What to Eat in Bronte: Typical Dishes & Local Products

Bronte's green gold ripens on Etna's lava flows: the PDO green pistachio is harvested only in odd years, in September, and the tiny yield is the price of its intensity. Pesto, fillets, nougat and the gelato that here reaches its perfect form: everything carries the same sweet resin scent.

The date to know is the Pistachio Festival in early autumn, when the whole town becomes an open-air pantry. Beware "Bronte pistachio" sold at bargain prices: the real one is known by its emerald colour and by a price that does not apologise.

Typical dishes of Bronte

The specialities to try here, and their stories.

Street food PAT

Arancino fried rice cone stuffed with ragù, pointed like Etna

Saffron rice, ragù with peas and caciocavallo inside a golden cone-shaped crust: in Catania it is masculine and pointed, and the quarrel with Palermo over the name is serious.

First course

Pasta alla Norma pasta with fried aubergine, tomato, basil and salted ricotta

Fried aubergine, tomato sauce, basil and a snowfall of salted ricotta: Catania’s signature dish is named after the opera by Bellini, a native of the city.

Local products of Bronte

What is grown, raised and aged here: PDO, PGI and traditional products.

🌿 Local produce DOP 📍 Born here

Pistacchio di Bronte the PDO pistachio of Etna, grown on lava soil between Bronte, Adrano and Biancavilla

Emerald green and known as «green gold»: it grows on the lava slopes of Etna between 400 and 900 metres, is picked by hand every two years and is both PDO and a Slow Food Presidium.