TABELIAAUTHENTIC RECIPE
Caponata
Sicily’s classic starter of eggplant simmered in sweet-and-sour seasoning with capers, olives, tomatoes and pine nuts. Its hallmark is agrodolce, or sweet and sour. Delicious at room temperature or the next day.
AUTHENTICITY SCORE
Authenticity Score
This is the standard recipe, exactly as it’s made where it comes from — the highest Authenticity Score possible. Substituting ingredients changes this score; the app shows exactly how, ingredient by ingredient.
Ingredients (4 servings)
- EggplantCut into 2 cm cubes3 pieces
- CeleryCut into 2 cm lengths3 stalks
- Pitted green olives80 g
- Salt-packed capers30 g
- Canned whole tomatoes200 g
- Wine vinegar60 ml
- SugarFor balancing the sweet-and-sour agrodolce20 g
- Extra virgin olive oil80 ml
- Pine nuts30 g
- Raisins30 g
Method
Cut the eggplant and celery
- 1 Cut the eggplant into 2 cm cubes.
- 2 Cut the celery into 2 cm lengths.
Shallow-fry the eggplant
- 1 Heat 60 ml olive oil in a frying pan and shallow-fry the eggplant over medium heat.
- 2 Once golden brown all over, after about 10 minutes, remove and drain on paper towels.
Simmer the celery and tomatoes
- 1 Add 20 ml olive oil to the same pan and sauté the celery over medium heat.
- 2 Once softened, add the olives, capers and whole tomatoes, crushed by hand, and simmer for 10 minutes.
Season with agrodolce
- 1 Stir in 60 ml wine vinegar and 20 g sugar and simmer for 2–3 minutes to give it a sweet-and-sour flavor, or agrodolce.
Ready when
Proceed when acidity and sweetness are balanced.
Return the eggplant and cool
- 1 Add the eggplant, pine nuts and raisins and stir gently.
- 2 Cool at room temperature.
- 3 It tastes best the next day.
About this dish
Walking through Ballarò market in Palermo, you see eggplants piled at stalls everywhere. Caponata condenses the abundance of Sicily’s summer vegetables and reflects the complexity of the island’s food culture. Arab, Norman, Spanish and French rule left successive culinary layers, and the sweet-and-sour flavor of caponata reflects that history.
Eggplant, celery, olives, capers and tomatoes: its ingredients bring the full Mediterranean larder into play. The seasoning called agrodolce, or sweet and sour, was influenced by Arab cooking with sugar and vinegar and dates back to medieval Sicily.
Caponata is served after a day of resting, when the ingredients have mingled, rather than freshly made. Sicilian families traditionally make a large batch at the beginning of the week and eat it over several days.
Bring the full course home next weekend.
Bring every dish to the table at its best.
Choose the dishes you want to cook, and Chef Authen handles the shopping list and the day-of schedule. The Tabelia app turns everything from starter to main into one coordinated course in your kitchen.
- One shopping listBuilt automatically from your menu and any substitutions, ready to check off.
- One timelineEvery dish’s waiting and cooking time combined into a single schedule.
- Answers beyond the recipeFrom judging the heat to adapting on the fly, Chef Authen answers with concrete criteria, not guesses.