Ciccio Sultano

Brambilla-Serrani

Brambilla-Serrani

Ristorante Duomo

via Capitano Bocchieri, 31
Ragusa Ibla
T. +39.0932.651265
info@ristoranteduomo.it

LEGGI LA SCHEDA SULLA GUIDA 2019

«If we realize that a Sicilian is first of all Sicilian and then medical doctor, lawyer or policeman, we would better understand». We borrow a statement from Giovanni Falcone and try to explain Ciccio Sultano starting from the category of Sicilian nature. And given that this chef has explained his art – because it is actually an art: culinary art – and pours it out without hesitations, we can go on using his words: «Our purpose is to be able to take possession and sum up a culture which is, by definition and development, full of contrasts, contradictions, changes, contaminations». And again: «In our dishes we try to express the essence of the territory, the ancient people, and the suggestions of what we have lived».

Yes, Sultano’s creativity is a sort of concentration of Trinacria. You eat the island and it blows up into your mouth with its Latin and Arab, Iberian and Norman echoes: «Everybody has been here. A stratified cuisine, originated from the endless mixture of races and cultures, the most complex of the Mediterranean». Complexity, contrast, contamination and even contradiction: it is the result of tradition and modernity which invade the kitchen in their island declination (first Sicilian than chef...). And Sultano’s dishes can only be according to the following explication: «Not based on the concept of taking away but on that of adding, intimately baroque», like the Cathedral which rises very close, heart of the enchanted Ragusa Ibla. The call of the territory is pressing, so rooted that it even keeps the sinuous mystery of this region, which explodes in the dish into an unbridled (erotic?) carnality.

A “tasty” cuisine is originated, flaming because it takes its roots in the rise and fall of mankind. Therefore, in a changing balance. It is another characteristic: «Creating a dish is like improvising in: you can make I again thousands times but it always reflects emotions and moods of that moment». Do not require repetitive perfection, aseptic techniques: if there is life there can also be, again, contradiction and even little mistakes: «Spring is the period of the year when I am the best; in August, for instance, fish isn’t so good any longer, it isn’t the same of when it is in love». Having dinner at Sultano is like biting into a pulsating Sicily.

Has participated in

Identità London, Identità Milano


by

Carlo Passera

journalist born in 1974, for many years he has covered politics, mostly, and food in his free time. Today he does exactly the opposite and this makes him very happy. As soon as he can, he dives into travels and good food. Identità Golose's editor in chief