Sicily Fest London 2018

Pop up market Sicily began in 2012 in Sicily's second largest city, Catania.

The market is a mixture of apparel, handmade accessories, art and design all made in Sicily accompanied by Sicilian musicians, local food and drinks. It has been made into a regular event and after just two years it became one of the most important markets in Italy.

It has been featured in Glamour Italia, Vanity Fair, Vogue and many more publications. The market takes place around once a month in historical locations in and around Catania and this weekend for the fourth time it came to London at a new location, The Boiler House in The Old Truman Brewery, which is located in the popular East London area of Brick Lane.

Created to bring to London an authentic Sicilian experience Pop Up Market Sicily transformed The Boiler House into a traditional Sicilian street market, just like the ones in Catania, but without the Sicilian sun and Mount Etna keeping a watchful eye, however the British late summer sun did come out to bless us this weekend.

Spanning from Friday evening and all weekend we decided to visit on Sunday as we knew that our friend and favourite Sicilian chef Enzo Oliveri from the London restaurant Tasting Sicily UK Enzo's Kitchen would be putting on a special treat with a cooking demonstration and tasting session.

The Boiler House is an industrial red brick warehouse on Brick Lane with heaps of character, a very high ceiling, large windows, skylights and many original features such as the Truman chimney. The building dates back to the 1830's.

Our first visit to Pop Up Market Sicily was in London's Spitalfield's market in 2015, we have unfortunately missed the past two as we were in sunny Sicily.

My lovely friend Carola from Rome had visited on Saturday and excitedly messaged me to say "Sarah, the Sicilian market is great!!!!!! Oh my god and so full of people" My reply was "Have you had Arancini?" she replied immediately "Of course".

On arrival yesterday we felt as if we had been transported back to Sicily straight into the middle of a Catania market and were greeted by huge banners declaring "Sicily, Love at First Bite".

This year the Fest was on a much larger scale than before. Stalls included local produce and drinks such as Etna wines, liqueurs, amaro, gin (more about that later), olive oil, jars of Sicilian sunshine in the form of honey, marmalades, jams, pesto, caponata and preserved artichokes, tempting sweets and biscuits, gelato, cheeses and cooked meats. Food available to be savoured and eaten included panelle, pasta, arancini, Sicilian style fried fish served in paper cones and my personal addiction, cannolo.

The lovely guys at Etnacoffee who with two stalls had people queuing in long lines for their delicious Arancini and Cannoli. The cannoli tubes were being freshly filled quicker than I have ever witnessed.

The in house bar served up cocktails with names such as Montalbano gin, Sicily sun and Sicilian spritz amongst bottles of Etna red wine and Sicilian craft beers.

We arrived just in time to find Chef Enzo perusing the many stalls looking for local produce and ingredients for his cooking demo. We headed up to the mezzanine level and waited eagerly for the master chef to work his magic. Upstairs there was a small art exhibition with work by 'Pop Art and Comics Umberto Gagliano" whose artwork depicts reinterpretations of folklore, traditions and places from Catania in a pop art style together with "Ciulla Art" who create digital prints from symbols and images of Sicily merged with ones from London.

Chef Enzo declared that today he would showing us how to prepare cous cous.

This typically Arabic dish made its way into the cuisine of Sicily with the Arab conquest which began in AD827. It is a very popular dish served with seafood on the western side of Sicily. Every year there is a cous cous festival in San Vito Lo Capo, a stunning seaside village on the north-western coast of Sicily near Trapani.

After telling us about the history and origins of cous cous Chef Enzo showed us how to prepare the cous cous and what to add to give it depth and flavour adding to it chopped tomatoes, lemon, artichokes and olive oil then giving us samples to taste and then adding more ingredients such as pesto, caponata and olives.

He also prepared and let us taste fresh bread topped with provolone cheese drizzled with either honey or Niru d'Amuri, which is a creamy thick Sicilian chocolate liqueur, he then sprinkled chopped pistachio nuts on top. The taste was like a Sicilian explosion in our mouths.

All products that he used were from traders at the Fest.

It was a pleasure to meet the family behind Niru d'Amuri, who made a big fuss of our dog Daisy. This chocolate liqueur has a unique and velvety texture and is hand made from beginning to end by the producers. It is delicious enjoyed on its own or try it on top of puddings and ice cream.

It was also lovely to see Emilia from Strazzanti who was also visiting the Fest. It was great to hear about her upcoming plans for more Sicilian supper clubs in London, so sign up to the Strazzanti newsletter to receive updates and news or follow her on social media.

Now back to that gin ... over the last five years the trend of drinking gin in the UK has continued to rise every year with gin tasting becoming increasingly popular, so I was delighted to be able to taste 'Panarea Gin'. The Inga Family chose the brand "Panarea" as a statement of their heritage. Panarea is one of the Aeolian Islands that sit like gems off the northern coast of Sicily. This refreshing gin is made using a combination of juniper and myrtle berries and citrus peels from the island. This gin was delightful to taste and held a lovely aroma and fragrance.

As more and more people arrived to enjoy a Sicilian experience it was soon time to leave.

Sicily Fest was a great day out, Daisy our dog loved it. Everyone was so lovely and as always with all things Sicilian we walked away after making wonderful new friends.

A big thank you to the organisers of Pop Up Market Sicily for bringing a piece of Sicily to London once again and for appeasing my withdrawal symptoms of missing Sicily, for a little while anyway, as we prepare to drive Daisy home to her Sicilian house in a couple of weeks time. We are looking forward to many adventures including the wine harvest and olive picking. So watch this space.

I am now signing off and going to go and pour myself a large refreshing gin and tonic, Salut !!!

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For Sicilian Cooking Classes in London
with Chef Enzo Oliveri visit
https://www.tastingsicily.restaurant/

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