Signum, Salina, restaurant review, VANE

Name: Signum
Address: Salina

A one-star dining room inside the family's Hotel Signum on the Aeolian island of Salina, off Sicily's north coast, where Martina Caruso cooks the volcanic island's own produce, its capers and wild fennel and the day's catch, in a kitchen that now carries a Michelin Green Star beside the star.

By Dimitris Stathopoulos

The cooking

Sicilian, read through one small island. Martina Caruso heads the kitchen in the hotel her parents, Clara Rametta and Michele Caruso, built from three nineteenth-century houses on Salina in 1988, and she cooks what the island gives up rather than a menu shipped in from the mainland. Salina is the greenest of the Aeolians, a volcanic speck of some twenty-six square kilometres with a couple of thousand residents, known for its capers and its Malvasia, and both run through the cooking. The kitchen builds its tasting menus on the season and the morning's catch: smoked albacore with wild fennel, grilled escarole with yoghurt, pine nuts, raisins and the island's capers, rabbit from the hillside with sea fennel. Caruso took her first star young and has held it since, and was named the Michelin guide's best female chef in 2019. Her brother Luca runs the floor and the cellar, with a hand in the Eolia winery up on the island, so the wine reads Salina as closely as the plate. The room looks out over the sea towards the other islands, and the service keeps the ease of a house that has taken in guests for decades.

Why it is in VANE

It holds one Michelin star in the Michelin Guide Italia 2026, together with a Michelin Green Star for the way the kitchen sources and runs. That second award is the case VANE cares about: a chef cooking her own island, its capers, its Malvasia and the catch off its shore, from the family's own hotel rather than a borrowed script on the mainland. Salina all but empties in winter and the restaurant works to the island's season, open spring to late autumn, which tells you how close the cooking stays to what the place can actually grow and land. Two generations of the same family have kept the house since 1988, and the kitchen is the daughter's on her own terms. A researched profile, drawn from the restaurant's own record and Michelin's listing, not a first-hand VANE visit.

Where

Hotel Signum, Via Scalo, Malfa, on the island of Salina, Aeolian Islands, Sicily

Kitchen

Chef Martina Caruso, in her family's hotel, her brother Luca on the floor and the cellar

Michelin

One star, Michelin Guide Italia 2026, plus a Michelin Green Star

Style

Sicilian and contemporary, built on Salina's own produce and the day's catch

Best for

A tasting menu built on the island's capers, wild fennel and seasonal catch

VANE selection. Chosen with a critic's eye and judged independently. It's here because we judged it, not because it paid.
On this profile: a researched profile, drawn from the restaurant's own record and reporting, not a claim of a first-hand visit. Where we have eaten there, the review says so.
Image: original VANE artwork; photography to follow.

Asked and answered

Where is Signum?

Hotel Signum, Via Scalo, Malfa, on the island of Salina, Aeolian Islands, Sicily.

Who is the chef at Signum?

Chef Martina Caruso, in her family's hotel, her brother Luca on the floor and the cellar.

What kind of food does Signum serve?

Sicilian and contemporary, built on Salina's own produce and the day's catch.

Who is Signum best for?

A tasting menu built on the island's capers, wild fennel and seasonal catch.

Signum