Episode 3 Sicily Unpacked

'I'm Andrew Graham-Dixon and I'm an art historian.'

Is it a town or is it a piece of theatre?!

'I'm Giorgio Locatelli and I'm a cook.'

The sultana is really tangy, a little aggressive. Like a little Sicilian, huh?

'We both share a passion...'

THEY LAUGH

-This is real Baroque, yeah.

-This is decadent.

'..a love...'

Oh-ho!

-'..an obsession.'

-I've never seen anything like that.

'Her name?

'Citalia - the Mediterranean island of Sicily.

SHOUTING

'We've both been her ardent suitors for years.

'I love how layers of history have created a unique blend

'of art and architecture here.'

-It's like winning the World Cup in archaeological terms.

-Exactly!

-THEY LAUGH

'And I adore her incredible flavour and no-nonsense approach to food.'

Here you are - ten square metre, you could find all these ingredients, here they are in front of you.

'It's only recently we discovered that we share

'the same intense passion for the island.

'So, we decided to team up and travel here together.'

This really is the Naked Chef! The real one.

He is the real naked chef!

'In sharing our knowledge and our love for the island with each other,

-'we hope to uncover even more of the secrets and treasures...

-..the sadness...'

This was a hole in a nation. This was a hole in the heart of a nation.

'..and the pleasures of our beloved Sicily.'

As a piece of sincere painting, it's fantastic!

'From simple, delicious food packed with incredible flavour...'

There you are - perfection!

'..to the truly jaw-dropping art and culture -

'a mirror to the exuberance

'and extraordinary history of its people.'

We're travelling to one of the most fascinating places

on the whole island.

Over half a million years old, but still bubbling with life -

the volcano, Mount Etna.

For me, it's where everything begins,

inspiring countless ancient myths and legends about the island.

The key to Sicily's future lies in its ancient past,

so this is why we're going to explore its origins.

We're winding our way up Etna on an old narrow gauge railway.

It's surprisingly luscious and beautiful, isn't it?

Look at that.

You have grapes, you have, like, massive fig trees,

olive grove, all the fruits growing out there.

I notice ginestra.

I was struck by this extraordinary contrast

on this side and up there.

-Right.

-You know, there's, like, sort of Etna,

and then over here it's like the Garden of Eden.

It's pure... It's fertility, isn't it?

It's like you've got the anger of the gods

and then you've got the bounty of the gods.

The bounty, yeah. That's exactly...

Before we explore the foreboding upper slopes of the volcano,

we stop off at one of the vineyards which flourish at the foothills.

Wine has been produced in this part of Sicily

since the first great coloniser of the island, the Greeks,

arrived in the 8th century BC.

Etna wine, like Sicily, has experienced mixed fortune.

Years of glory, followed by a slow, painful downturn.

But thanks to producers like Ciro Biondi,

this wine is finally getting a second chance.

I'm very struck by the sheer sort of verticality of the slope.

It would seem to me kind of perverse to be growing grapes

on such a steep slope. Why don't you grow on a flat field?

Because if you want to produce a quality wine,

you had to give sun to the vines.

Think of the solar panel.

-They're not straight.

-They're not straight.

So, if one vine not give the shades to the other one, it's better.

Right. And what about the water? How do you water them?

Ah, that's interesting.

We not irrigate the vines because irrigation means cheat.

If it's a year where it's no rain, you will taste it in the wine,

-but if you give the water, you cheat.

-Right.

You will have the same kind of wine every year.

The wine should be the result of a year of work

and of the climate, and which should be all with difference.

-So, for example, if you have a dry year...

-Maybe it will be more flavour, more robust wine

because it's been in the heat. That brings more alcohol,

rather than elegance that normally we got here.

One thing that I notice that is so much different,

that you have thousands of butterfly, which, you know,

when you go to Piedmont or something like that,

it's...there's no insect whatsoever.

Because we don't use any chemical

because we are so lucky not to need this chemical spray in the vineyard.

So, you can make a wine that's sort of almost organic,

even without having an organic philosophy?

I don't want to say on the label that I'm organic

because I want to sell the wine because it's good.

What's Giorgio doing?

I was just thinking... He say he doesn't spray the leaves -

-the Greeks used to cook with that, so maybe we should cook something with that. No?

-Why not?

Before we sit down to taste the wine,

I prepare the perfect snack -

Ciro's very own vine leaves,

dipped and fried in a batter of flour, eggs and beer.

I hope they enjoy them.

-There's a lot of activity going on in there.

-There you are.

-Hey!

-Taste this.

-Wow! Will be boiling hot.

