All About our Trip to Rome & Sicily
Short version: it was THE ABSOLUTE BEST.
About a year ago, my mom told me that she wanted to do a big trip, just the two of us, and she asked me to plan it—I mean, YES PLEASE! Put me in, coach! Of course the first place I thought of was Italy—when Aaron and I were there for our anniversary a couple years ago, I definitely returned home with the sense that there’s so much more of Italy that I want to experience.
Elizabeth and Sophie Minchilli lead food tours all over Italy, and I’ve been wanting to go on one of their tours for years. I started following them on Instagram (@eminchilli & @sminchilli) based on Jenny Rosenstrach’s recommendation—even if you’re not planning a trip, their Instagram accounts are gorgeous (but fair warning: it will definitely make you want to start planning a trip!).
I chose Sicily for three reasons: because my mom & I both love all things island/coast/water, because it’s known for its natural/rural beauty, and it’s known also for its art, especially handmade local ceramics. Of course just the food and wine aspect is enough to capture my interest entirely, but my mom isn’t as food-obsessed as I am, so I wanted to make sure we visited a place and chose a tour program that would highlight lots of cultural and historical aspects of a place, beyond food and wine.
Also, I really wanted to get into the mother-&-daughter aspect of all of it. I wanted, if possible, a trip led by both Elizabeth and Sophie—they mostly lead tours separately, so when Elizabeth posted this spring’s trip schedule & I saw a trip to Sicily led by both of them, I couldn’t dial my mom’s number fast enough.
Two Days in Rome
Before the tour began in Palermo, my mom and I spent two days in Rome. After an overnight flight and breakfast at our hotel, we walked to Campo Di Fiori to look at all the beautiful produce and flowers and to pick up mid-morning pizza at Forno Campo di Fiori, one of the oldest bakeries in Rome.
From Campo Di Fiore, we walked to Piazza Navona and on to the Pantheon and the Trevi Fountain—those last two are touristy and crowded, but beautiful nonetheless.
We had an incredible lunch at Roscioli—but also we over-ordered catastrophically, and also that’s right when the jet lag kicked in hard. One of the funniest memories I have of the trip was when the server came by and found us giggling helplessly at the mountains of food around us. After naps, we wandered Trastevere, my favorite neighborhood, and had gelato for dinner and then watched the sun set over the city from the rooftop of our hotel.
The next morning, we went to the Borghese Gardens—it was my first time there, and I highly recommend it. My mom loves flowers and gardens, and it’s a beautiful place to stroll. It has one of the best views of Rome—it’s set high above the city, so you can look out at all the different neighborhoods and rooftops. From there we went to St. Peter’s in the Vatican City, which is, of course, absolutely extraordinary. My mom is a painter, so it was extra special to look at all the mosaics and frescos through her eyes.
BTW, Sophie leads day tours of Rome—highly recommend!
Six Days in Palermo
We met Elizabeth and Sophie and our fellow group members over Prosecco at our hotel, and then walked together to dinner in a palazzo (yes, that’s the library of my dreams!) and a band playing traditional Sicilian music.
Each day, we gathered after breakfast for day trips—the first day, we drove into the countryside to visit a traditional cheesemaker who makes caciocavallo and fresh ricotta. We ate together with their family under a pergola, with their beautiful cats and dogs stretching in the sunshine and circling near for attention and scratches. We ate traditional baked pasta, roasted potatoes, delicious caponata, and for dessert, truly the best cannoli of our lives.
Another day, we had lunch at the home of a chef who makes couscous by hand in the method he was taught by his grandmother, and then we visited a baker in her eighties who’s been making traditional Sicilian desserts in a medieval village since her twenties. She allowed us back into the space where they make the pastries and taught us how to shape and fill the Genovese pastries that her shop is known for.
One morning in Palermo, we went on a market tour and then took a cooking lesson with a local chef—he taught us to make pannelle, homemade cavatelli with artichokes, swordfish meatballs, and strawberry granita.
(My mom would like me to point out that in the photo below I’m sticking out my tongue while rolling cavatelli—it’s a sign that I’m concentrating. I’ve been doing it all my life—and she’s been teasing me about it all my life...)
We visited Segesta, an architectural site from the period when the Greeks ruled Sicily. The wildflowers were blooming, and we couldn’t get over how beautiful it was. Another morning we went to the salt pans of Tripani to learn how sea salt is still harvested today using a traditional process involving windmills—my Dutch roots were thrilled and here’s a confession: I came home with an unreasonable amount of sea salt—regular sea salt? Check? Sea salt with lemon? Check. Sea salt with sage? Check!)
