simon says french food blog

GHOST RESTAURANT

By Joe Ray
NYC

The boss is in town, looking to dine and wants to know where we should go. I almost panic. Where do you take the most-feared food critic in France? I call friends and comb over the list of places I’ve been until I remember the place I really want to try: M. Wells in Queens.

Something of a media darling, M. Wells is/was also a gastronomic UFO housed in a diner: they do what they wanted to, which is pretty admirable in my book. It received incredible raves and, since I’ve been there, one blazing, bizarre review whose subject matter I’m not touching with a ten-foot pole.

Since then, the restaurant has apparently been forced out of their Long Island City location by their landlord and, at this point, there are only rumors about it resurfacing.

When we arrive, François promises to share some of his Caesar salad with smoked herring but it disappears before I point my fork in his direction. I try ‘Bacalao Magasin’ a veritable bath of olive oil that poaches, heats or finishes carrots, shrimp, beans, peas and salt cod in a great terracotta bowl.

For our ‘Big Dish’ – menu choices here are divided into ‘big’ and ‘small’ – we try the ‘BibiM Wells,’ a seafood riff on the Korean dish, which is something of a bunt that could have been a home run with more thought given to the play of texture that make the original so good.

The night we’re there, I wish we were with a much larger group to try the big dishes, where much of the creativity appears to lie – BBQ short ribs, lamb saddle with za’atar, tahini and pomegranate molasses, chicken wonton pot-au-feu – but get a sense of the bigger game the chefs seem to be after with an escargot and bone marrow pasta dish with shallots and a red wine ‘purée’ – the mollusk cousin to octopus and bone marrow pasta. M. Wells’ snails are served right in the bone, two forms of slippery goodness bathing in the wine sauce, covered with crunchy, garlicky breadcrumbs.

What is (“What was”?) most interesting at M. Wells is the idea factory the place became. Francois and I get talking about it - in Paris, you’d wonder about the chef’s motives, what they want to accomplish and, often, what their next step will be. Here, creation seems to be the whole point – there is no next step.

Brouhaha aside (please) it’ll be interesting to see what happens next.

Food and travel writer and photographer Joe Ray is the 2009 Lowell Thomas Travel Journalist of the Year and author of the blog Eating The Motherland. Follow him on Facebook and on Twitter: @joe_diner. 

 

INSERT GONG HERE

By Joe Ray
MANHATTAN

On a recent trip to Richmond, B.C., the value of a good guide was reaffirmed when exploring Chinatown. (Anywhere, for that matter.) With thousands of options, how do you figure out where to go, let alone the two specialties on 100-item menu?

Craig Nelson figured out Manhattan’s Chinatown on his own. Not For Tourists guide editor by day, Nelson spent years worth of lunches trying every place he could walk to near their offices. Then he made his own app – Chinatown Chow Down. (Insert gong sound here).

We started with pork buns at Mei Li Wah Bakery – brown (baked) or white (steamed) – is about all you need to say at the counter. We scarfed them in the street - they’re packed with sweet, meaty flavor. Total cost for both? $1.60! Cheaper than a Snickers bar!!! Ha!

We had sit-down handmade noodles around the corner, fritters and a mustard green sandwich from a street-food vendor which we ate in the park under the West Side Highway. We capped the tour with my favorite – fresh sour plum juice at Yuen Yuen. It’s sweet, sour, funky and smoky. How did they make it smoky? No matter – just keep it coming. How much? $1.25! Fresh juice for less than a Coke! Where’s that gong?!?!

 

Holy Cow! Forget pork belly – Italian beef is the Windy City’s ultimate meat

CHICAGO
By Joe Ray 

In the parking lot of one of the Windy City’s better-known Italian beef sandwich stands, while waiting for my Uncle Joe to arrive for lunch, Uncle Charlie added the terms “juice loan” and “bag drop” to my vocabulary, as if Mafia-style extortion and illicit payoffs are part and parcel of a Chicago beef tour.