-A little bit.

Giorgio Locatelli, to come all the way

to let me taste my own...leaves,

which I've never done in my life!

-You've never tasted your own vine leaves?

-No. Never.

-What do you think?

-Amazing.

I think I like it!

This white wine named Outis

is made from the Carricante grapes grown here.

So, we start with this 2010 white.

It's delicious.

And completely unique.

I can't think of another white wine to compare it with.

It doesn't taste... Often you can taste, ooh, it's a bit like a Pinot Grigio,

-or a bit like a white Burgundy, but...

-Yeah.

Is this grape pretty much unique to here?

To here, when you say "here", it's Etna, it's not Sicily, because...

If you imagine, Etna is like an island on the island,

so what you found on Etna is completely different

to what you can find on the rest of Sicily. So, we...

Because of the altitude, the soil, all these things put together,

the grape's variety.

Well, it smells of honey to me.

It's got the sort of, almost like a taste of saltiness or...

-And you've got the sea over there, so...

-Yeah, but I think

the saltiness is from the soil, the mineral, from lava soil.

-But do you agree that...?

-Yeah, of course...

Well, it taste to me more than all these adjectives

that we can put on it. It tastes like Ciro looking for himself here.

-Mm, yeah.

-This is your wine.

This is your collaboration with this land and this soil

and this weather and this grapes.

It's teamwork - the soil, people, grapes...

-And it works like an harmony.

-Yeah. It should be...

I mean, this is something... When you work with nature, you are to...

You can't try to win the nature, you have to go with the flow.

This earthy connection with nature is what makes Sicily special.

And it's what a new breed of Sicilians like Ciro is striving for.

To once again be in touch with the motherland.

The next morning, we set out to face the mountain.

Sicily is full of paradoxes,

but Etna captures one of the most extreme -

the lushness of the foothills versus the convulsive force of the volcano.

Locals think of the mountain as female -

a great beauty with a seductive, dark side.

We meet our guide, Carmello, a volcanologist,

and take a cable car up the rocky crater-scarred face of the volcano.

-So, Carmello, how many times have you been up here?

-Oh, hundreds.

-You spend your life coming up here?

-Yes. Basically, yes.

Etna is my life in every respect.

-You're in love with it.

-More than love, actually,

because it's just a little bit of myself.

Actually, a big bit of myself.

I study Etna,

I come here in winter with skis,

for climbing during the summer,

I sometimes take people, I take my students,

I go here all the time possible.

So, I've seen Etna in all seasons.

It changes, because every time there is an eruption,

you see a new cone, a new lava flow,

the landscape changes a little bit and it's really alive.

I've always been curious to see what the top of the volcano looked like.

No photo prepares you for it.

The sight that greeted us when we reached the summit

was truly awe-inspiring.

That's just incredible! Do you know what that reminds me of?

Do you remember when you were a kid, looking at...

-the moon buggy - shots of the moon buggy...

-That's exactly...

Neil Armstrong should be over there, jumping up and down.

One of the most fascinating things about Etna

is how this ancient mountain is recreated with every explosion.

Sometimes with dramatic other-worldly results.

This cone you see on the left

formed during two weeks of eruption in 2001.

Only two weeks, accumulated enough material

to rise the elevation of this cone of almost 80 metres.

This is the first channel on Earth

which has been carved directly by a lava flow.

We have situations like this only in other planets.

So, every time, then, there is a different eruption,

we cannot forecast where is it going to come from.

A cone could form any time, anywhere?

Cones form any time, anywhere.

This happen since the beginning of the formation of Etna

which is about half a million years ago.

We trek up the steaming volcano for another couple of hundred metres,

but it's just not safe to climb any further.

Strange and mysterious.

It's easy to see why it inspired the Ancient Greeks to concoct

so many myths and legends about it.

You feel like you've entered the world of the gods somehow.

-We've entered some other place.

-Into hell...

Hades. Well, they thought it was the Underworld.

It's like some vision of...this is what the world would look like

if the atomic bombs all went off.

It's post-apocalyptic.

Yeah, except for the fog.

The fog makes it even more eerie.

Yeah, you're right. I think you're right.

I had never quite realised the extent to which Greek mythology

actually reflects, you know, very precisely some of the elements

of this unique, exploding mountain.

Polyphemus, you know, the Cyclops that Odysseus meets on Etna,

he's got this single round eye.

-Maybe that's the idea of a crater, one of these hundreds of craters.

-Yeah, absolutely right.

And that's how myths are born. It's exactly for explaining reality.

And when reality is a little bit too complicated to explain

then they made up something - a myth, right.

