buds.
- Along the roads, facing the dry stone walls, one can pick or smell the aromatic plants of this island. The wind, sometimes, really seems to want to distribute their scent to the whole island. These are mostly rosemary and oregano and wild fennel. Alongside the well-kept seedlings of mint, sage, and basil, all of which have a very intense scent here, the typical Pantelleria aromas become a school of taste and fragrance. Used to give flavor to dishes, they also in truth give fragrance to homes and people. Perfuming the tables with zibibbo grapes, rosemary, oregano, fennel, smelling these odors, is truly a school of taste.
- If you look closely at the coastline you can suddenly see climbing little green clouds of capers. Grown extensively and heroically on the island, then patiently worked with salt, they are the strong taste of the island, they give flavor to all dishes, they manage to harmonize with everything, giving tastiness, imagination and flair. They are perhaps the icon of how Pantelleria loves to make itself enjoyable to all tastes, and how it knows how to give flavor to life with small things.
And what season will you come to taste Pantelleria zucchini
and pick rosemary, oregano, wild fennel, and capers?
