Mallorcan Cuisine

About Mallorcan Cuisine

By the ULTIMATE Mallorca Editorial Team

Editor-in-Chief: Jai Michael

The cooking of the Balearic Islands is a resourceful branch of Mediterranean cuisine, shaped by island life, Catalan roots and old trade routes. On Mallorca it means pork in every form, garden vegetables, fish and a great pastry tradition. This is our guide to the island’s dishes.

Balearic cuisine

The cooking of the Balearic Islands is a distinct and resourceful branch of Mediterranean cuisine, shaped by island isolation, Catalan roots and centuries of trade. Because preserving food mattered on an island, it relies on pork in every form, on garden vegetables and fresh fish, and on a celebrated tradition of baking.

Ensaimada

Mallorca’s most famous creation: a light, spiral pastry made with strong flour, sugar, eggs and saïm, pork lard, which gives it its name. Eat it plain and dusted with icing sugar, or filled with cabell d’àngel, a sweet pumpkin preserve, or cream. The Ensaimada de Mallorca has its own protected geographical indication, and you will see families carrying the large, round boxes onto flights home.

An island larder: the pig, the garden, the sea and the baker’s oven.

Sobrassada

A soft, cured pork sausage, coloured deep red and flavoured by the island’s paprika, tap de cortí, and meant for spreading on bread. Sobrassada de Mallorca is also protected; try it on toast with a drizzle of honey.

Pa amb oli

The island’s everyday dish, “bread with oil”: dense, unsalted country bread, pa pagès, rubbed with garlic and the island’s ramallet tomatoes, generously drizzled with Mallorcan olive oil and topped with cheese, cured meats or pickled sea fennel.

Tumbet

Mallorca’s answer to ratatouille: slices of aubergine, potato and red pepper, each fried separately, layered and topped with a rich sauce of tomato, garlic and olive oil.

Sopes and frit

Sopes mallorquines are a hearty dish of thin slices of country bread soaked in a broth of seasonal vegetables, usually cabbage, cauliflower and chard, with a little pork. Frit mallorquí, one of the island’s oldest recipes, is a fry of pork offal with potatoes, fennel shoots, garlic and sweet peppers.

Arròs brut

“Dirty rice”: a soupy, deeply spiced rice cooked with game such as rabbit or quail, wild mushrooms and a warm blend of cinnamon, cloves and nutmeg.

Where to taste it

Browse the stalls of the Mercat de l’Olivar in Palma, in this guide, for sobrassada, cheeses and the morning’s fish. For the island’s traditional cooking, eat in a celler, a rustic restaurant set in an old wine cellar; inland towns such as Inca have several, and in Palma, Celler Sa Premsa, in this guide, has served Mallorcan dishes for decades. By the sea, the beach restaurants serve grilled prawns, squid and rice dishes with a view.

Our advice: start the day with an ensaimada and coffee, lunch on pa amb oli, and take a box of ensaimadas home.

Opening hours, prices and seasonal openings change, so please check with Mallorcan Cuisine before you go.