And is there a reason why they don't let us go right to the top?

Yeah, in this sphere, the activity at the main crater,

the main crater, is very sudden and there could be explosions.

So, in other words, we might die.

Calm down!

Yeah, there are sudden very violent explosions

that can last for three, four years,

emitting big volume of rocks like this.

Then they stop for one and a half months

-or only ten days, who knows.

-Right.

-And then again.

-Next time there is an eruption, I want to come and have a look at it.

-You should, you should.

Etna is ancient, but it's also alive, just like Sicily.

A living organism full of turmoil and unpredictability.

A fiery phoenix rising out of years of destruction.

Travelling through Sicily today, you really do feel

as if the island is experiencing a renaissance.

Having spent most of the modern era escaping poverty

and the suffocating grip of the Mafia,

Sicilians are now rediscovering the true value

of what's been left by the island's ancient colonisers.

Places like the Valley of Temples in Agrigento.

In the 5th century BC, Akragas, as it was called,

was one of the richest of all the cities in the Greek Empire.

And today these breathtaking Doric temples -

the finest outside Greece - attract visitors from all over the world.

And there are jewels of the Ancient World all over this island.

We've headed to the fishing town of Mazara del Vallo,

to find one of the most precious.

It's a place I visit every year with my family.

This time, I'm turning the table on Andrew and introducing him

to a great work of art.

In 1998, a magnificent Ancient Greek statue

was fished out of the sea here.

But before I take Andrew to see it,

we catch up with the local fisherman, Captain Cicchio,

who caught the bronze statue in his nets.

It came out with the face?!

Like a shipwrecked person.

Just come out. And the face come out the water first, just like that.

Were there barnacles on it? Fish on it?

HE TRANSLATES

There were prawns...

-Prawns and little crabs coming out of its ears!

-Yeah.

Yeah, it was the house,

there was a house inside it.

Captain Cicchio could have sold his special catch to a private dealer,

but instead, he returned it to the state.

He wanted it to be shared and looked after by ordinary Sicilians

as a precious piece of their heritage.

And he had his wish.

Today, there is an entire museum dedicated to it.

I've seen the statue many time,

and I'm really excited to see what Andrew makes of it.

Well, every time, it's such a revelation.

Wow!

-So, it's been under the sea for 2,500 years.

-Yes.

And...it looks like he wants to swim out, doesn't he?

He does. He looks like a diver swimming to the surface.

Well, I can see why they built a whole museum around a single object.

So many things about this beautiful statue remain a mystery,

but it's believed he's a mythological creature,

a satyr - part man, part beast.

The archaeologists always struggle. They don't really know what it is.

I think what we can say is, the satyr...

represents...

uncontrol, inspiration.

One of those arms that we don't have any more

would probably have been holding a cup of wine.

And I think the figure is meant to be in the throes of this ecstasy.

Spin around.

He's spinning around the god Dionysus, the god of wine,

and what he represents is man's connection to nature, to the natural world.

The hole in the back here maybe would have had a ponytail

to signify...

that the satyr is part animal, part human.

-And you see he's got these funny ears.

-Yes.

-Not like human ears.

-Pointed.

I think there's something about works of art that are mysterious.

I mean, there's people who believe - I quite like this idea -

that that hole in the back

-was actually where the statue would be attached to the front of a boat.

-Oh, right.

So, this would actually be this ecstatic figure,

the boat would be sailing and this would have been a figurehead.

In the front.

-I think it's just a beautiful mystery.

-Mm.

Was he created for a temple?

Was he created to mark a Greek victory?

Was he created as a single work of art for sale on the open market?

Or was he the figurehead of a ship?

In the end, we're left with the enigma.

The seas around Sicily are full of treasure.

I got another surprise up my sleeve for Andrew -

it's at the docks, a few minutes' walk away.

The fishing port of Mazara del Vallo is the most important,

not only in Sicily, but all of Italy.

And my friend Vincenzo is the skipper of a fishing trawler

that hunts the most precious fish -

the most sought-after prawns in the world.

The Gamberi Rossi - red prawns.

-Hi, Vincenzo.

-Ciao!

-Come stai?

-Bene.

-Vai salire?

-Prego!

Andiamo.

Questo e Andrew.

-Ciao.

-Grazie.

-Ciao.

'Before we get a look at the prawns, he gives us a tour of the boat.'

They stay out two or three weeks!

So, these are the living quarters.

-Or the eating quarters.

-This is called the cambusa.

What's this?

This is his bedroom for three weeks!

-There's always a Madonna.

