Which Ortigia street food tour is worth booking?
Updated October 22, 2026 · 5 min read
Book the three-hour street food walk for €62.10 if you want one tour that covers cheese, arancino, fried fish and something sweet. Book the €69 walk if you want a local host, a market stop and seven tastings. Both are rated 4.9 or 5.0 by a lot of people: 414 reviews for the first, 238 for the second. The two cheaper or shorter options are different trips, and one of them is more of a sightseeing walk with a fish snack at the end.
The four tours compared
| Tour | Price | Length | Rating |
|---|---|---|---|
| Street Food Walking Tour in Ortigia with Tastings | €62.10 | 3 hours | 4.9 stars, 414 reviews |
| The Authentic Ortigia Street Food Tour by Hidden Syracuse | €69 | 3 hours | 5.0 stars, 238 reviews |
| Guided tour of Ortigia with fish street food at the market | €49.90 | 2.5 hours | 4.4 stars, 29 reviews |
| Sicilian Food and Wine Tour | €85 | 2.5 hours | 5.0 stars, 21 reviews |
All prices are per person.
The two three-hour walks
The €62.10 walk is built around four or more stops. The booking page lists local cheeses, an arancino, fried fish, and a granita or a cannolo, with a visit to the cathedral square and the Arethusa spring on the way. It includes water and one alcoholic drink, usually local wine, and runs in groups of up to 12 with a guide in English or Italian.
The €69 walk starts with coffee at Piazza Duomo, goes through the old Jewish quarter and spends an hour at the market. The host’s description lists seven tastings, among them arancini from what the description calls the oldest bakery in town, market cheeses, pistachio salami, baked ricotta, a mozzarella sandwich, almond sweets and a granita. Groups are up to 15 and the tour is in English only. The description says the portions are generous enough to replace a full meal, and the first tour also bills itself as a complete meal, so do not book lunch afterwards.
The difference between them is style more than food. The first is a tidy tasting route with a larger review base. The second reads like a walk with one person who knows the stallholders, and has a market stop built in.
The two shorter tours
The €49.90 tour is mostly a walk. It starts at the Temple of Apollo and goes through Piazza Archimede, the cathedral, where the entrance ticket is included, and the Arethusa spring, then ends with a fish tasting at the market. If you want to understand the island and eat a little, it is fine. If you want a food tour, it is not one. Its 4.4 stars come from 29 reviews, so the evidence is thin. It may be run in Italian and English at the same time.
The €85 tour goes to the market, three tasting spots, a cheese stop and a small tasting of two Sicilian wines, in English, Italian or Spanish. It has a 5.0 rating, but from 21 reviews. That is a good sign, not yet a pattern. Pay the extra only if the wine pairing is what you are after. The listings hold other Ortigia tours with tastings, each with 19 reviews or fewer; they are not compared here.
What to check before you book
The market is closed on Sundays. The booking page of a cooking class that visits it says so, and local sources describe the market as running Monday to Saturday. Three of these tours go through the market, so on a Sunday ask the operator what the route looks like.
Diet and allergies. The €62.10 tour says vegetarian and other diets are supported if you tell the operator when you book. The €69 tour lists vegans as not suitable. The €49.90 tour is a fish tasting, and the €85 tour asks you to report intolerances. On all four, say so when you book, not on the street.
Mobility. The listings do not agree. One of the three-hour tours lists people with mobility impairments as not suitable, while the other and the €85 tour show a wheelchair-accessible label. Ortigia has old, uneven streets, so ask the operator directly before you book.
Which one for whom
First food tour in Syracuse: the €62.10 walk, with 414 reviews behind it.
You want a host and the market: the €69 walk.
You mainly want to see Ortigia and eat a little fish: the €49.90 tour, or read Ortigia on your own and do it without a guide.
Wine is part of the point: the €85 tour.
You want to cook, not just eat: the cooking class in Syracuse with a market visit is a longer and more expensive morning.
All food experiences are on the food and wine tours in Syracuse page, and the guided walks without food are under Ortigia walking tours.
