Italian Sicilian Fava Bean Macco with Wild Chicory | Macco di Fave con Cicoria
Macco is the oldest cooked dish in Sicily and it survives for the reason it was invented. Dried split fava beans, water, salt and a long quiet simmer give a thick golden purée that slides off a wooden spoon and sets as it cools. Wild fennel goes in with the beans, and bitter chicory is boiled separately and laid over the top.
This is the Val di Noto and Ragusa reading of the dish, tied to the feast of San Giuseppe on the nineteenth of March. It is not the Murgia purée of Puglia and Basilicata, whipped smooth with oil against a raw onion, and it is not a spring salad of fresh favas. It is looser and rougher, it carries the aniseed of finocchietto selvatico, and it is finished with mollica atturrata.
Two decisions carry the plate: how long the favas cook, and how hard the chicory is squeezed. Favas pulled off the heat early leave a grainy macco that beating cannot rescue, because the graininess is unburst cell walls. Chicory that arrives wet thins the purée under it into a grey puddle.
Yield: 6 servings as a contorno or 4 as a light main. Prep: 25 minutes plus overnight soaking. Cook: 1 hour 40 minutes. Total: about 2 hours of work spread across two days. Difficulty: easy to intermediate. Course: contorno, also served as a piatto unico. Region: Sicily, the Val di Noto and the province of Ragusa.
The Story
The name comes from maccare, to crush, and it describes what happens in the pot rather than what the cook does. Favas have grown in Sicily since the Greek colonies, and they carried the island through winter long before tomatoes, peppers or pasta arrived. Split and dried they keep a year in a sack and cost almost nothing, which is why maccu outlasted every wave of foreign rule without changing.
Its strongest association is the nineteenth of March, the feast of San Giuseppe. Across the Val di Noto and around Ragusa and Modica, households build the tavole di San Giuseppe, tables laid for the poor and blessed before anyone eats, and maccu must appear on them. The feast falls in Lent, so the table is meatless, and fava with wild greens carries it without anyone feeling deprived.
Two Sicilian habits separate this from every mainland fava purée. The first is wild fennel, gathered along field edges from autumn to spring, which gives an aniseed perfume the bean cannot produce. The second is what happens to leftovers: cold maccu sets firm enough to slice, flour and fry, and maccu fritto was eaten the next day as a matter of course. The chicory was foraged too, and its bitterness is the counterweight that makes a heavy starch edible in quantity.
Ingredients
For the macco
Dried split fava beans, skinless, 1 lb (450 g)
Cold water for soaking, 8 cups (1.9 L)
Cold water for cooking, 7 cups (1.65 L), plus more as needed
Wild fennel fronds, chopped, 2 oz (55 g), or 2 tsp (4 g) fennel seed as a fallback
Yellow onion, finely chopped, 1 medium, about 5 oz (140 g)
Celery stalk, finely chopped, 1
Extra virgin olive oil, 3 tbsp (45 ml)
Fine sea salt, 2 tsp (12 g), added late
Freshly ground black pepper, to taste
For the chicory
Wild chicory or catalogna, trimmed, 1 1/2 lb (680 g)
Coarse salt for the blanching water, 2 tbsp (36 g)
Garlic cloves, thinly sliced, 3
Dried Sicilian chilli, crumbled, 1 small, or 1/2 tsp (1 g) flakes
Extra virgin olive oil, 3 tbsp (45 ml)
Fine sea salt, 1/2 tsp (3 g)
For the mollica atturrata
Coarse dry breadcrumbs from stale semola bread, 3/4 cup (75 g)
Extra virgin olive oil, 2 tbsp (30 ml)
Fine sea salt, 1 pinch
For finishing
Extra virgin olive oil, Sicilian, 4 tbsp (60 ml) for the table
Wild fennel fronds, small, for the top
Crushed chilli, to taste
Freshly ground black pepper, to taste
Preparation
Soaking the split favas
Cover the split favas with the 8 cups (1.9 L) of cold water and leave them at cool room temperature overnight. Skinless favas do not strictly need a soak, but it cuts half an hour from the cooking and makes them break down evenly instead of leaving hard cores. Drain, rinse until the water runs clear, and never salt the soaking water.
Sweating the onion and celery
Warm the 3 tablespoons of oil in a heavy pot of at least 4 quarts (4 L) over low heat and add the onion and celery with a pinch of salt. Cook gently for 10 to 12 minutes, stirring often, until soft and translucent with no colour. Browning would push the dish toward a soup base, and maccu is not a soup.
Starting the favas
Add the drained favas and stir them through the oil for a minute, then pour in the 7 cups (1.65 L) of cold water, starting cold so the beans heat with the liquid and release their starch gradually. Bring slowly to a bare simmer, skimming the grey foam of the first 10 minutes: it is loose starch and saponins, and leaving it in tastes faintly soapy.