Inside the kitchen of one of these restaurants, someone politely told me, “You won’t be taking a picture of him,” and I stuck my camera right back into its bag, no questions asked.

As ubiquitous and popular a Chicago institution as pizza and Vienna hot dogs, Italian beef needs a guide. I’ve got family.

... read the rest here in The Daily.

 

Chocolate - Distilled To A Science in Red Hook

By Joe Ray
Red Hook, BROOKLYN




The mysterious voicemail from a well-informed friend arrived at the last minute. “Dude, we’re meeting in Red Hook in an hour and going to this bar that’s never open to taste homemade chocolate and drink homemade hootch. Wanna come?”

I arched an eyebrow, checked on clearing my schedule and called back.

“The guy designed one of those James Bond-style jet packs. That’s all I know. This is New York — are you coming or not?”

How do you say no?

... read the rest here in The Daily.

Distilling’s Gold Rush - Reviving Small-Batch Spirits in America

... hot off the press ...

If not for a wave of state legislation in the past five years, the microdistillery boom may never have come to pass. The Corpse Reviver could have lain dormant well into the next century, Tom Collins preferring to spend his summer in less trendy climes

Remember the blossoming of the brew pub and the craft brewing trend that left the United States with a surprising number of good options on grocery store shelves? American distilling is now on that edge and the gold rush is on, even if it’s wrapped in a ball of red tape.

Click here to read the full story in The Daily...

FORGOTTEN FRIES

By Joe Ray
SEATTLE

“Look at those fries,” a friend said walking past the Capitol Hill sandwich shop, Homegrown. Stuffed to the gills, we still considered a plate.

I wound up there for lunch a few days later, convinced we’d head to the neighboring Sitka & Spruce, but for reasons I didn’t understand, nothing on Sitka’s menu looked as interesting as Homegrown’s catfish po boy with slaw. 

Homegrown calls itself a ‘sustainable sandwich shop’ which is about as interesting as sustainable wine - it’s only worth it if it’s good.

It’s worth it. We try a fun spin on grilled cheese made with cured ham and mozzarella, along with solid homemade chips and a beet salad, but the po boy, made crispy with the slaw, is the show stealer - a sandwich with momentum. So much momentum, we forget to order the fries.

After lunch, visit Homegrown’s top-notch neighbors: The Calf & Kid for cheese and sausage from Rain Shadow Meats. I’ll go back to try Sitka & Spruce, though I might smuggle in some Homegrown fries.

Homegrown
1531 Melrose Avenue
Seattle, WA
+1 (206) 682-0935
eathomegrown.com

Count on $10-15 for lunch.

Food and travel writer and photographer Joe Ray is the 2009 Lowell Thomas Travel Journalist of the Year and author of the blog Eating The Motherland. Follow him on Facebook and on Twitter: @joe_diner.

THE SCENT OF FRYING GARLIC

SEATTLE
By Joe Ray 

 

“I love how this neighborhood smells like garlic,” said a friend as we walked from Stumptown down into the International District.

Coffee and frying garlic - what a nice way to lead into dim sum.

We’d tried to get into Harbor City last time I was in town only to be discouraged by the line at the door on a Sunday morning. Today, our group of eight got there early and waited it out.

Moments after tea is poured and my nephew Eli is installed in his booster chair, the first cart arrives - hum bow (pork bun), salty long beans, broccoli rabe, shu mai, fried calamari just need to have their little bamboo steamer opened and showed to our crowd to start a “Yes” chorus.

There’s something about dim sum that makes you forget that more will come if you wait. Whoever thought of the dim sum cart was a business genius: seat the hungry customer then immediately wave hot, fresh food under their nose. You may have a little mountain of dumplings in front of you, but would you like an order of sticky rice with meltingly good meat?

Hell, yes!

 

Count on $10-20 

Harbor City Restaurant – MAP
707 S King St.
Seattle
(206) 621-2228

Food and travel writer and photographer Joe Ray is the 2009 Lowell Thomas Travel Journalist of the Year and author of the blog Eating The Motherland. Follow him on Facebook and on Twitter: @joe_diner.