-C'e una Madonna li?

HE SPEAKS ITALIAN

The Madonna of the Rocks.

-Even the boat has a patron saint.

-That's right. That's right.

E dov'e la cucina?

La cucina sta qua.

So, what's this kind of funny contraption on the cooker?

Well, this is...

Yeah, this is useful for when the sea is rough,

so you just unscrew that, move it up, close the pan in,

so you're not going to end up with all the pasta on the floor.

E cosa mangiate?

Do you eat the prawns?

HE SPEAKS ITALIAN

Naturally...naturally they like to eat the steak,

since they live with fish all day, they like to...

-So, really, they don't...

-No. They don't eat fish.

Very little.

But we want to see the prawns. Possiamo vedere...the fish?

Si.

He understood! What kind of Italian am I speaking to?

-Possiamo vedere il fish!

-"Possiamo vedere il fish." What is that?

'The Gamberi Rossi are a real delicacy.

'Meant to be eaten raw,

'they're frozen on board as soon as they are caught.'

Ah, they really are red, aren't they?

They are absolutely beautiful.

This animal lives at 600, 800 metres underneath the sea,

and because the current is so strong, he really needs to swim.

They kind of suffer, they have to work hard to be alive, you know.

How does the current affect the taste of the prawn?

Because the prawn has to work against the current.

He has to suffer.

So, this is... Why is there always suffering involved in Sicilian food?

What is that all about?

Even the prawns have to suffer! So, what am I looking for?

What you're looking for is, you know,

is this absolutely sweetness that will come out of the prawns.

I mean, now, look at that. It's so beautiful.

That is a monster! And can you eat it raw?

No. You HAVE to eat it raw!

-You have to eat it raw?

-That's what it is.

-So, what am I...?

-Eat maybe the bottom that is still...

-OK.

The prawns is sweet. The sweetness is incredible.

-It's, like, denser.

-Yeah.

On a farmed prawn, it's a little bit sort of, you bite,

-there's no bite to it.

-Yeah, the white prawns doesn't have to have...

It's almost like more fat.

The animal living at such a deepness

really needs to have a lot of fat.

If you eat that from the top...

That's what you eat. That's got even more flavour.

Uh-huh! That's like the top of the brain.

Yeah.

I can't believe I'm sucking a prawn's brains out!

But I've been told that's the best bit.

It's an acquired taste.

-I think I prefer the meat.

-Yeah.

HE SPEAKS ITALIAN

And you know, what is amazing as well,

these have been washed in sea water and then they're placed

in the box perfectly like that, obviously weighted and put away.

So, wherever you are in the world and you receive one of these frozen,

when you defrost it, you have a piece of this,

of the Mediterranean in the front of you.

Literally, the water that will be left there, it's water of the Mediterranean.

And I think this is an exceptional way to serve something like that.

Simplicity.

So, you've got to be nice to Vincenzo so that he keeps supplying you, right?

If Vincenzo stops fishing, I'm in trouble!

Grazie, Vincenzo.

Grazie, Vincenzo.

Grazie.

This journey really does feel like a treasure hunt.

We're heading to the heart of the island,

home to a unique statue of Damita, the Greek goddess of fertility.

And although she's a local, she's only recently returned home

to the town of Aidone.

This prized work of art had been looted

from the ancient site of Morgantina nearby in the '70s

and eventually sold to the Getty Museum in California.

But when the Getty realised that she had been stolen,

they returned the statue to the rightful home.

Davide, one of the curators of the town's archaeological museum,

proudly introduced us to this long-lost treasure.

-Que bella!

-Bellissima!

-Very impressive.

-Yes, yes, yes.

It's such a rare thing for a statue to come back.

This idea of restitution, it's so unusual.

And for the statue to have come back all the way from California

-to this little town, that's almost like a David and Goliath story.

-Yeah, yeah, you're right.

When we found out that the trip of the statue was illegal,

we tried to make this big step of the restitution.

And we won. It's something very special. You're right.

It must be a great feeling after years of feeling ripped off completely.

Suddenly they got one over, not only, got one over the Americans,

-which is really big for them!

-What could be better than that?

-It's like winning the World Cup in archaeological terms!

-That's it!

This statue's almost as old as the sculptures on the Parthenon in Greece.

It's truly exceptional.

How did they definitely establish it to the point the Getty were prepared to surrender it?

Because of the proof of the material.

The limestone was the same of the other statues here.

So, it was DNA evidence.

The archaeological equivalent of DNA evidence.

That limestone has been geologically established as definitely, boom, X marks the spot.

Exactly.

