… Most traditional dishes on Cyprus are either Turkish-Cypriot or Greek-Cypriot in origin…
Souvlaki is the favourite street food in Cyprus. Skewers of pork grilled over coals are wrapped in pita bread, garnished with tomato, cucumber, cabbage and pickled vegetables and doused with yogurt sauce. Season to your taste with a wedge of lemon.
It's hard to resist the savoury smell of a streetside grill. Another good thing to try from the coals is pastourma, a spicy sausage made with fenugreek and hot peppers. Sausages are a big deal on Cyprus — every village makes their own and has different ways of spicing them although crushed coriander seems to be pretty much a constant. The variety of coriander grown on Cyprus is especially fragrant and it is used abundantly in local dishes.
Home cooking in Cyprus is still very much rooted in the traditions of village life and rural agriculture. Theo A. Michaels, UK chef and author of the cookbook Rustica, comes from a large Greek Cypriot family and writes: “They typically grew their own produce, foraged and fished, and also kept some small livestock, such as chickens, pigs, goats and rabbits, which gave them meat plus eggs, milk, butter and the means to make cheeses. Sourcing food this way automatically meant eating in tune with the seasons and a higher intake of vegetables, fruit, pulses, grains and nuts. Meat and fish, often considered a luxury, were reserved for feast days and celebrations.”
The municipal markets are where you can see how the locals really shop and eat. Most of the action takes place in the morning when housewives pick up fresh ingredients for the day's lunch. Tomatoes, avocados, peppers, squashes, artichokes, okra, blackeyed peas, herbs and salad greens are all locally grown. Kolokasi is a sweet potato-like root vegetable that Cypriots love — it's said that Richard the Lionheart enjoyed it at his wedding feast when he married Berengaria of Navarre in Cyprus in 1191. Fruits follow the seasons — oranges, grapefruits and lemons are winter crops, strawberries arrive in spring, stone fruits in summer. Hit the market in June and you can taste plums, apricots, peaches and big black cherries. Watermelons are everywhere in July and August and green and purple figs show up in the fall.
A variety of grapes grow on Cyprus — pink, black and green for the table — the indigenous Mavro, Xynisteri and Commandaria varietals for wine. Commandaria is the oldest named wine in the world and is unique to Cyprus. It's a sticky sweet dessert wine that it was drunk by the Knights Hospitallers in the 12th century. Flash forward to today and in Limassol (Lemesos), the principal tourist