About Us

Trattoria Caico was born in 1952 from the happy and fortunate intuition of grandfather Umberto Caico and his wife Concetta, who decided to start their restaurant business in the seaside village of San Leone, a seaside lido that was already popular at the time with the people of Agrigento and tourists who came to visit the Valley of the Temples.

My grandparents had already consolidated their work experience as owners and managers of a characteristic Osteria in the historic centre, in Via Porcello, a side street of Via Atenea, already in business at the time of the Second World War, where one could enjoy traditional, poor but absolutely authentic cuisine.

Definitely worth mentioning are the fried fish (shrimps, mullet and cod) or the beef stew that was served in a cup: it was possible to buy a cup of beef broth, with or without the meat, depending on one's availability.

Remember the aubergine caponata and pasta al forno in traditional versions or with aubergines and spaghetti alla carrettiera - a personal version of spaghetti with garlic and oil. Not to be forgotten is pasta with sardines, which my grandmother used to call ‘alla milanese’ to differentiate it from ‘palermitana’ pasta due to the presence of tomato sauce.

The Osteria could not lack good wine: grandfather Umberto kept only three barrels, two large ones of red and white and a smaller one of extraordinary zibibbo.

My grandparents transferred their experience and cuisine, assisted by their children Giovanni , Giuseppina (my mother) and Rosa to San Leone.

Initially, the Trattoria was born as a purely summer restaurant, in fact the spaces were exclusively outside covered by a majestic vine pergola, so dense that even during the day you had to turn on coloured light bulbs.

Grandpa Umberto would open the gates on the first of May for Labour Day and close them sometimes at the first rains: late August, early September.

Trattoria Caico thus becomes a safe and reliable reference point for Agrigento residents who love good food.

The eighties arrived and with them new demands and different needs. My mother Giuseppina took over the reins of the Trattoria, partly due to the fact that her brothers Giovanni and Rosa had meanwhile left their hometown and moved elsewhere.

Giuseppina Caico took the Trattoria into a new dimension and made it a real restaurant: she decided that the restaurant should remain open all year round and consequently two indoor rooms were created.

The kitchen is becoming more attentive to the territory and is increasingly trying to meet the new demands of a more informed and more demanding clientele with a new food and wine consciousness.

We come to the present day. After the death of my mother, Giuseppina, in 2005, the responsibility and management of the restaurant fell entirely on me (Marco Maccarrone Caico) and my wife Patrizia Triassi.

In 2007 we took the decision (considered crazy by most of our friends and customers) to remove the pizzeria (added to the trattoria in the 1970s) and dedicate ourselves exclusively to the restaurant: we want our restaurant to become one of the best in town!

The first important professional accolades and certificates began to arrive.

Presence in several international and national guides: Routard, Lonely Planet, Süddeutsche Zeitung, L'Espresso, La Repubblica, Slow Food's Osterie d'Italia (from 2008 to the present), I Love Sicilia, Civiltà del bere, La Sicilia, Giornale di Sicilia, Sigrid Verbert Blog, Mondo del Gusto, Two TripAdvisor Certificates of Excellence 2011 - 2012.

In 2000 I obtained the third level diploma of Professional Sommelier A.I.S. Associazione Italiana Sommeliers.