-And where do you think she stood?

-In the centre of the agora.

So, it's the main square of Morgantina,

because it was representative for all the city.

-There's a mixture of the god but also the human.

-Yes.

-It's very human.

-Exactly. It's human because of the body.

-And she's a goddess because of the head.

-The face, yeah.

What I think's amazing about the sculpture is the sense of movement.

This is that time in Greek sculpture when you got this tremendous sense of movement and energy.

In fact, from here... Giorgio, come here.

I think only from here...

when you stand at this angle...

Can you see how the sculptor has created, with the flow of the drapery backwards,

with these wave-like forms, there's a sense of movement.

-It shows her body kind of thing, advancing.

-Exactly.

And not just she's advancing, you think where she advancing to.

She's Damita looking for her daughter, Persephone, in the Underworld,

and she's got this solemn expression in her face, maybe even a bit of sadness.

Yeah, it really gives you the sense of movement, for sure.

Like of search, almost. It has this kind of searching sort of pose, isn't it?

Exactly right. She's searching for her daughter

to bring back spring, to bring back growth.

So much in Sicily is about things growing, about fertility.

The Greeks saw this place as a plentiful place.

Land was so rich.

A tutta la Sicilia.

Aw! Patron goddess of Sicily.

-It's been such a pleasure. Thank you.

-Thank you very much.

-Thank you very much, Davide. It's been a great experience.

-Thank you for coming.

-We're delighted.

And the food of Ancient Sicily is just as refined as the art.

Back at our guesthouse, I treat Andrew to a recipe over 2,300 years old.

It comes from a food guide called The Life Of Luxury,

written by a brilliant Greek Sicilian named Archestratus.

If people think about Italian cookery, you know,

they always think about Apicius as being, actually, the main writer.

Apicius was not the main writer. He portrayed very much the cooking of Rome.

But you know, Archestratus was just a couple of hundred years before that,

and to me, he really talks about what I'm talking about when we're talking about food,

which is the quality of the raw ingredients, the knowledge.

I tend to think of classical food, ancient food,

as being quite heavily sauced and spiced,

perhaps because they didn't have refrigeration

-and they were perhaps wanting to cover up...

-That's right.

-..certain things.

-But this guy is a purist.

He's the first guy who says, keep the meat rare.

You know, we're talking about, you know, 3,000 years ago, you know,

and this guy had this kind of knowledge.

He had a very refined palate.

He talks about using a piece of a she tuna, a female tuna,

and the underbelly, so kind of nice and fatty.

If you can think about this guy as somebody modern,

that would have been like kind of a Michelin guy.

But instead of being interested in a restaurant,

he was interested in what town did what, fished what, grow what,

what type of bread.

-So, he's almost like a philosopher of food?

-Yeah.

I think he had a very heightened capacity of interpreting flavours.

The recipe is so simple, you can't... It's like, you know,

you don't mess about at all, it's just a piece of tuna,

a little bit of olive oil and a touch of oregano

which would have grown completely, like, wild all over the island.

-What leaf are you using?

-Using fig leaves.

Fig leaves will release some flavour.

Also, some other essential oils will help to flavour it.

And it will keep it really moist.

-Look at the time for me, yeah?

-Sure, yeah, I've made a note. How long does it take?

Six minutes I will give it. We like it rare, don't we? We don't want it extra cooked.

OK, now it's roasting gently there, and...

There you are! Perfection!

That's your tuna wrap.

I guess that maybe this would have been cooked in the street

so you walk away with your fig leaves in your hand.

-Early Greek-Sicilian takeaway!

-Takeaway, yeah!

Grazie.

-It's a nice, straightforward way of cooking, isn't it?

-Absolutely.

-It's nice and rare.

-This is pure food.

So, eat it like an Ancient Greek, with the hand.

Mmm. It's particularly nice in the middle.

-Yeah.

-That's really soft, but it's taken the flavour of the fire.

Yeah.

For me, food like this puts you in touch with the past

just as vividly as any work of art.

It's history you can eat!

While the Greeks saw Sicily as an ethereal place,

full of magic and mystery,

the island's next great colonisers made Sicily their heaven on Earth.

The Romans took over in the 3rd century BC,

and there's a place nearby that shows just how sumptuous

and lavish their world was.

This is Villa Romana del Casale.

Built in the 4th century, it boasts the largest collection

of Roman mosaic floors anywhere in the world.

It's like walking into a painting, isn't this?

'The mosaics in here positively seethe with vivid detail,

'intricately designed, brilliantly executed.

'But there's one room in particular I want Giorgio to see.'