The long simmer
Lower the heat until the surface barely trembles, set the lid ajar and cook for 1 hour to 1 hour 20 minutes. Stir every 10 minutes with a wooden spoon, scraping the base, because fava starch settles and catches faster than any other legume. Add hot water if the pot tightens early. It is ready when a bean crushed against the side offers no resistance.
Adding the wild fennel
Stir the chopped wild fennel in for the last 20 minutes only. Added at the start it leaves nothing behind, because the volatile aniseed compounds boil away and what remains tastes merely vegetal. Twenty minutes softens it into the purée and still keeps the aroma. Fennel seed needs the whole simmer instead, so add it with the water.
Beating the macco
Take the pot off the heat, add the 2 teaspoons of salt and beat the mixture hard against the side of the pot with a wooden spoon for 2 or 3 minutes. This is the step the dish is named after and it must be done by hand: a blender gives a gluey cream with none of the broken texture maccu needs. The purée should fall in a ribbon that holds its shape for a second. Loosen it with hot water if it has gone past that.
Boiling and dressing the chicory
Bring a wide pot of water to a rolling boil with the coarse salt and drop in the trimmed chicory. Cook uncovered for 6 to 10 minutes, until a stem crushes easily between finger and thumb: under a lid, bitter greens go dull and olive coloured. Drain and press firmly with the back of a ladle. Warm the garlic and chilli in the 3 tablespoons of oil until pale gold, add the chicory and the fine salt and toss over medium heat for 3 minutes.
Toasting the mollica
Warm the 2 tablespoons of oil in a small pan over medium heat, add the breadcrumbs and the salt and stir continuously for 3 to 4 minutes until deep gold and smelling of toasted bread. They colour all at once near the end, so stay with the pan and tip them onto a cold plate. Cool them completely: warm mollica goes soft, and the crackle is the point.
Plating
Maccu is served warm rather than hot, at around 140°F (60°C), and it is worth warming the bowls, because a purée with this much surface area loses heat fast. Shallow bowls suit it better than deep ones.
Ladle the macco into the centre of each bowl and turn the back of the ladle through it once to spread it and leave a shallow well. Lay the dressed chicory across one side rather than over the whole surface, so the gold and the dark green are both visible. Do not chop the leaves small.
Finish at the table. Pour a thread of Sicilian olive oil over the bare purée, scatter the mollica over the chicory, add a few fennel fronds and crushed chilli, and put the rest of the oil out in a jug. The oil is not a garnish here, it is the ingredient that was never wasted by being cooked.
Professional Technique
The central technique is starch gelatinisation controlled by temperature rather than by time. Fava starch swells between about 150°F (65°C) and 175°F (80°C), and the cell walls around it collapse only once that swelling is complete. At a proper boil the outside of each bean bursts while the centre is still dry, which is how a purée ends up watery and grainy at once. At a bare simmer the whole bean hydrates at one rate, and the liquid stops looking like water holding beans and starts parting around the spoon as a single mass.
Late salting matters more with favas than with most legumes. Salt in the water strengthens the pectin between cell walls, so beans salted early take far longer to break down and often never reach the collapse the dish needs. Season while the purée is still loose and it will be over salted once it thickens.
The beating is a textural decision, not a shortcut. A blender shears the starch into an even elastic cream that reads as a modern vegetable purée. A wooden spoon breaks the remaining structure unevenly, leaving fragments inside a smooth base, and that unevenness carries the oil and gives the purée something to chew. A correctly beaten macco also sets firm when cold, which is what makes the traditional frying possible.
Texture and Moisture Control
There are three water problems here and each has its own answer. The macco thickens as it cools, so the consistency wanted in the pot is looser than the one wanted in the bowl. Aim for a ribbon that just holds its shape for a second. Keep hot water beside the stove and slacken a spoonful at a time, never cold water, which makes the starch seize.
The chicory is the opposite problem. Boiled greens hold a surprising amount of water in their stems, and all of it will run out and thin the purée underneath. Pressing them in a colander with the back of a ladle removes far more than shaking does, and the 3 minutes in the garlic oil afterwards evaporates the last surface water so the oil coats the leaves instead of sliding off.
The mollica is the fragile element. It has no fat structure holding it together, only dried starch, and it absorbs moisture from steam alone. Cool it on a cold plate, keep it away from the stove and add it at the last moment. Good mollica is audible when you scatter it.
Professional Mise en Place
Almost all of this can be finished in advance. Only the chicory dressing and the final assembly belong to service.
Equipment and tools
Heavy pot of at least 4 quarts (4 L) with a thick base
Long handled wooden spoon, flat edged if you have one
Wide pot and colander for the chicory
Small frying pan and a cold plate for the mollica
Ladle, and hot water kept beside the stove
Prepared ahead
Favas soaked overnight, drained and rinsed
Macco cooked, beaten and seasoned, up to 2 days ahead, refrigerated
Chicory blanched, pressed and refrigerated undressed, 24 hours ahead
Mollica toasted and cooled, up to 3 days ahead in a sealed jar
Wild fennel chopped on the day, under a damp cloth
Service setup
Macco held warm at about 140°F (60°C), covered, hot water within reach
Garlic and chilli oil warm, chicory drained beside it
Bowls warmed, not hot
Mollica dry and away from steam, added only at the pass
Finishing oil decanted into a jug for the table
Chef Tips
Buy split skinless favas, sold as fave decorticate, and check the date on the bag. Dried legumes do not spoil but they age, and favas more than three years old refuse to soften however long they sit. If a batch resists after ninety minutes the beans are old, and a pinch of bicarbonate of soda is the only fix.