DEAR CATASTROPHE WAITER

By Joe Ray
LYON 

Dear catastrophe waiter
Dear catastrophe waiter
I’m sorry that you seem have the weight of the world over you
I cherish your smile
– Lyrics (with a tiny gender substitution) by Belle and Sebastian

I’m not sure what phase of the meltdown I arrive in, but the sweet-as-honey waitress hadn’t started crying yet.

Walking into at Café Gadagne, a beautiful spot with a terraced patio designed to be a compliment to the newly-refurbished Musée whose name it bears, I’m glared at by the waiter, a walking black cloud whose pants hang a bit too far down the southern half of his rear end for a place this nice. 

Turns out he glares at everyone, clanking plates, occasionally pretending everything’s ok, but his whirlpool of bad juju sucks the place down around him. A smart teacher would put this kid in the ‘time out’ corner. Instead, he bosses the hard-working waitress around in front of everybody until she implodes. 

Too bad. The food would be good if you could get past his distraction. I would have enjoyed my pumpkin ‘cappuccino’ soup with roasted chestnuts – there was a nice hot/cold thing going on, but it’s lost in the chaos. Ditto for my steak tartare.

Appropriately chaotic jazz warbles out of the kitchen and at one point, the chef comes out, smiling and oblivious. This is where I realize the bigger failure: nobody’s in charge.

Who knows? I was there a few weeks ago and maybe he’s gone by now. We can all hope, but I’m not going back to find out.

Count on about 20 euros.

Café Gadagne – MAP
1 Place du Petit Collège
Lyon
+33 4 78 62 62 34 60

Food and travel writer and photographer Joe Ray is the 2009 Lowell Thomas Travel Journalist of the Year and author of the blog Eating The Motherland. Follow him on Facebook and on Twitter: @joe_diner. 

 

LE SEVERO - ORDER ANOTHER PLATE

By Joe Ray
PARIS

I’ll begin with the closer; sometimes I talk about a meal having ‘momentum,’ something that gets better and better with every bite making you want more. Le Severo served a meal’s worth.

I’d wanted to come here since I first walked by years ago when I lived on place Denfert-Rochereau. The chalkboard wall full of good wines and the short menu had a wonderful ‘serious food’ air that tripped my radar.

The hard-working waiter speeds around the floor by himself. He also happens to be the owner, a former butcher and a man who knows how to age meat, which he does for 40 days in the space beneath the dining room.

Did I mention he can carry three wine bottles in one hand and though very busy, is unfailingly polite and patient with my table of nine?

On this night, we order appetizers, passing them around to share. When cep mushrooms, seared in generous quantities of butter make it to Mom, she takes one bite and commands, “Order another plate.”

There’s also a meatier-than-most blood sausage served without casing and cooked crispy on the outside, melting within. Mom immediately declares one of the best she’s ever eaten.

I mention this to the owner and he blushes.

After this, we pass to the serious meat. Just before taking our order, the owner declares that all meat will be cooked rare, fanning his arms out over the table. I mention that Mom prefers her meat on the done side and he blushes again, then caves to her wishes.

Dad and Jim get a côte de boeuf with intense marbling served blissfully rare and accompanied by fries that would make a Belgian proud. Jim gnaws on the bone, smiling the whole time and Dad’s got that “ooh, baby, baby” look on his face.

At the end of the night, the owner’s got time to come by and talk about his food – he’s wonderfully proud of it, rightfully so.

Momentum, indeed.

Count on 40-50€.

Le Severo – MAP
8 rue des Plantes
Paris
+33 (0)1.40.44.73.09

Food and travel writer and photographer Joe Ray is the 2009 Lowell Thomas Travel Journalist of the Year and author of the blog Eating The Motherland. Follow him on Facebook and on Twitter: @joe_diner. 

 

 

NYC'S SWAN SONG OF THE ALABAMA SLAMMER

NYC
By Joe Ray

A bit out of sequence, but, this stuff isn't getting any younger. Above, a shot from the scene at the 'pop-up' Fatty Johnson's in the Village last night - barman/journalist/pal Toby Cecchini announced "sundry a selection of reviled cocktails from the 70s through the 90s" signing off on the invite saying "Join us if you dare, and feel free to bring anyone you don't particularly like."