Now, this is completely unique.

There is nothing like this from the Ancient World

that survives anywhere else except here.

And if it hadn't been for the discovery of these mosaics,

everybody would still think

-the bikini was invented in the 20th century.

-That's right!

Here we are, we've got Ancient Roman girls wearing bikinis!

You can see a woman running around on Bondi Beach now

with their weight in their hands.

-It's incredible!

-It's amazing, isn't it?

In Latin literature they record this thing that aristocrats would do,

is that they would sponsor female gymnasts to engage in team sports.

And they think that's what this shows.

-So, these girls have all been competing in different sports.

-Different sports.

She's been given the victory palm.

Look at this one. All different texture of colours of the skin on her belly. It's incredible, this.

It's a tour de force. Modelling of human anatomy in mosaic is about as hard as it gets.

Archaeologists get annoyed because the people who promote tourism here

call them "the bikini girls",

and they say, "No, they're not bikini girls, they're gymnasts!"

'Nobody's sure who lived here,

'but they think it might have been the summer retreat of a Roman emperor.

'And there are some mosaic images here that certainly feel like

'a proclamation of Roman power on Sicilian soil,

'a statement they really were here to stay.'

I guess in part, it was the Romans' way of showing

anybody who came here that they had power.

All the way from Asia to Africa, they could take whatever they wanted.

These wild beasts symbolise the reach of their empire.

The detail of everything is just incredible.

How they managed to do something on a large scale like that.

In some ways, it's almost like naive art.

All the figures have got these sort of strange shapes.

What is it? It's actually a diagrammatic version of a shadow.

Right.

These people look like they've got things attached to their feet.

They're meant to be their shadows.

This is one of the most spectacular rooms.

'Although the mosaics were first unearthed in the 19th century,

'it was 100 years before a complete restoration started in 1991.

'Peter and Elena are two of the army of conservators

'painstakingly restoring the mosaics to their original splendour.

'They allowed us to take a sneak peek at the work still in progress.'

Elena, when you have the information...

HE SPEAKS ITALIAN

..you can complete the shape, is that right?

Yes.

She's matching the whites at the moment.

And then she'll reveal it after.

It's a painstaking job, isn't it?

If she's in any way doubtful,

she'll create an abstract jumble of forms

that are in the right set of colours,

so that when you visit and look down, you can see...

Your eye is not distracted by a great big blank.

THEY SPEAK IN ITALIAN

I'll try to make one. I'm going to contribute to this.

HE SPEAKS ITALIAN

This feels really nice to be part of these things, this process.

Thank you.

-HE SPEAKS ITALIAN

-This colour?

It's nice to get a feel of it.

How many tesserae are there here?

-120 million?

-Millions. We've done one each.

THEY LAUGH

-It's not a big contribution but it's something.

-Yeah!

'For me, the villa's a kind of emblem of what's happened to Sicily.

'A jewel of the Ancient World, hidden for years,

'but now being given a new lease of life.'

And this renaissance extends to the agriculture of Sicily.

The food produced here, like the art,

is experiencing a revival of fortune.

Sicily's colonisers exported the crops grown here for centuries.

But with the rise of the Mafia, it became more difficult

to trade successfully with other countries.

Now that's changing and one of the greatest success stories

is the most Mediterranean of fruits -

the tomato.

We've come to Pachino in the south-east of the island

where today the regional cherry tomatoes are its most prized export.

Pachino's seaside location, with its mineral rich soil and sandy climate

make it perfect for cultivating tomatoes.

Salvatore is one of the growers

managing to capture the unique taste of this territory in the produce.

Salvatore, what's the secret?

HE SPEAKS ITALIAN

The hard work.

Oh, you've even got a...

you've even got a piece of volcanic lava in the...

Stone, yeah.

HE SPEAKS ITALIAN

The water...

The type of water that's not... that's not too sweet, not too soft?

No, it's kind of salty.

-Like the saltwater gives a certain taste.

-A certain taste.

It's always good to have salt with tomatoes anyway, isn't it?

And what really is amazing, it is like with the grapes,

you know, to keep the tree under stress,

that really allowed you to have a superior quality tomato.

So, you don't want a tree that yields millions of tomatoes?

Millions of tomatoes.

ANDREW SPEAKS ITALIAN

SALVATORE SPEAKS ITALIAN

This greenhouse is not a greenhouse.

This is like a house where you protect your family.

-Family.

-here is your house where you protect your tomato.

So, that allowed you to have

something that hasn't got any pesticides

and nothing gets preyed on...

So, the function of the greenhouse is not primarily to concentrate

or focus the heat, it's actually just to protect?

