Mella Malta

I recently went to visit my friend Andy in Malta. Having no idea what to expect, i was delighted by the sun and sea, and mixed north african and meditteranean influences in the food. A firm favourite were pastizzi, which a version of pasties. It made me think about the various types of pasty type snacks I've tried around the world, and almost always enjoyed. Indian samosas, middle eastern boreki, chinese spring rolls, south american empanadas, the best Bolivian saltenas, Cornish pasties and now maltese pastizzi. The picture (and our favourite) shows spinach ones, but peas, meat and spinach and ricotta were also available and a suprisingly filling snack. There are two aspects of these pasty variations that stand out: a sweet light pastry and a tasty spicy filling; Bolivian saltenas have a sweet glaze over a thin pastry, and boreki have the salty spinach and feta with a crumbly pastry.

Another Maltese favourite was 'kinni', a bitter orange fizzy drink, which sadly did not wash down the pastizzi as well as I thought, and I ended up carrying it around for hours trying to finish it as it grew warmer and flatter and even less apetizing. A much tastier drink were the mojitos with strawberries. Our version with seasonal pomegranate is to follow.