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FOOD & DINING IN MALTA

Dining al fresco is one of life’s simple pleasures. It’s almost a daily possibility in Malta. Choose from courtyards of baroque palazzos to harbour restaurants and local café-bars. Find somewhere secluded, or dine in a busy trattoria.

The Islands’ cuisine is influenced by the people who made their home here over the centuries, from the Arabs, Italians and Spanish to the French and British. Traditional Maltese cooking has distinct touches of the Sicilian and Moorish. Look out for rich sweets, pastries and deserts of ricotta, almonds and figs as well as tomato and wine sauces with pasta, rabbit and fish.

Restaurant menus follow the seasons using the best of available fare: from tomatoes, zucchini, herbs and olives to fish like lampuki, a national favourite, swordfish and tuna.

International cuisine is available everywhere. Most restaurants are influenced by Italian or French cuisine, but there are plenty specialising in Oriental, Tex Mex and other themes. In true Mediterranean style, children are welcome everywhere.

For a quick, but substantial snack during the day try some pastizzi, bite-sized, ricotta or pea-filled flaky pastries. You’ll never be far from refreshments or snacks. Just pop into a local bar.

Malta produces some fine wines from native grapes and most visitors soon discover the excellent local beers.

Culinary Heritage

Traditional Maltese food was until recent years relegated to the home. As in all parts of the Mediterranean, the daily main meal, often still cooked at lunchtime here, is an occasion to bring the family together. Until the past decade or so, this home cooking was found only in village bars.

Today though, there has been renewed interest in the Islands’ rich culinary heritage. There are numerous television and radio programmes and weekly columns on Maltese fare - you’ll even find recipe write-ups in Air Malta’s in-flight magazine.

This revival has also encouraged more restaurants to offer local fare. They proudly serve their own version of specialities such as Lampuki Pie (fish pie), Rabbit Stew, Bragioli (beef olives) and various ricotta sweets and semi-freddo deserts like Cassata.

Seasonal Favourites

Traditional Maltese food is rustic and based on the seasons. In the era before refrigeration, this made sense. Families were inventive with the best of the seasonal produce. The housewife would stock up with the seasonal gluts, often preserving or drying produce to make use of them later in the year.

In the past, as in most southern Mediterranean diets, meat was scarce so fish played major role. Even today, many older people follow the Catholic tradition of eating fish on Wednesdays and Fridays.

Specialities use a lot of vegetables, from zucchini, artichokes, the giant cabbage and cauliflower that grow here, sun-ripened tomatoes and potatoes. Stuffed marrows and tomatoes, and thick vegetable minestra (soups) are frequently on the menu in homes and restaurants.

Look out for widow’s soup which includes a small round of Gbejniet (sheep or goat’s cheese). Dried and fresh beans are another mainstay. On most food shop counters, you’ll see Bigilla, a thick pate of broad beans with garlic. It is sometimes sold direct from vans in village squares. Another vegetable speciality is Kapunata, a Maltese version of ratatouille.

When fish is in abundance, you’ll find Aljotta (fish soup) laced with garlic, chilli, tomatoes, rice and liberal handfuls of chopped marjoram or parsley. A trip to Marsaxlokk fish market on Sunday mornings, will show you just how varied the fish catch is in Maltese waters.

Depending on the season, you’ll see spnotta (bass), dott (stone fish), cerna (grouper), dentici (dentex), sargu (white bream) and trill (red mullet). Then there’s swordfish and tuna, followed later in the season, around early to late autumn, by the famed Lampuka, or dolphin fish. This tasty, white, versatile fish is a particular favourite here. While, octopus and squid make some rich stews and pasta sauces.

No mention of Maltese food is complete without talking about the bread. Some visitors make sure they grab a loaf before boarding their planes so they can take back a simple, but incredible slice of Maltese life. Bread here is made from sour dough, left from the previous day’s batch. Cooked often in wood ovens, the bread is crusty yet springy in the centre.

A perfect snack is ‘hobz biz-zejt’, served in nearly every bar and still the ‘packed lunch’ of farmers and workmen. It is a large thick round of bread dipped in olive oil, rubbed with ripe tomatoes and filled with a mix of tuna, onion, garlic, tomatoes and capers. In restaurants smaller ‘bruschetta’ are served as appetisers.

The other daily snack is the pastizzi, a flaky pastry parcel filled with ricotta or mushed peas. Each baker and bar has their own version. The pastizzi makes a wholesome all-day bite when you’re out and about.

Deserts and pastries are for those with a sweet tooth! A favourite delicacy is the Kannoli, believed to have originated in Sicily. It is a mouth-watering tube of crispy, fried pastry filled with ricotta, and sometimes also with chocolate chips or candied fruit. Other favourites include various, Sicilian-style, semi-freddo deserts with a mix of sponge, ice-cream, candied fruits and cream pressed into moulds and chilled.

After dinner, you may be offered helwa tat-Tork, a very sweet sugary mixture of crushed and whole almonds. But more than likely, desert will be a simple but delicious offering of fruits from melons to figs, peaches, apricots, and citrus fruit.

These are all the great information about the favorite and eminent food spots and culinary delights centers in Malta and these are all very sumptuous foods and extremely delightful and hygienic as well.

To set the record straight, I didnt write any articles. Was just along for the ride.

Not caring for the overly salty packaged foods and freeze-dried stuff, I make my own. Couscous, minute rice, corn pasta, bulgar wheat or taboulli, hummus, potato flakes with spices you prefer work well. Sprinkle some dried vegetable mix for texture and flavor variety. Some folks add dried meat too. One essential ingredient is parmesan cheese.

Some of these work well using canteen-cooking. In the morning, put hot water in a screw-mouth plastic bottle. Add, say, bulgar wheat and a bullion cube. By lunch time you have a quite satisfying lunch.

In general, cooked foods are lighter than non-cooked. So you need a lightweight method to boil water. A subject for another thread though. Anyway, an extra few days of food should be simple, light, and easy to prepare in case of emergency.

The WB Mason and the Olio trucks do not look like they are standard food trucks,nor do I see Ice Cream Trucks as standard food trucks,they are conventional but they are not part of the new wave of food trucks since they have been around for the longest.

Cities like LA are far ahead in the food truck business in my opinion.

Most food trucksWith good quality in NYC are operated by Mexicans and Salvadorians.

What a great post, fantastic to read. I love the food in Malta and the seasonal vegetables and fruits are amazing. Going out to eat in Malta is also a true joy, the food is great, the places have nice staff and often the views are great. This site is great as it lists a lot of restaurants with description and all; http://www.malta.com/en/dining/restaurant
In St. Julian's i love Cafe Rafael for a casual dinner and Zest on special occasions. Can anyone recommend a good restaurant in the south though?

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