“What’s it like here in summer?” Ed asks the waiter who sets down two brimful glasses of prosecco.
“Pieno, pieno,” he says. Full, full.
This evening is anything but. In the vast piazza of Marzamemi, a few souls stroll about then settle, as we have, into one of the bars and restaurants with brightly colored chairs that ring the glorious space. A pretty church sits in one corner, but the main business of the place seems to be eating and drinking. Perhaps in another season, a place to see, be seen. A Facebook friend told me we all go to Marzamemi. I’m not sure who we is, but I imagine an artistic, international boho crowd of fashionista hipsters. (Are they on Facebook?) Maybe summer is like that—tie up your sailboat in the harbor and swan into town for bowls of mussels straight from the sea and cold wine.
But I’m loving this wan October twilight, still warm enough to sit outside, with the paving stones gleaming like wet soap from the lights on surrounding buildings. For such a tiny town, the piazza is huge. I imagine the summer film festival. Children running wild and fireworks, moon rising from the water. A thousand glasses of Aperol spritz circulating on trays. Tonight, no party yachts anchor in the harbor, just well-used fishing boats and piles of nets. Traditionally the main business was tuna, thousands caught in a series of entangling nets then killed, the ritual called mattanza, essentially massacre. Tonnara (tuna processing and canning) buildings still stand, ruins waiting for condo transformation. To the north stretches a long crescent of sand beach and a colony of small houses. Marzamemi, way south in Sicily—ideal low-key, picturesque Italian beach town. Colorful and crumbly, its evocative beauty makes me want to stay.
All quiet. We walk until dark.
WE CHECKED IN earlier at Scilla Maris, a small inn down a dirt road. Ah, the sleek room with mezzanine bed has a distant view of the Vendicari nature reserve with its wild beaches, and of the sea, with nero d’Avola vineyards, blackening into autumn, between us and the coast. More nero d’Avola vines in back. From our patio, we are already steeping in the idea of these wines.
ON LANDING IN Catania this morning, we walked into the arrival area and were hit with an array of delicious smells. This has to be a first! An airport permeated with aromas of warm focaccia, dark concentrated espresso, an array of fruit and cream pastries, and best of all—arancini, those delectable balls of rice stuffed with cheese or ragù and fried to crunchy greatness. A long bank of cafés introduced us to Sicily, one of the world’s best places to feast. We have come here to eat. And drink. Anything we see along the way is a bonus. This is our fifth trip to Sicily. Although we’ve explored Palermo, Erice, Agrigento, Siracusa, Taormina, Cefalù, the Greek ruins, and the grand, intricate Baroque cities of Noto, Ragusa, and Modica, we’ve never made it to the southern towns. We’re so far south, we could water-ski to Tunis.
WE FOUND SCILLA Maris by chance—a lucky choice. The landscaping keeps close to the native terrain: low stone walls, borders of lavender, santolina, and rosemary-lined pebble walkways. Relaxing with a prosecco by the pool, we have a chance to watch the antics of eight kittens. Will there soon be exponential population growth with a lot of recessive genes? Meanwhile, they are crazy fun.
THE CANDLELIT DINING room overlooks the courtyard. The cats come to the glass wall by our table, hoping for what? Surely not a bite of our shared tempura di gamberi, scampi, e ortaggi con riduzione al limone, tempura of shrimp, scampi, and vegetables with a tangy sauce of lemon, honey, and apple cider vinegar. (I’ll be reproducing this at home.) Perfect antipasti, so very light. Or do they want a sip of Ed’s chickpea soup with crispy onions, or our beauteous tomato and beef stew with potatoes roasted with oregano? Soon they leave for the evening and we linger at the table over an inexpensive bottle of Note Nere Syrah from Marzamemi. Ed gives it a hurrah, this easy syrah.
After dinner at home, usually Ed has an Averna, a Sicilian digestivo made from thirty-two herbs, while I’m content with the last of the wine, but tonight we both try the orange digestivo Amara, made on the slopes of Mount Etna. Distilled from Tarocco blood-orange peels and herbs, this rich, essential orange elixir appeals to me much more than its kissing cousin limoncello.
