What the culinary specialties from Siracusa were at the time of the Dinomenids, Dionigi, Timoleonte or the time of Verres compared to the cuisine of the other Greek colonies of Sicily or southern Italy, I truly could not say, as we haven’t found the menù of any of the inns of the time and the ancient historians who worried about many other things, only left us scattered information on this topic. And we have to admit that even in modern times the study of this particular branch of the human arts, despite being no less attractive and pleasant, has been overlooked, and while many volumes on architecture, figurative arts or weapons in antiquity have been written, very little has been written on cuisine.
But while we know little about the gastronomic specialties, we are much better informed about the implements and furnishings of ancient kitchens. The excavation of ancient homes has given us plenty of fragments, rarely some complete remains of pans, casseroles, tins, and even fireplaces. Such fragments allow us to determine the evolution of forms and types over the centuries quite easily.
We won’t discuss here what the furniture might have been inside the dining halls of the houses, with the refined, luxurious ceramics which adorned them, the finely worked ceramics painted black and with elegant designs and painted scenes, as even a brief examination would bring us far over the space limits which we are allowed here. So let’s just discuss the kitchen itself, as regards the preparation and cooking of the food, starting with the fireplaces.
Apart from the ovens, which definitely weren’t missing, but of which not a single example has survived intact in the area of Siracusa, no kitchen lacked a small terracotta grill to cook with charcoal.