To protect.

What would be the opposite end of this beautiful tomato?

Would it be like some kind of Dutch tunnel, full of water?

Aiming for size, instead of flavour.

So, you end up with lots of tomatoes that kind of taste of water?

They look all the same, they're perfectly looking...

on the look, but they don't have any flavour left in them.

And so each one of these is kind of...

it's concentrated the flavour of that volcanic soil,

so you're ending up with a kind of Sicilian taste-bomb of this...

You're eating a piece of Sicily then.

You literally are having a piece of Sicily.

It tastes good!

This produce is...

I feel then, somebody in London can have access to a tomato like that,

he can feel like he's spending an afternoon in Sicily

when he's having lunch in my restaurant.

So, if you make Pasta al Pomodoro Fresco with his tomatoes...

-Yeah.

-..that's a collaboration, that's not just a Giorgio dish...?

No, that's... 75% is his job.

And only 25 mine.

And I'm taking all the credit as well!

ALL LAUGH

There have always been people like Salvatore here in Sicily -

ordinary workers making an honest living off the land,

as those in charge of the island play out their own agendas.

To many foreigners, Sicily was simply the home of Mafia villains.

So much so that the real world of ordinary Sicilians

was obscured for years.

But someone has been documenting this hidden Sicily.

We've come to the town of Ragusa to meet a photographer

who's been taking pictures of Sicily for over 50 years.

Giuseppe Leone's pictures have won him many fans,

including the fashion designers Dolce and Gabbana

who were inspired by his sensual pictures of Sicilian women.

But what I find compelling about Giuseppe's pictures

is how the changes in Sicilian life are captured in subtle ways.

Yeah.

He's nostalgic about this world.

And the boat is so small, and you know,

the risk that is taken to go out fishing is enormous!

Again, like, there's no radar, there's no nothing,

it's just going out, getting the food and just bringing it back.

And it's just so real.

This idea of living your life in the street,

that the street is almost a public form of theatre.

GIORGIO SPEAKS ITALIAN

It's almost like that's their bedroom, this is their living room.

Andrew, I love this picture because it reminds me so much

when I was little

and the people in the village would take all part of the wedding.

Obviously they all went to the celebration.

So, everyone in the village...

Everybody would be out, everybody would see it

and wait for the sposa, the bride, to come,

especially if the bride was from the village, everybody would be there.

I love this cast of characters.

I mean, I love...

Actually, I really love the way he's used the chiaroscuro...

This...way that the light has caught the bride

and she looks so happy,

and all the older generation are watching.

He looks like maybe he's remembering the day he got married.

Look at her! What a face!

Theatricals is so important.

-He wants to show us an extraordinary...

-Something extraordinary.

-OK.

No way! Look at that!

It's unbelievable!

These are the old gargoyles.

Yes.

Oh, no. Look!

'I love these pictures.

'They're so beautiful, full of humanity and fun.'

I think the Sicily in Giuseppe's pictures is the best of the island.

Proud, sincere, with a strong sense of identity.

And I believe time won't change that.

Sicily's had so many foreign influences over the years

but it's never compromised its true essence.

'That's why I think Sicilians

'can now afford to start taking more chances.'

I know of a rising star, a chef in the nearby town of Modica,

who is taking the best of Sicily food tradition

and putting a modern twist on them.

15 years ago, Accursio Craparo's restaurant, La Gazza Ladra,

would have struggled to attract visitors.

But today, it's got a Michelin star

and diners are queuing up

to sample his inventive take on Sicilian food.

Buongiorno!

Buongiorno!

-Hello.

-Hello.

Andrew.

'We arrive just before lunch and Accursio offers to make us

'one of his most original recipes -

'a tuna-fish burger with oyster tonic.'

Accursio...

He loves sandwiches!

Food.

-Street food, again, for Sicilian is important.

-Right.

'This dish may be inspired by Sicilian street food,

'just a simple panino like they have been making here for centuries,

'but Accursio's version has an ingenious modern twist!'

I assume this is the burger?

OK, it's turning around.

The bread of the panino, of the burger, is fish!

So, basically, he's... he's creating something

that's going to fool my brain into thinking it's like a burger bun?

That's exactly...

You have this absolute fishcake that will be incredible!

The famous sesame seeds that you find in every bread.

OK.

He takes the part from right to the tail,

so hard, and so when you eat, when you're going to eat it

you're going to have a little bit of bite into that.

It's beautiful tuna, isn't it?

'It only took a few minutes to steam Accursio's burger bun,

'but it still didn't look like bread to me!'