DEEP SLEEP. SUBMERGED dreams. Is it the ancient farmland? The lagoons of the nature reserve where pink flamingos stand in marshes full of birds, where there are paths to wander as in a dream? Ed wakes me early. “Look out,” he says, sitting up in bed. The sun is wobbling up from the sea, a blood orange, a spilling of silvered gold light across the water. No better place to wake up in this world or the next.
WE ARE BIG fans of the Tuscan Tenuta Sette Ponti wines. How many celebrations have commenced with Ed opening bottles of their Oreno or Crognolo? As everyone knows, Sicilian wines have been on the rise for a couple of decades and now many of Italy’s best come from the island. Antonio Moretti Cuseri, owner of Sette Ponti, bought vineyards here a dozen years ago. We love his grand Mahâris. And Corposo—big-bodied wine we pour at holidays and birthdays. When he learned that we were coming to Sicily, he invited us to stop by his Feudo Maccari. Three minutes from our hotel, we’re there.
Alessandra, a young woman from Palermo with a passion for wine, comes out to take us around the property. The enormous storage room vaults upward like a cathedral. What a fabulous venue for a wedding on a scalding August afternoon. In the modern tasting room, she’s prepared seven bottles: two whites, a rosé, and four reds. A stellar lineup, as we find out during an easy, contemplative chance to experience each wine. (I’m not really good at this. After a few, I’m lost. I keep wanting to go back to the second one, or the first.) We discuss and toast. Our old friend Mahâris (the name means sentinel tower in Arabic), and, oh my, Saia, whose name is from the canal system for collecting water used by the Arabs centuries ago. Dark, bursting fruit, but with a ray of Sicilian sun in each bottle. That must be, as one swallow makes you think good thoughts. I’d take a glass of this by fire late at night and read Neruda.
Maybe the soul in these wines comes from growing the vines in the ancient Greek alberello, little tree, form. Instead of espaliering vines, each one is grown separately on its own stake, not touching the next, for maximum exposure to light all day. The vine is kept low, more protected from the sun, and the leaves also protect the maturing grapes. So much of the ancient world still lives in this vineyard. I double back to the white Grillo (cricket); a crisp and mineral fragrance makes it as pleasant to smell as to drink. Fragrance, the hint of pleasure to come. I would love to sip Rosé di Nero d’Avola on a late summer afternoon under the rose arbor in the piazza of Marzamemi and watch the petals fall as our faces brighten.
THE FAMOUS PACHINO tomato grows in the eponymous town a few kilometers south. At first I thought I saw lakes in the distance. Closer, afraid not. Growing that acidic-sweet red bauble we love in salads has blotted the landscape with acres and acres of plastic greenhouses as far as you can see and much farther than you would imagine. Economy dupes aesthetics.
We reach Portopalo, near the bottom of Sicily, and stop for lunch on the harbor. Eerie to think of Allied troops landing near here in 1943, swarming and spreading into the area on their way to winning Sicily. One or two of the old people dining here might remember.
Slow service but the view of blue and white boats is lively. I order a simple pasta with tomato and basil. It tastes like a tin can smells. Ed has an enormous antipasto, chef’s choice, and chef has chosen about fifteen of his favorites. One plump little fish stares at the ceiling. The arancini stuffed with mozzarella look very tasty. Then I feel sick. Something orange and squishy on his platter looks lurid. My mound of pasta, no. I feel really sick.
I’m doubled up in the car, cursing and sipping water. We omit the trip to see the beach of the tiny offshore Isola delle Correnti, the very southernmost point of Sicily. I wish we had another night with the eight kittens, a chance to spot a flamingo, and a dinner at Cortile Arabo, the Arab Courtyard, a white terrace overlooking the sea at Marzamemi.
Our destination: Scicli. We’ve got to stop saying Chee clee. It’s SHE-clee.
NOTE:
By appointment, you can arrange a tour and tasting at Feudo Maccari. www.feudomaccari.it