Capers of Pantelleria

The flower bud of the caper plant has been used as food for a long time, it was already mentioned in the Bible, in greek and latin classical literature  and there were also references of its use as a medicine or a cosmetic. But its main use has always been as food. The buds are picked from plants which either grew spontaneosuly or have been cultivated. The caper is used as a condiment (garniture).
The capers of Pantelleria are of the highest quality. The gastronomic tradition identifies the capers of Pantelleria as the best. The capers are characterized by some vitamins (tiamina, etc) and the glucocapparina which gives it the aroma. The techniques of how the caper is handled after being picked contributes to the high quality of the product. Once the caper is picked, it carefully cleaned from leaves, earth, peduncles, and carefully divided according to the different sizes. The capers are kept under salt to preserve the strong aroma. After this, there are two phases. The first is set in the farm: the peasant, after finishing the picking, places the capers in special brick containers and covers them with sea salt. The salt dissolves because of the waters in the capers and so it forms a kind of pickle, in which it is immerged for 7 – 8 days. The capers are then drained from the pickled water and salted again. The process is repeated several times. The second phase is set in a co-operative, where the capers are divided according to the calibers (sizes) thanks to special machines and then preserved under sea-salt in the percentage of 15%.