Jello shot and a Blue Hawaiian, anyone?

Fatty Johnson's - MAP
50 Carmine Street
New York, NY 10014
+1.212.929.5050
www.fattyjohnsons.com

THE CREPE KING OF OYSTER CITY

CANCALE, France
By Joe Ray 

Dad, Jim and I leave the ladies to roam on their own for a bit and we head to the oyster stands to split a few plates, sitting on the sea wall and flipping the shells into the sea.

Later, we double back for lunch at the Breizh Café. With the mother ship here, and branches in Paris and Tokyo, this place is multiplying like, um, hotcakes and that’s not such a bad thing.

Bertrand Larcher serves classics with high-quality fillings or more creative combinations like my smoked herring, lumpfish roe and cream - smoky, salty and just a little sweet. Whatever you get, the buckwheat crepes are crispy on the outside, downy within.

Nobody at the table offers to share - a good sign - and we wash it down with a Fouesnant cider that has a wonderful, farmy funk.

I run out to feed the meter before the dessert crepes - chocolate and butter and apple compote, cider syrup and whipped cream - are ordered and return to two rather tiny wedges the gang has ‘saved’ for me. Not bad considering I had to push the idea of dessert on them.

After that, we go back out and have more oysters on the sea wall.

Not really. But we thought about it.

Count on 15-20€ with cider.

Breizh Café - MAP
7 quai Thomas
Cancale
+33 (0)2 99 89 61 76
www.breizhcafe.com

Food and travel writer and photographer Joe Ray is the 2009 Lowell Thomas Travel Journalist of the Year and author of the blog Eating The Motherland. Follow him on Facebook and on Twitter: @joe_diner.

SPAIN LOSES ONE OF HER GREAT CHEFS

He may have been a bull in a China shop, but he was a very interesting bull. Spain's lost a great chef. R.I.P. Santi Santamaria.

DAD, TINTIN AND THE RESTAURANT ON THE BEACH

By Joe Ray
SAINT-MALO, Brittany

I’ve just made a mad dash inside the walls of Saint-Malo, trying to find a restaurant for my party five and left glassy-eyed. I’m sure some are fine, but most look like they’re made to accomodate the hordes that descend on the city in the warmer months.

“Bof!” the nonplussed French would say. 

Crestfallen, I meet the gang.

“There was a good-looking place back by the hotel,” suggests Dad.

The place near the hotel, are you kidding!?!? I think. I’m the food guy - I should be able to find something better…Except I had noticed that place and it’s getting late...

“Perfect! Let’s go!”

La Brasserie du Sillon, a 10-minute walk down the beach from the center of Saint-Malo is bustling when just about everything else out this way is quiet. The food will be good and after a week of translating menus for my folks and their friends, the service is blessedly, impressively bilingual. While there are several à la carte options and shellfish platters a gogo, there are good values in the 25 to 40 euro prix fixe menus. My favorite is the whopping raie à la Grenobloise, skate served in brown butter, capers, lemon and walnuts. Roasted, it makes the tip of the skate wing flip up like Tintin’s hair. Mom gets an Italian-themed salad with a great slab of cured ham and the best mozzarella I’ve had in France.

Good call, Dad.

La Brasserie du Sillon - MAP
3 Chaussée du Sillon
Saint-Malo
+33 (0)2 99 56 10 74
www.brasseriedusillon.com

Reservations recommended 

Food and travel writer and photographer Joe Ray is the 2009 Lowell Thomas Travel Journalist of the Year and author of the blog Eating The Motherland. Follow him on Facebook and on Twitter: @joe_diner.

NO MAP, NO PHOTO. NO WAY.

By Joe Ray
PARIS 

This is a public service writeup for the “run away” column.

