Palermo Restaurant with 100 Years of History, Adored by Footballers and Fans

A stone’s throw from the Tyrrhenian Sea, Trattoria Da Piero’s culinary fairytale began in Palermo nearly a century ago.

Offering an extensive seafood menu and boasting spectacular views of Monte Pellegrino, owner Piero Giammanco sat down with us to reveal how he transformed his grandparents’ house into a must-visit location for footballers and fans alike.

“This restaurant, in the 1920s, was my grandparents’ home. My grandfather (Pietro) became an octopus fisherman in the 1930s, and, along with my grandmother (Rosalia), they would cook and serve what they caught, sometimes even raw.

“My grandmother would go to the shore as there was no gas in houses back then. She would fill the pan with seawater and light a flame.

“My grandfather would then arrive from the sea with the day’s catch and my grandmother would cook them all, then take them back in front of the house here,” Piero says, pointing to his outdoor seating area.

“She would place them on a table as the locals passed by, slicing up the octopus and serving it with a glass of wine.”

Prudently, Piero’s ancestors took advantage of what they had close by. With the sea no more than 100 metres away and much of the nation suffering from impoverishment, Pietro and Rosalia could expand on their meagre beginnings throughout World War II.

“By the 1940s they began to make pasta dishes – food for the poor – because during the war, there wasn’t much money. As the years passed, the restaurant became what it is today.”

Entering from Piazza Mondello in the centre of the town, you can’t help but take in the restaurant’s colour and charm, which is like-for-like with Piero’s ‘simpatico’ character. He gets behind the hotplate to make us food and share stories, many of which involve Palermo footballers past and present.

“This is the type of food that makes all the footballers fall in love with Palermo,” Piero explains while dishing up polpettine made from sardines, garlic, onion and breadcrumbs, and simmered in a “special” tomato sauce with mint.

“Those who arrive from northern Italy, from southern Italy, and from around the world, they play for Palermo and fall in love with Palermitana kitchen, and Palermitana women. Many footballers have married women from here, including (Javier) Pastore.”

Indeed, it was Palermo FC that recommended Da Piero to us during our interviews with Rosanero players Kristoffer Lund and Joel Pohjanpalo. They have eaten here, as have most of the squad, team managers and staff, as well as fans.

The love is, of course, reciprocal, with Da Piero sponsoring the team. The restaurant’s logo can be seen on the billboards at the Stadio Renzo Barbera on match day, a testament to Da Piero’s success, and a brilliant tribute to the family lineage.

“All those years ago, it didn’t even have a name (the restaurant). It was just a house. By the seventies, we started introducing new dishes – pasta with clams (spaghetti alla vongole), mussels, seafood platters and oysters, as we modernised.”

During our visit in autumn 2025, Piero cooked and served us up his signature dishes: swordfish caponata, rigatoni in tomato, sardine meatballs, lemon-infused octopus, and souté of clams and mussels.

Whilst the location is heavenly, it is clear that it’s Piero – the brains, talent and passion behind the stove – who makes Trattoria Da Piero such an iconic venue.

With seafood cooked almost right next to where it was caught and local wine made by the same family the city’s stadium is named after, this is a dining experience like no other.

Address: Piazza Mondello, 12, 90151 Palermo