The logic of eating at the water's edge
There is a moment, in the late afternoon, when the smaller fishing boats come back in. Not the big commercial vessels but the gozzi and paranzelle — low-hulled, paint-peeled, managed by one or two men — sidling up to the quay with ice-boxes and a day's worth of whatever the sea gave up. Watch for twenty minutes and you will understand everything about what you should eat that evening.
The restaurants directly on the port don't need elaborate menus because the decision was made on the water. What came in goes on the grill or into the pan: totani split and charred quickly over high heat, alici flattened and fried to a crisp golden tangle, dentice baked with oil, caper, and a few tomatoes that have been collapsing in the summer heat since July. On Lampedusa, those capers are likely to be local ones — small, firm, packed in sea salt — and they matter more to the dish than any technique. On Pantelleria, the same logic applies to the capperi grown in the volcanic terraces above the port: the geography is in the food.
The better harbour restaurants are not always the prettiest. Look for the plastic tables that nobody bothered to upgrade because nobody asked them to; look for the chalkboard rather than the laminated menu; look for the smell of hot oil and charcoal before you look for a view. You will usually find the view anyway, because the building is already on the water.
Timing matters. Arrive when Italians actually eat — half eight, nine o'clock — and the kitchen is at full speed, the fish is properly fresh, and the port has settled into its evening self: the boats still, the lights coming on in long reflections across the water, someone's radio leaking football commentary from inside a cabin. Order the catch of the day and nothing else. Ask what came in. They will tell you, and it will be true, because lying about that to someone sitting fifty metres from the quay would be embarrassing for everyone.