Regional highlights
Tomatokeftedes
Santorini's signature meze — fritters made from the island's tiny PDO cherry tomatoes (tomataki Santorinis), grated onion, mint, oregano, flour and sometimes feta, fried in olive oil until crisp outside and soft inside. The tomatoes are sweet enough that no sugar is needed; in summer when they're at peak the fritters taste of pure concentrated tomato. Served with tzatziki or a yogurt dip.
Fava Santorinis
PDO yellow split-pea purée — not the broad-bean fava of the rest of Greece, but a smaller native legume (Lathyrus clymenum) grown only on Santorini. Cooked down with onion and olive oil into a silky, golden purée, served warm or at room temperature with a drizzle of olive oil, capers, raw onion and a few drops of lemon. "Fava me sta" adds slow-cooked onions; "fava pantremeni" ("married fava") tops it with stewed onion and capers. The most photographed plate on every Santorini menu.
White aubergine
An ivory-skinned aubergine native to Santorini — sweeter than the purple version, with no bitterness and a creamier flesh because it holds less water. Eaten grilled over charcoal with olive oil and lemon, fried, in melitzanosalata (smoked aubergine dip), or in moussaka. The plant tolerates the island's drought far better than mainland varieties.
Capers & caper leaves
Both the buds and the young shoots of the wild caper bush, which grows on Santorini's cliffs, are pickled or preserved in oil and eaten as a meze. The buds are small and intensely briny; the leaves are tender, slightly tart and faintly mustardy. Both appear scattered through fava, salads and grilled-fish plates. Picked from May to July.
Stewed cherry tomatoes
Slow-cooked PDO cherry tomatoes with garlic, olive oil and oregano, reduced to a sweet-savoury jam-like sauce — sometimes served as a meze with country bread, sometimes as the base for pasta or fish. The tomatoes' high natural sugars caramelise during the long cook, intensifying everything they were already.
Chloro tyri
Santorini's local fresh goat's-milk cheese — soft, slightly sour, eaten very young. Sometimes salted lightly, sometimes unsalted. Used in salads, as a meze with a drizzle of honey, and as the filling of melitinia (sweet cheese pies). A village product made in small dairies in Megalochori and Pyrgos. Lighter and tangier than mainland feta.
Melitinia
Open-topped cheese tartlets — a thin pastry case holds a sweetened mixture of fresh chloro tyri (or mizithra) with mastiha and sugar, baked until just golden. A traditional Easter sweet on Santorini, now sold year-round at village bakeries in Pyrgos and Oia. Light, fragrant with mastiha, less sweet than mainland Greek pastries.
Chtapodi sta karvouna
Octopus, sun-dried briefly on a tavern washing-line, then charcoal-grilled and dressed with olive oil, oregano and lemon — the ubiquitous Aegean dish, but Santorini does it especially well at the harbour tavernas of Ammoudi (below Oia) and Vlychada. Slightly chewy, smoky, simple. Pairs naturally with Assyrtiko.
Psarokeftedes
Fish fritters — typically made from salt cod or local white fish, mashed with potato, onion, mint and parsley, and fried into golden patties. A summer meze in the Vlychada and Akrotiri tavernas. Light, herb-fragrant, served with skordalia (garlic-and-potato dip) or tzatziki.
Santorini horiatiki
Greek village salad with local upgrades — tomataki (PDO cherry tomatoes), white aubergine, capers, caper leaves, raw onion, oregano and chloro tyri instead of feta, all dressed with the island's olive oil. Same idea as a mainland horiatiki, but every ingredient is Santorini-grown and the result is sharper and more aromatic.
Loukaniko Santorinis
Pork sausage seasoned with oregano, fennel seed and a generous amount of pepper — the mince is sometimes spiked with a splash of local wine. Coiled into rings, cured briefly, and pan-fried or grilled as a meze. Found at village butchers in Pyrgos and Megalochori; the spicing is slightly more Aegean than Cycladic.
Sun-dried Assyrtiko grapes
Late-harvest Assyrtiko grapes are laid out on the volcanic ash to dry in the sun for 10-14 days, concentrating their sugars to a raisin-like intensity. Most go into Vinsanto wine; a small share are sold as a sweet snack with cheese, or chopped into pastries. A direct survival of the island's pre-industrial wine economy.