“You have to be smart to come to Ibla," award-winning writer Gesualdo Bufalino (1920 - 1996) wrote of the land surrounding the Hyblean mountains, a range in southeast Sicily. Of course, this was well before anyone could foresee that Val di Noto’s baroque villages would become the backdrop for Montalbano, one of Italy’s most popular TV shows.

Bufalino’s statement could also apply to food. Try to interpret his words thinking of flavors and aromas instead of piazzas and balconies. "It takes a certain quality of soul, (...) a passion for architectural machinations is required, where the enthusiasm of the forms in flight hides the twist of the lying perspective to the last," he wrote.