Erica De Mane

Cannolis minus all the calories.

When you need a little something sweet and somehow don’t see a whole tray of cannolis fitting into your diet plan, Italy still has a lot to offer you. A neurotic little trick of mine is to eat something extremely small but tooth-achingly sweet to curb my craving. It almost always works, since the thing I eat winds up being delicious yet ultimately sickening at the same time. Victory.

Italians, especially in Sicily, specialize in intensely sweet, compact nuggets of pleasure (or pain?). After all this is the home of marzapane, the outrageously sweet almond paste fashioned into clusters of grapes or creepy seafood shapes, or stuffed inside of dates (as if dates weren’t sweet enough already). But they’ve also got torrone, also big in Naples, soft or hard whipped-up sugar studded with almonds and usually covered with something that resembles a Communion host. Not only will a mouthful of torrone overcome your sweet tooth, but it’s amazing at extracting seemingly perfectly intact dental work. The best one I’ve tasted recently was made by Caffè Sicilia in the Baroque town of Noto. It’s soft and almost gooey, and sweeter than any other I’ve ever sampled (if you’re interested, you can order it from gustiamo.com). There are also all sorts of tooth-aching and tooth cracking nut brittles, again typically Sicilian, made with sesame seeds, pine nuts, or, my favorite, pistachios. I buy these in sheets in Little Italy and just crack off a little piece from time to time when a craving strikes.

Honey is also a good bet for tamping down a sweet attack. There’s almost nothing that squelches a really strong craving better than a tablespoon of Italian chestnut or Eucalyptus honey, especially if you desire something with a haunting, bitter edge (and those particular honeys leave a slightly funky aftertaste, so you really don’t want any more). Liccu Manias brand from Sardegna is my current fave. The millefiori (mixed wildflower) variety they make is gentle going down and memorable in a very good way. I also order these through gustiamo.com, but buonitalia.com carries a good line of Italian honeys as well. And if I’m itching for a heaping tablespoon of a fruit preserve that’s got way too much sugar and is way too well made, I’ll chose fig or wild cherry by Agrimontana, again from buonitalia, though I’ve purchased these wonderful preserves at other Italian specialty shops in Manhattan as well.

Nutella, the thick hazelnut and chocolate spread (a flavor also known as gianduja), is another excellent option, not on toast, of course—that would be too civilized (and fattening)—but tablespooned right from the jar (just one spoonful, though). Marrons glacés can also really hit the spot. Sometimes just the syrup will do.

And when all else fails, a good option is a hefty shot of Fra Angelico; more hazelnut, more sugar, but with the added bonus of high alcohol content. I usually can’t stomach much of anything after that, except possibly another hefty shot of Fra Angelico. Which I try to resist.