Before using it to fill the shells, they add a little bit of sugar to make it sweet. Traditionally, the shells are made from a dough that is quite similar to other doughs for pastries. It's made of flour, sugar, butter, eggs, and water. After shaping the dough into a tube (remember what cannolo means!), they deep fry it! The result is like a dessert taco! The shell is crunchy and the inside is creamy and sweet. Like I mentioned, the specific cannoli I tried are prepared by nuns.
The cannolo is tied less to the local environment and more to the people that have passed through Palermo. Cannoli originated in Sicily, more specifically in the city of Palermo. However, many historians think that they are an adaptation of desserts that people have been enjoying in the Middle East and North Africa for hundreds, if not thousands of years. As people from these regions moved to and through Palermo, they brought their food with them. One of those foods later became what we know now as the Sicilian cannolo!
