The month the kitchen has been waiting for. What comes back on, and what quietly leaves.
November is when Maltese cooking stops being a summer cuisine pretending to be relaxed and becomes what it actually is: a slow, heavy, deeply unhurried way of feeding people.
On, and off
On: the soups — kawlata, soppa tal-armla, aljotta. Rabbit braised for hours. Bragoli in a sauce that has reduced properly. Baked pasta and ross il-forn, which want a cold day to make sense.
Off, or nearly: the lightest of the summer plates. The lampuki are thinning out as the season runs down towards December, so the fish moves back to whatever the boats find.
This is the good half of the year to eat here, and locals know it. The room in November is mostly people who live on this island.
Everything worth cooking slowly is now worth cooking slowly.
November is when Maltese cooking stops being a summer cuisine pretending to be relaxed and becomes what it actually is: a slow, heavy, deeply unhurried way of feeding people.
On, and off
On: the soups — kawlata, soppa tal-armla, aljotta. Rabbit braised for hours. Bragoli in a sauce that has reduced properly. Baked pasta and ross il-forn, which want a cold day to make sense.
Off, or nearly: the lightest of the summer plates. The lampuki are thinning out as the season runs down towards December, so the fish moves back to whatever the boats find.
This is the good half of the year to eat here, and locals know it. The room in November is mostly people who live on this island.
Everything worth cooking slowly is now worth cooking slowly.
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