What to Eat
Madeiran cooking is not mainland Portuguese cooking. It is meat over wood, bread off a hot stone, deep-water fish with fruit, and a drink made from sugar cane grown on the slope behind you.
Calheta's table is Madeiran: beef on bay-laurel skewers, flat bread baked on stone, limpets off these rocks, and black scabbardfish landed on this coast. The sugar cane that made the island rich in the fifteenth century still ends up in your glass, the mill in the village distils it.
Espetada
Espetada
Beef on a bay-laurel skewer, grilled over wood.
Chunks of beef rubbed with garlic and coarse salt, threaded onto a stick of bay laurel and grilled over wood embers. The laurel is not decoration. It perfumes the meat from the inside as it cooks, and it is why this tastes like nowhere else.
Traditionally the skewer is hung from a stand at the table and you work down it, with milho frito and bolo do caco alongside. Village grills up in the parishes do it better than seafront kitchens.
- Look for
- A metal or laurel skewer hung at the table, not plated
- Best as
- A long lunch or dinner at a village grill
Bolo do caco
Bolo do Caco
Flat wheat bread cooked on a hot stone, served with garlic butter.
A soft, round flatbread traditionally baked on a caco. A flat basalt stone over the fire. It arrives hot, split and slathered with garlic-and-parsley butter, usually before you have ordered anything.
It is also the island's sandwich bread: filled with espetada meat, or with pork, it is the standard street food at every festival and roadside stand.
- Look for
- Served hot with garlic butter, or as a filled sandwich at a stand
- Best as
- A starter you should ration, or a walking lunch
Espada com banana
Black Scabbardfish with Banana
A deep-water fish, fried, with fruit. It works.
Peixe-espada preto is a long, black, deep-water fish caught off Madeira, filleted and fried in a light coating. Serving it with fried banana sounds like a tourist invention and is not. It is the island's own pairing, and the sweetness cuts the richness of the fish.
Order it once even if you are sceptical. It is on almost every menu in the municipality, from the marina to the village rooms in Paul do Mar.
- Look for
- Long white fillets with fried banana and often passion-fruit sauce
- Best as
- The dish to try first
Lapas grelhadas
Grilled Limpets
Limpets off these rocks, grilled in the shell with garlic butter.
Limpets are prised off the basalt shoreline, grilled in their own shells with garlic butter and served with a wedge of lemon. They are chewy, briny and very much of this coast. The rocks below Paul do Mar are exactly where they come from.
A standard starter, usually sold by the half-dozen. Squeeze the lemon on before the butter cools.
- Look for
- Served in the shell on a hot metal dish with lemon
- Best as
- A starter with a cold beer
Milho frito
Fried Cornmeal
Cubes of firm cornmeal, fried crisp, the island's chip.
Cornmeal cooked with kale and herbs, set firm, cut into cubes and deep-fried until the outside crackles and the inside stays soft. It is the standard side with espetada and grilled fish.
Cheap, filling and better than it sounds written down. If a menu offers chips or milho frito, take the milho.
- Look for
- Golden cubes, crisp outside and soft in the middle
- Best as
- A side with anything off the grill
Poncha
Poncha
Sugar-cane rum, honey and citrus, Madeira's drink, made where the rum is.
Aguardente de cana, bee honey and citrus juice, stirred together with a grooved wooden stick called a mexelote. Classically lemon; orange and passion fruit are common. It is strong, and it does not taste it.
Calheta has the advantage: the Engenho da Calheta in the village distils the rum on copper stills, some over a century old, and pours the poncha in its own tasting room. Entry is free.
- Look for
- Made to order and stirred with a wooden mexelote, not poured from a bottle
- Best as
- Before dinner, or after a levada
Bolo de mel
Honey Cake
A dark, spiced cake made with sugar-cane honey, not bee honey.
Despite the name, the honey here is mel de cana, cane molasses, the other product of the mills. The cake is dark, dense, spiced and studded with nuts, and it keeps for months, which is exactly why it was made this way.
Traditionally baked in early December and never cut with a knife. It is broken by hand. Calheta's mill produces the cane honey it is built on.
- Look for
- Dark, dense and spiced, sold whole or by the wedge
- Best as
- With coffee, or taken home
Vinho da Madeira
Madeira Wine
The fortified wine that survives being deliberately heated.
Madeira is fortified and then aged with heat. A process that began by accident on long sea voyages and is now done on purpose. The styles run from dry Sercial through Verdelho and Bual to sweet Malmsey.
An opened bottle lasts for months, which makes it one of the few wines worth ordering by the glass anywhere. The lodges are in Funchal, but every restaurant here pours it.
- Look for
- Sercial (dry) through to Malmsey (sweet). Ask which end you are at
- Best as
- An aperitif or with the honey cake
Sopa de tomate e cebola
Tomato and Onion Soup
Madeira's everyday soup, with an egg poached in it.
Tomatoes, onions, garlic and herbs simmered down, with an egg poached in the pot at the end and bread underneath. Peasant food, and still the most common lunch on a village menu.
It is the thing to order on a wet day off the plateau, and it is usually the cheapest line on the board.
- Look for
- An egg poached in the soup, bread in the bowl
- Best as
- A cheap lunch after a levada
Picado
Picado
Garlicky beef pieces with chips, eaten from one plate with cocktail sticks.
Cubes of beef fried with garlic, chilli and bay, tipped over chips and put in the middle of the table with a jar of cocktail sticks. There are no individual portions; that is the point.
A bar dish rather than a restaurant one, and the natural partner to a round of poncha.
- Look for
- One big plate, cocktail sticks, no cutlery
- Best as
- Sharing, with beer or poncha
Now find a table
From the marina quay to the village grills up the hill, where to eat in Calheta and the west.
What to Eat in Calheta, FAQ
What food is Calheta known for?+
Madeiran food: espetada grilled on bay-laurel skewers, bolo do caco with garlic butter, black scabbardfish with banana, grilled limpets, and poncha made with rum distilled in the village.
Where should I eat fish in Calheta?+
Paul do Mar, where the boats land at the village and the seafront rooms cook what comes in. The marina in Calheta is the easier option and does the same fish well.
Is Calheta good for vegetarians?+
Reasonably. Bolo do caco, milho frito, tomato-and-onion soup, salads and grilled vegetables are on most menus, though the headline dishes are all meat or fish.
What should I try first?+
Black scabbardfish with banana, because you will not order it anywhere else, then espetada at a village grill, and a poncha at the mill.
Read the food guides
The complete food guide, where locals actually eat, the fish worth ordering, and poncha done properly.
Where to Eat in Calheta: Marina, Village Grills and the West
Where to eat in Calheta, Madeira. The marina quay, the village grills doing espetada, and the seafront rooms at Paul do Mar where the fish is landed next door.
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Where to Stay in Calheta: Seafront, Terraces or the West
The three places to base yourself in Calheta, Madeira, the seafront beside the beach, the quintas in the terraces above town, or the cliff villages out west.
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The Best Time to Visit Calheta, Madeira
When to visit Calheta, why there is no closed season on Madeira's south-west coast, when the sea is warmest, and which months give you the best odds on the levadas.
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The Best Day Trips from Calheta
Where to go from Calheta, Madeira, Porto Moniz, Fanal, Seixal, Cabo Girão, Câmara de Lobos, Funchal and Pico do Arieiro, with honest drive times.
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