I’ve spent the last few weeks on the road, working on a Frommer’s guide update in Burgundy and the Rhône. Meeting an out-of-town colleague and his wife for brunch right after my return to Paris, I was happy to have someone else choose the location.

Les Editeurs sits across the street from Yves Camdeborde’s wonderful Le Comptoir and a stone’s throw from the Odeon metro. Walls of books and red-leather chairs make Les Editeurs look like a nice place to while away an afternoon, perhaps that’s best done with a beer or something else that they didn’t create on site.

Yesterday morning, 25 euros bought Sunday brunch at Les Editeurs. Brunch is a Parisian trend I’ve never understood in ten years here - a bad translation from the beautiful, bountiful American original. The French version is often overpriced and boring. Les Editeurs version included watery OJ, bad coffee, a basket of croissants and soggy toast and a plate with small ramekins of unremarkable scrambled eggs, a fruit cup, yogurt and something else that my mind has blocked out.

My colleague’s wife ordered a fifteen-euro club sandwich which she asked for without bacon. She was informed the sandwich was pre-made, but she could remove the bacon.

Really? Why do you need to pre-make a club sandwich in a restaurant? There are other time-saving/corner-cutting measures to take in a kitchen that don’t make bread soggy.

She did her best to push the sandwich around on her plate, but couldn’t bring herself to eat it. The waitress asked her about it and she couldn’t lie. To their credit, they comped it.

I’ve just come off of three days of incredible food in Lyon - fantastic three-course meals for under 20 euros. Yes, you can argue you pay for a prime location, but today’s brunch made me want to walk to the train station and have a few more meals in the Rhône before returning to Paris and pretend like I just got back.

Les Editeurs
4 Carrefour de l'Odéon
75006 Paris

Food and travel writer and photographer Joe Ray is the 2009 Lowell Thomas Travel Journalist of the Year and author of the blog Eating The Motherland. Follow him on Facebook and on Twitter: @joe_diner. 

 

FOLLOWING YOUR NOSE TO A MAN OF HIS CRAFT

By Joe Ray
GREENSBORO, Vermont

New story: Beer wunderkind Shaun Hill's new digs at Hill Farmstead Brewery in Vermont's Northeast Kingdom. Cheers!

A TASTE OF THE FUTURE

By Joe Ray
LUMMI ISLAND, Washington

I’ve seen the future on a little island in the Pacific Northwest. A few weeks ago, I got a taste of Blaine Wetzel’s cuisine in his new role as executive chef at the Willows Inn.

Who’s Wetzel? You’ll likely be hearing quite a bit about him, particularly if you’re from that neck of the woods. Wetzel, 24, is fresh off a stint at Copenhagen’s noma restaurant, working as the chef de partie for Rene Redzepi. He was there when noma officially went through the roof, knocking El Bulli out of the top slot in San Pellegrino’s Best Restaurant in The World hooplah.

Did they win because he was there? No. Was he taking good notes? You bet.

I was at the Willows to interview Wetzel for a set of upcoming articles and a sneak preview of what to expect when the Willows reopens next month.

A seven-course tasting menu was about six courses more than I needed to know that it was worth the trip. He might be a two-hour drive and five minute ferry ride from both Seattle and Vancouver, but you might want to reserve now.

What’d he serve? Barely poached end gently pickled Hammersley Inlet oysters were one of many surprise ‘snacks,’ but my favorite dish might have been the wild mushrooms, fresh cheese and woodruff. For the latter, he forages some of the mushrooms and woodruff and makes the cheese - rennet’s in a little bottle on a shelf in the fridge. He devotes a whole course to the potatoes inn owner Riley Starks grows at the adjacent Nettles Farm that supplies much of the kitchen’s produce.

Need any more reason to go? A four-course tasting menu will start at $40 and a seven course for $65. The inn and restaurant are closed for a January remodel.

Taste of the future begins in February. Go early.

The Willows Inn - MAP
2579 West Shore Drive

Lummi Island, WA 98262
+1 
(360)758-2620
www.willows-inn.com

For a bit of background on Wetzel’s arrival, click here. ...and for my Boston Globe story on Willows Inn owner Riley Starks, click here.

