Cypriot cooking is what happens when Greek, Middle Eastern and Mediterranean traditions simmer together on a sunny island for a few thousand years. It’s generous, smoky, herb-scented food built for sharing — and eating well here is less about famous restaurants than about knowing what to order. This is your cheat sheet.
Start with meze — the Cypriot feast
The single best way to eat in Cyprus is to order meze: not a starter, but a rolling parade of small dishes — often fifteen to thirty of them — that keeps coming until you surrender. Dips and salads first (hummus, tahini, taramosalata, tzatziki), then grilled halloumi, olives and village bread, then a march of hot dishes and grilled meats or fish. Order it for the whole table, come hungry, and pace yourself — the good stuff arrives late.
The halloumi you’ve been waiting for
Halloumi is the island’s gift to the world: a firm, salty, springy cheese that grills and fries without melting, turning golden and squeaky outside while staying soft within. Grilled with lemon, wrapped in warm pitta, tucked into a village salad, even paired with watermelon in summer. It now carries EU PDO protected status, so the real island-made version is the genuine article.
The meats: souvla, souvlaki, sheftalia, kleftiko
Cypriots are masters of slow fire. Learn these four and you’ll never order wrong:
Souvla
Big chunks of pork or lamb cooked slowly on a long rotating skewer over charcoal — the centrepiece of every Sunday lunch. Smoky, tender and utterly Cypriot.
Souvlaki & sheftalia
Souvlaki is the smaller grilled skewer, served in fluffy pitta with salad and sauces. Ask for sheftalia alongside — a herby minced-meat sausage grilled over coals. Together in a pitta, they’re the island’s perfect cheap lunch.
Kleftiko
Lamb slow-baked for hours in a sealed clay oven until it falls off the bone, scented with bay and lemon. The name means “stolen” — after the bandits who supposedly cooked meat in hidden pits so the smoke wouldn’t give them away.
Village dishes worth hunting down
Look for afelia (pork braised in red wine and coriander seed), stifado (onion-and-cinnamon beef stew), koupepia (stuffed vine leaves), louvi (black-eyed beans with chard and lemon) and tavas (cumin-scented lamb). For a snack, a warm tyropitta or a sesame koulouri does the job.
The sweet finish
Save room for loukoumades (honey-drenched doughnut puffs), loukoumi (the rose-scented “Cyprus Delight” of Geroskipou), pastelli (carob or sesame bars), soutzoukos (grape-must-dipped almond strings) and the syrupy glyko tou koutaliou spoon sweets offered to guests.
What to drink
Cyprus has made wine for over 5,000 years. Try crisp white Xynisteri and deep red Maratheftiko from the mountain wineries, and taste Commandaria — the sweet amber dessert wine said to be the world’s oldest named wine still in production. The local firewater is zivania; the beer to ask for is an ice-cold KEO. Finish with a tiny cup of thick Cyprus coffee (order it metrios for medium-sweet).