On our days in Palermo we visited churches and fountains and walked through markets. We stopped for delicious coffees and visited a traditional Sicilian hat maker and stopped for arancini at a little stand down by the waterfront.
On a gorgeous mild afternoon, we visited a family estate on an olive farm that produces organic olive oil, and the whole thing felt like something out of a movie. Our host Daniela prepared the most extraordinary meal, and her enthusiasm and generosity were palpable—an absolute highlight.
The tour ended Friday night, & my mom and I stayed one more day, just the two of us. We bought some beautiful locally made ceramics, walked through the (chaotic! amazing!) Mercado di Ballaro and had spritzes over looking Palermo Cathedral. As the sun set, we walked down by the waterfront and marina, and then—ending the trip just as we began—gelato for dinner.
Our amazing tour guide Salvatore kept reminding us that in Sicily, food isn’t just food—it’s history, it’s geography, cultural identity. One of the most fundamental realities of Sicily’s history is that because of its geography—because it’s an island right in the middle of the Mediterranean—it has, over the centuries, been conquered by almost every European, Middle Eastern, and North African nation. From Romans and Greeks to Phoenicians to Egyptians and North Africans, from Spanish to French to British, from Ottoman to Turks to Berberes…everyone has left their fingerprints on Sicily. Sicilian identity—including its culinary identity— has been shaped by all these influences.
Americans often arrive in Sicily expecting what they perceive to be “traditional” Italian food…but even that’s something of a myth: in some ways, there is no one traditional Italian food, because the regions that are now Italy were only united in 1861, and each region has a distinct culinary identity forged over centuries.
When you’re in Sicily, you see the North African influence everywhere—currants, pine nuts, mint, couscous. And of course, the Italian way on the whole is both hyper-seasonal and hyper-local—what that means is that we ate tons of seafood: octopus, calamari, swordfish, anchovies and sardines, cuttlefish fried until crispy and light. Tons of citrus, especially blood oranges—my mom’s favorite. Lots of fennel, peas, fava beans. It was peak artichoke season, which was delicious, and we ate fresh ricotta on everything.
To me, Sicily tastes like blood oranges and fennel, pastries with pistachio cream, cannoli studded with tiny chocolate chips, and a lovely white wine called Grillo that I will definitely be tracking down here in New York.
Travel makes your world bigger and smaller right at the same time—bigger, in that now I’ll always carry with me the history and flavors and customs of this extraordinary part of the world. It’s not an abstract place on a faraway map—it’s a place I know, a place I’ve tasted, a set of stories and flavors that I understand now, in at least some small way.
And smaller, in that right now I’m looking out at high rises, listening to sirens blaring and watching delivery bikes zip down sidewalks, and also right now, on the other side of the world, Giovanni is making cheese in the same way that his family has been making it for generations, and Maria is piping pastry dough into Genovese in her tiny bakery, high on a hilltop in a Medieval village. Daniela, I’m quite sure, is hosting guests around her table, telling them about the olive oil they press, about the history of their family home, reaching back five generations.
My life is so much richer for having met them, having been in their homes and listened to their stories. I read the news differently, shop more thoughtfully, think about food and history and political movements and art in new ways. Travel is a privilege, absolutely. And it’s such a gift.
I read years ago that the psychological benefits of travel aren’t just measured in the days and hours that you’re away. It’s the planning, the research, the texts back and forth about what you’re packing and omg how heavy your suitcase is. And it’s the ongoing conversations, well after the suitcases have been unpacked…remember that funny moment? Hey, how’s that thing we talked about that night over gelato?
I feel so very grateful for this extraordinary time with my mom—moments and conversations and shared memories neither of us will ever forget. It was truly some of the sweetest time we’ve ever spent together.
This is a busy season for our little family, with some changes on the horizon, and some complexity and just generally lots to balance. I know it’s hard for all of us to get things on the calendar, that it’s easier and seems more sensible to just stay home and check things off the list.
But here I am, my eye catching on a little bowl that I bought in Palermo, knowing that my mom has a similar one on her kitchen counter a thousand miles away. We text each other back and forth about funny memories and recipes that remind us of Sicily. Here I am, setting out a pretty yellow box of pastries that I packed between sweaters in my suitcase, because I want the people I love here to taste the flavors that captured me so deeply there. Here I am, all full-hearted and grateful, heart bursting with memories. What a trip!