Food and travel writer and photographer Joe Ray is the 2009 Lowell Thomas Travel Journalist of the Year and author of the blog Eating The Motherland. Follow him on Facebook and on Twitter: @joe_diner.

 

“THIS PART OF SICILY IS LIKE A PROTEIN FACTORY”

By Joe Ray
FRIGINTINI, Sicily

Having found pizza 8.5, we went to see grandma in Frigntini. I’d heard about Ristorante Maria Fidone from a man who let his choice to live in Noto be based largely on proximity to pastry chef Corrado Assenza so I followed through on the recommendation.

Maria Fidone is the spiritual cousin of Casalinga Benevento, one notch higher in quality and one notch less expensive. This is about as close as yo8u can get to eating at a Sicilian grandmother’s house without an invite from a Sicilian grandmother.

The exterior has a art deco look more at place in Florida than here but the interior has that peculiar no-frills look that allows a flat screen TV to qualify as a decoration.

There are few choices to make. Red or white is one and it will arrive in a carafe fitting to the number of people at your table. There’s no menu to choose from either, but just by answering in the affirmative to every question the waiter asks, you’ll be eating what grandma is making. You’ll be wildly happy.

I know we’re on to something special when house-cured olives arrive with a bit of mint, but realize how serious this place is with one bite of ravioli di ricotta con sugo di maiale - something that instantly becomes one of the best-prepared pasta dishes of my life. The pasta is almost see through while still retaining a bit of al dente crunch. The ricotta within is transformed, with a cloudy, almost flan-like texture. 

“This part of Sicily is like a protein factory,” quips Francesco. 

The meat in the sauce along with the tomatoes create an acidic tang that gives the place immediate momentum: the more you eat, the more you want to eat.

“There’s a precision to this that reminds me of my grandmother’s cooking,” says Francesco. In all of the meals we’ve shared together, he’s never complimented food like that.

We share a pork dish, also in the tomato sauce, and the meal is crowned by stewed rabbit with veggies - again, a hint of mint - and each element retaining its own flavor.

The kicker? It’s a steal. Dinner for two, including wine, fizzy water, several courses, coffee and a shot of grappa and a handshake from the waiter as we head out the door is 26 euros. Total. Thirteen euros each. 

Memories of grandma and her untouchable cooking are provided free of charge.

If you don’t get to a restaurant like this in Sicily, you’re missing the point.

Ristorante Maria Fidone - MAP
Via Gianforma, 6
Frigintini (Modica)
+39 0932 901 135
www.mariafidone.com

Closed Monday. Cash only. Reserve ahead. Wednesday is vegetarian night.

Food and travel writer and photographer Joe Ray is the 2009 Lowell Thomas Travel Journalist of the Year and author of the blog Eating The Motherland. Follow him on Facebook and on Twitter: @joe_diner. 

DIPASQUALE DUE

By Joe Ray
RAGUSA IBLA, Sicily

When not in Ragusa Ibla for gelato, Ragusa proper can hold its own. The discreet Pasticceria DiPasquale - no relation to the wonderful cheese shop up the hill with the same name - doesn’t fool around.

The inside has a whiff of discreet luxury and there’s a room devoted to writer Leonardo Sciascia (seek out his Mafia writing - he’s blissfully good). God knows if he’s ever used the typewriter in the corner case, but it makes you dream anyway.

Unusually, the gelato is hidden from view - you choose from a short list on the bar. A pair of Sicilian classics are seriously good but what’s most intriguing is the difference in texture; the almond is cake-like and the pistachio more liquid and creamy. I could be just a flux in the fridge, but I doubt it. The slight differences make each one that much better - a secret modern touch in an austere place.

Pasticceria Di Pasquale - MAP
Corso Vittorio Veneto, 104
Ragusa, Sicily, Italy
+39.0932.624635
www.pasticceriadipasquale.com

CHEESE TIME IN RAGUSA

RAGUSA, Sicily
By Joe Ray 

We arrive a bit early for the cheese and mill around in the mist - wandering through the garden courtyard of a church we never find before settling on the step in front of DiPasquale. We’re not alone; a pair of men wait next to us and two women wait in an old, minuscule baby blue fiat that’s nudged up against the curb.

