One of the biggest flaws of us Sicilians is having a poor memory. We easily forget if someone has wronged us, and that is not necessarily a bad thing, since then, but the problem is that we often forget our traditions and where we come from.

One of the most beautiful things that Sicily has, besides art, the sea, the perfumes, the islets, the beaches, is certainly the pastry. I think we all agree that Sicilian pastry is unmatched all over the world And if anyone has any doubts just think of the top 5 typical Italian sweets that come to mind: Tiramisù, Cannolo, Cassata, Babà and the fifth most likely the Modica Chocolate PGI.

In short, out of 5 famous Italian desserts, 3 are Sicilian, one from Campania and the other still has not understood whether Treviso, Tuscan or something else.

You understand well that if Italy is the home of cooking and pastry and if 50/60% of the most representative desserts are Sicilian we can without a doubt confirm that pastry, even before Italian, is Sicilian.

And we can go ahead with all due respect to the French and pastry chefs from northern Italy, also because they then have to explain to me what we should do with their pastry made from 7 gram micro bites, so we have to eat 49 to understand something, but oh well.

That said, there is nothing about these desserts today that hasn’t been handed down for CENTURIES. Cassata, Cannolo, Modica Chocolate IGP, nougat with sesame or almonds, almond biscuits, mpanatigghi are all sweets that have existed for more than 100 years.

Now, considering that until half a century ago Sicilian men worked in the countryside and women looked after the house, in your opinion who has carried on these wonderful culinary traditions? Women.

If we go specifically, it was the GRANDMOTS.

Because when it came to retirement age and men could rest from their strenuous jobs and the children were already adults, grandmothers delighted in the kitchen taking back those sweets that they had always seen their grandparents make, and so on for centuries and generations.

Also, because many years ago there were no specialized pastry shops. In short, if the most important pastry is the Sicilian one, and if the Sicilian pastry exists thanks to the grandmothers, we can only refer to them and their tradition every time we think of a dessert.

This is why I decided to honor the memory of my Nonna Lina (Don Peppinu’s wife, who passed away 2 months ago) by paying her homage and dusting off all those wonderful sweets of Sicilian tradition. A tribute therefore to all Sicilian grandmothers.