From Morning Coffee to Midnight Souvlaki: Eating Rhodes

Rhodes cooks like the Dodecanese rather than like a postcard. There are dishes here you will not find on the mainland, wine from mountain villages that rarely leaves the island, and a rhythm to the day that rewards eating late. Follow the clock and you will eat far better than the harbour menus suggest.

The quick facts

• Rhodes, Dodecanese, Greece, with strong Ottoman and Italian layers in its food history
• Local specialities to look for: pitaroudia, melekouni, kolokythokeftedes and fresh island fish
• Embonas, in the mountains, is the island s best-known wine village
• Kitchens open late; dinner before eight in the evening marks you out immediately

Morning: coffee, properly cold

Greek breakfast is small and sweet. A bakery will sell you spanakopita, tiropita or a koulouri ring, and the drink to order is a freddo espresso or freddo cappuccino, whipped cold and drunk slowly. Nobody rushes this. Sit outside and let the town wake up around you.

Mid-morning: the market

The New Market building beside Mandraki Harbour is the traditional heart of food shopping in Rhodes Town, and the surrounding streets sell thyme honey, olives, sun-dried tomatoes and the local sesame sweets. Buy figs and cheese for the beach rather than an overpriced sandwich later.

Lunch: the mezze table

Order small and order several. Pitaroudia, the Rhodian chickpea fritters flecked with mint and onion, are the dish to try first. Add kolokythokeftedes (courgette balls), a proper horiatiki salad with a slab of feta and good oil, grilled octopus if it is hanging out to dry near the kitchen, and bread to clear the plates. Two people can eat generously without a main course.

Afternoon: something sweet

Loukoumades, small yeasted doughnuts drowned in honey and cinnamon, are the reliable afternoon fix. The island speciality is melekouni, a chewy sesame-and-honey bar traditionally made for weddings and now sold year-round. It travels well, which makes it the sensible edible souvenir.

Dinner: inland and unhurried

The seafront tavernas with laminated menus are not where the island eats. Head for the hill villages instead, or the back lanes of Lindos and Archangelos, where the day s cooking is often shown to you rather than described. Fresh fish is priced by weight and worth confirming before it is cooked. Drink the local wine: Embonas and the surrounding slopes produce the island s best-known bottles, and asking for the house version is rarely a mistake.

Late: the skewer

A gyros or a souvlaki wrapped in pita, with tomato, onion, tzatziki and a handful of chips folded in, is what Rhodes eats after everything else has closed. It costs very little, it is served until absurd hours in Rhodes Town, and it is genuinely one of the great late-night foods.

Tip: When a taverna offers you a small carafe of house wine from the barrel, take it. It is usually made nearby, it costs a fraction of the bottled list, and it suits the food far better.