If wild fennel is unavailable, the fronds from a bulb of cultivated fennel beat fennel seed easily. Use double the weight, since they are much milder, and add them in the same last 20 minutes. Dill does not work at all.
Taste the chicory before you dress it. Wild chicory varies enormously in bitterness with the age of the plant, and a harsh batch buries the fava instead of balancing it. If the blanched leaves are aggressive, blanch again in fresh water for 2 minutes. If they are mild, shorten the boil.
Make double and refrigerate half in a shallow tray. Cold maccu sets firm enough to cut into squares, dust with semola flour and shallow fry until crisp, which is how Sicilian households have handled leftovers for centuries. With the same chicory and a squeeze of lemon it is arguably the better dish.
Common Mistakes
Salting the favas at the start. Salt firms the pectin in the bean walls, adding half an hour to the cooking and sometimes preventing collapse altogether. Add it off the heat at the end.
Boiling instead of simmering. A rolling boil bursts the outside of each bean before the centre has hydrated, giving a purée that is watery and grainy at once. Keep the surface barely trembling.
Using a blender. Blending shears the starch into an elastic cream that sets into rubber rather than the firm sliceable block the traditional frying needs. Beat it with a wooden spoon.
Plating wet chicory. Greens lifted straight from the colander carry enough water to thin the purée into a grey puddle within a minute. Press them hard, then dry them in the garlic oil.
Adding the wild fennel too early. The aniseed aroma is volatile and boils off completely over an hour, leaving a flat vegetal note. Stir it in for the last 20 minutes and keep a few raw fronds back for the top.
Wine Pairing
Cerasuolo di Vittoria DOCG: The local bottle in the most literal sense, grown on the red sands south of Ragusa. The Frappato half of the blend gives light floral fruit and very soft tannin, which is what lets a red sit beside a legume purée without turning chalky against the starch. Served at about 57°F (14°C) it takes the bitterness of the chicory as an echo.
Grillo Sicilia DOC: A white with real weight, which is what a dish this dense needs. Grillo carries ripe citrus and a saline finish, and the salinity is what matters: it lifts a purée that has no acidity of its own and no cheese to season it.
Etna Bianco DOC: Carricante on volcanic ash gives a sharper, more mineral wine than the rest of the island makes. Chicory and chilli both leave a lingering heat, and this acidity resets the palate between mouthfuls where softer Sicilian whites cannot, while the faint smoke it develops with bottle age runs alongside the toasted breadcrumb.
Faro DOC: The rare red from the hills above Messina, built on Nerello Mascalese, and the choice when the dish is served as a main rather than a contorno. It is pale and perfumed rather than heavy, with fine grained tannin and a dried herb note that meets the wild fennel directly.
Storage & Reheating
Cooled and sealed, the macco holds 4 days in the refrigerator and is better on the second day, once the fennel has spread through it. It sets very firm, which is normal. The dressed chicory keeps 3 days but must be stored separately, because its water will seep down and spoil both. The mollica lives a week in a sealed jar, never in the refrigerator.
To reheat, put the cold macco in a saucepan with 2 or 3 tablespoons of hot water per portion and warm it over low heat, stirring and breaking up the block as it softens. It looks wrong for a minute and then comes together. Refresh the chicory in a hot pan with a spoonful of oil rather than in a microwave, which dulls the colour, and crisp the mollica for 60 seconds in a dry pan.
Macco freezes for 3 months in portioned containers, which is one reason it was cooked in quantity. Leave headroom because it expands, thaw overnight in the refrigerator and reheat with a little more water than seems necessary. Do not freeze the chicory, which thaws to a wet grey mass, or the mollica.
Nutrition
Per serving, based on 6 contorno portions including the chicory, the mollica and the finishing oil:
Calories: 395 kcal
Total Fat: 17 g
Saturated Fat: 2.4 g
Trans Fat: 0 g
Unsaturated Fat: 14 g
Cholesterol: 0 mg
Sodium: 520 mg
Total Carbohydrates: 45 g
Fiber: 15 g
Total Sugars: 5 g
Added Sugars: 0 g
Protein: 18 g
Lactose: 0 g
Principal micronutrients: folate, iron, manganese, potassium, magnesium, vitamin K, vitamin A
These figures are estimates. Fiber and folate are unusually high because split favas are among the densest legume sources of both, and the sodium depends on how much blanching salt the chicory retains. Without the mollica the dish is gluten free, and it contains no animal products.
Comments