Ah, now I get it!

Mm. It's like a little joke on a Big Mac, right?

It's like a Mini Mac!

'And there was one final stage to the dish.'

He wants me to drink an oyster?!

That's right.

ANDREW LAUGHS

Ah!

Mm!

Mmmm! Man!

Is...is it a good joke?

It's a very good joke.

-All in one.

-All in one.

Yeah.

Due?

Maybe two.

And it's like the waves hitting the rocks.

It is, the waves hit the rocks.

Ah!

Accursio, grazie.

Grazie per la gita in barca.

Thank you for the boat trip!

ALL LAUGH

-Grazie.

-Grazie.

Accursio managed to combine the old and the new so easily.

He is the epitome of the new Sicilian -

someone generating fresh ideas, but still keeping faith in their roots.

On our trip, we've seen many positive stories like Accursio's

scattered all across the island.

I think Sicily's reaching a turning point...

..and the islanders are finally understanding

and appreciating the richness of their own heritage.

I wonder what they can do to keep this new energy alive?

For the final stop on the trip

we have returned to the capital, Palermo,

where I think we may find the answer.

We are visiting a prince at his grand palazzo in the city centre.

-It's a kind of unassuming doorway, isn't it?

-It is.

-Hello.

-Buongiorno.

'Principe Bernardo Tortorici's family

'have been in Sicily since the 12th century.'

Ciao.

Giorgio Locatelli.

Thank you for having us.

Who would imagine that that was here?!

Coming from that little street,

we never imagined that something like that was...

I can't help my eye being drawn to this lady here.

-Is she one of your ancestors?

-Yes.

She's a very important ancestor because she was...

..so rich and so beautiful, as you can see, that...

ALL LAUGH

-But she's got character in her face, hasn't she?

-Beautiful dress.

It's a Bottaro of the 18th century.

Bottaro, I love that!

'I wanted to know what the prince would make of our experience in Sicily.'

One of the things that struck me

on this... travelling that we've done,

this journey that we've done,

was that...I saw the youth,

I saw the young people

having this great passion of reclaiming their culture.

I mean, we were in Aidone,

and we saw this statue

that has been reclaimed from the Getty Museum, and...

There was the young curator and he was so...

The whole town was proud, but the young curator,

you could see, he was visibly proud,

you know, that, "We in Sicily have taken that back".

It's like, Sicily 1, America 0,

we've got it back from the Getty Museum.

The Aidone statue from the Getty Museum

was to have back something beautiful, which was Sicilian.

So, I'm sure that when a Sicilian

has back beauty,

he is proud of his territory or his country

because we produce... beauty always in art,

and the territory is beautiful,

the sea is beautiful, the sun is beautiful, the food is beautiful.

Sicily must go after its beauty.

All the contemporary art, all the food,

all the beauty that we produce

must be the sense of the future of Sicily.

So, the answer for Sicily is,

look at what you've got, or for the youth is,

look at what you've got, look at your beauty and valorise it.

Yes, and try to do it better. To grow with these things.

-Build...

-You have these things, grow yourself and grow these things.

Principe, it's been a great pleasure to talk to you, and...

'Our audience with the prince

'confirmed everything we'd seen and experienced on our trip.'

This place is a truly unique cornucopia of tastes,

cultures and influences,

but above all, a place of incredible beauty.

We're spending our final evening in Sicily down by the seafront...

..the perfect place to get away from the intense summer heat of the city.

I feel I've seen sides to Sicily on this trip

I've never witnessed or even thought about before,

and that's because Giorgio and I teamed up and came here together.

I think the thing that I never really realised

until I came and saw Sicily from your perspective, through the food,

I never realised how completely the different cultures

that shape the art that I love here

completely shape the food.

It's like the art and the food are a mirror image of each other.

So, you go from a beautiful Arab building,

straight to the fact that the Arabs left this legacy of sweet and sour,

and all of the vegetables that they brought.

Or you go from the Greek temple to the recipe of Archestratus,

that at every layer, it's a complete...

-It's represented.

-It's represented, yeah.

This time, just looking at

all the art and the architecture with you,

it really put it together as a whole thing.

And as a cuisine, and it's out,

not comes out, not from the mind,

comes out from the belly of the people, you know, what I mean?

Yeah, yeah.

That's why I feel it's so important for me to come here with my chefs

and bring them here to see this and see what they work out with that.

I hope you're going to take them to some art galleries next time you...

Definitely!

I'm going to look like, really with authority, talking to them about it.

And it won't be my final trip to Sicily either.

I'm definitely coming back!

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