We’re all waiting for the cheese. 

Once in, the cheesemonger recognizes my face and I just say that I’ve been in before and would like to introduce my friends to some good Sicilian cheese. In Sicily, Dipasquale is where you go for the good stuff. The sourcing is impeccable and the cheese, wine and meat they procure has made them deservedly famous.

Show interest or let your eye rest too long and the cheesemonger cuts a slab for each of you to taste. One slab per person. The clever could easily make a meal out of a visit.

He guides us toward beautiful Ragusanos of different ages - these being the large, rectangular cheeses aged by hanging them on thick ropes, tumas (tomme), pecorino and a lovely, saffron-laced Piacentinu Ennese.

Above it all, there’s Lardo di Colonnata - melt in your mouth fatback typically aged in marble with herbs in the Colonnata mines.

In a larger European city, we’d pay twice as much for this kind of quality, but the real value is the contribution to the evening ahead.

Here, I wink to my great friends in the Ispica Social Club, whisper buonanotte, and disappear.

Dipasquale - MAP
Corso Italia, 387
Ragusa
+39 0932 227485
www.dipasqualeformaggi.it

Food and travel writer and photographer Joe Ray is the 2009 Lowell Thomas Travel Journalist of the Year and author of the blog Eating The Motherland. Follow him on Facebook and on Twitter: @joe_diner. 

THE ANARCHIST’S CANNOLI

PALAZZOLO ACREIDE, SICILY
By Joe Ray 

At the end of dinner at the anarchist’s in Siracusa, I asked the woman at the counter - the anarchette??? - where to go in town for good cannoli.

“There’s a fair one on the square, but if you really want a good one, you have to head up into the hills - to Palazzolo Acreide, but they’ll be closed now. It’s too late.”

We went to the piazza and ‘fair’ in this case was more than enough. We’re thrilled to be rediscovering the island, the architecture and the people. The Motherland.

The next day, Lex and I head to see winemaker Salvo Foti in Chiaramonte Gulfi, then head up and away into the hills and windmills, the sheep and the sunset. We start leaning vaguely toward home when a roadsign indicates “Palazzolo A.”

“That’s where the cannoli is!” I shout. I may have a memory like a sieve, but not when a town shares a name with one of my favorite Sicilian pastry chefs and gelato makers, Santi Palazzolo. 

Had I not turned, Lex might have staged a putsch.

Palazzolo Acreide is an off-the-track find, cannoli or no. We hop a fence to explore the ruins of a hilltop castle, then wander between the town’s four gem-like churches. 

Everyone in town knows that Corsino is the place for cannoli and there’s a bit of a momentary panic when it appears they’re out of ricotta filling. My word.

Instead, we get two cannoli on one tiny plate and have a seat outside. They’re wonderfully un-made-up - no chocolate bits, no candied fruit just the ricotta, just the shell and a dusting of powdered sugar - the Tilda Swinton of cannoli.

The filling’s perfect - the silky texture contrasting with the punch of good ricotta. Lexy may have had a life-changing experience at Bonajauto but isn’t above devouring this one. She does her little ‘pure pleasure’ gesture, eyes closed, huge smile, head thrown back a little, clapping her wrists together. 

There we are again, grinning our way through another town. We sit on the stairs above the main square and watch a wedding party stroll by - photos of the bride and groom taken between the columns in the arcade of an old building.

In front of another church hidden up a set of stairs, Lex twirls and smiles. The moon comes up full and orange above the city. 

Corsino - MAP
Via Nazionale, 2
Palazzolo Acreide
+39 0931 875533
www.corsino.it

Food and travel writer and photographer Joe Ray is the 2009 Lowell Thomas Travel Journalist of the Year and author of the blog Eating The Motherland. Follow him on Facebook and on Twitter: @joe_diner.