Write: Santi Llinares. Director of Gastronomic Information
What marks the gastronomy of a place is its climate, its landscape, its territory. In the case of Menorca, it is also influenced by its long history as a land of passage and conquests. In addition, its people and its genuinely Mediterranean character give its gastronomy a unique flavor that is a pleasure to discover and taste. Its tranquility and its pride of belonging are marked in every corner of the island and are impregnated by a subsistence cuisine that knows how to value each of its products.
Menorca has a wealth of meats, cheeses, sausages, fruits, vegetables, fish, sweet and savory pastries and drinks that are also different from those of other places. The ambassador of Menorcan gastronomy tells us, Blanca Mayandia Briones a Gastronomic Information in a year when Menorca is European Gastronomy Region and that organizes throughout 2022 different samples of its products and gastronomy.
Cheeses from Menorca, the pride of the island
Menorca is known and recognized for its cheeses and they are protected by their Designation of Origin Mahón-Menorca. In many places they are known simply as Mahon cheese because although they were made throughout the island, Mahón was the port of departure to sell them on the Mediterranean coast.
There are different maturations, from the tender of a maturation three weeks to two months. The semi-cured cheese with maturation of two to five months, and curing of more than five. Finally there is the old, an ideal cheese for gastronomic recipes and that many chefs fall in love with.
They are made with milk from cows on the island of Menorca. Both cows of the Friesian breed, the most common, and the native breed, the Menorcan breed, are currently in production. The Designation of Origin Mahón-Menorca distinguishes the artisan elaboration from the conventional one, as well as the elaboration with raw milk.
The surprising meats of Menorca
Surprising the richness of meats that it has Menorca both for its diversity and for its quality. From beef and lamb to game meats such as partridge, rabbit, quail, pigeons, ducks and thrushes. Of course, the pig, and specifically the native black pig, has a great role.
Recipes like the rabbit with figs, partridges with cabbage, suckling lamb al oven or veal in sauce are traditional recipes that we should not miss on our visit to the island
Menorcan sausages
On an island where it was important to store food for the harsh winter, Sausages they were of great importance. Its appreciated sobrassada, which is made with the noble parts of the pig and paprika, is the best known outside of Menorca, but there are other sausages that also stand out for their quality. An example is the carn i xulla made with lean meat and bacon, or the white botifarro and black botifarro, which are made with minced meat and blood was added to make black, or cuixot, for which the minced meat and other parts of the slaughter are stuffed with the skin of the pig's thigh.
Delicious fish and shellfish
If we go to the coast, fish and shellfish take center stage. Rock fish, blue and white, are a real delicacy. From the Saint Peter's fish to sardines, including monkfish, red mullet, skate, grouper and dolphinfish along with crustaceans such as Norway lobsters, prawns, lobsters or spider crabs. Also molluscs like cockles They give us some exquisite elaborations.
Popular and simple recipes such as baked skate or Lobster stew They will take us to gastronomic pleasure that we will not forget. A clear example that the product is the protagonist.
Xoriguer, the distillery of Menorca
The influence of British colonization and his passion for gin meant that in Menorca There are several distilleries. Currently there is only one and it is a flag of the island: the Xoriguer distillery. His best-known and most classic gin is made there, a single distilled gin, with wine alcohol and with a single botanist, juniper. Currently, in addition to their classic gin, they make other types of both gin and liqueurs with different plants and flowers, as well as the most traditional liqueur, that of roses.
Gin in Menorca is drunk in many different ways, for example with siphon, but the best known way is with lemon, the popular ointment. A mixture of two parts lemon juice and one part gin that should be served very cold.
Minorcan wine
There are several wineries and viticulture is recovering on the island. All after the almost disappearance of the crop more than a century ago caused by phylloxera. Quality wines are currently being produced with varieties such as Tempranillo, Monastrell, Cabernet Sauvignon, Moscatell and Merlot, among others. All of them under Protected Geographical Indication of Wines of the Illa de Menorca.
Fruits and vegetables, plant world
Its Mediterranean climate, its land and the salinity of its waters provide an authentic and different flavor to the fruits and vegetables from Menorca. All kinds of vegetables are produced, such as courgettes, tomatoes, lettuce, aubergines, cabbages, peppers, onions, garlic, potatoes, sweet potatoes, etc.
Seasonal fruits such as cherries, pears, apples, peaches, watermelons and melons are also of high quality. We must highlight the production of beans, peas and chickpeas as legumes that were consumed throughout the winter and especially chopped wheat, the so-called arros de la terra. Delicious recipes are made with chopped wheat as a paella which are very special for Menorcans.
The rich Menorcan confectionery
Another great wealth of its gastronomy is its confectionery. The tradition of having an oven on farms has meant that pasta and pies, sweet and savory, have a great presence. Undoubtedly, the different cultures that have passed through the island such as the Muslim, the British, the Jewish and the French have helped to enrich its confectionery.
In the sweet confectionery, the ensaimadas, the buñuelos, the nougats, the Pastissets, els crepells and carquinyolis. In salty confectionery, vegetable, meat, fish and even fruit cakes. By way of empanadas, we find the blondies, which are empanadas filled with meat or vegetables, the flons, some cheese and egg muffins, the greixers, some pastries filled with sobrassada, and the formats, some empanadas of meat or sobrasada.
The essentials in gastronomy
The gastronomic ambassador of Menorca, Blanca Mayandía, recommends us to make four essential routes on our gastronomic journey.
La meat route in inland towns: on this route you cannot miss out on trying some game, such as partridges or rabbits, as well as excellent veal or suckling lamb. Recipes with rabbit with figs or baked lamb could be some of the traditional proposals that you will find.
On the second route we enter the Minorcan cheeses and Sausages. Its wide variety of sausages starting with sobrasadas and the butifarrons. And what about the cheeses from him. If you are a cheese lover, dare to try matured ones, the least common outside the island.
The third route is fish y shellfish. Dishes such as lobster stews, baked skate, stuffed squid or San Pedro fish are great proposals. But do not underestimate their grilled sardines.
In the fourth route we recommend that you try all its confectioneryboth salty and sweet. Try them to check the high quality of their elaborations and the careful raw materials. They will captivate you.
Finally, you can leave us without trying some dishes that are present throughout the island and that is the pride of any Minorcan. One is the Oliaigua, a simple and exquisite dish that is made by cooking water and oil to which some vegetables are added, mainly tomato. Another great and traditional dish is the Rice of the land, which is made, as we have told you, like paella but using broken wheat. It is usually made with meat and pork ribs.
