When I tell people I’m half-Maltese and talk about food, I’m usually met with the following response: “Does Malta really have its own cuisine?”
My conversation partner doesn’t mean to be rude. The question is usually encased in a positive curiosity that’s been lingering for years of knowing many Maltese-Australians and not knowing a vast number of Maltese restaurants in Australia.
Stephen Sultana, who immigrated to Australia from Malta six years ago, tells SBS he’s noticed similar misunderstandings about Maltese cuisine. “Some people in Australia often assume that Maltese food is just pastizzi and Italian pasta, but there’s so much more to it than that,” says Sultana, co-owner of – a venue in Sydney’s west that features many Maltese dishes on the menu.
“Maltese cuisine is good food that needs to be more recognised”.
Some people in Australia often assume that Maltese food is just pastizzi and Italian pasta, but there’s so much more to it than that.
Sultana explains that traditional Maltese food is not commonly the fare of fine dining haunts. Instead, it’s home cooking and the day-to-day food of family life.
“Food is very important to the people of Malta,” Sultana says. “After all the hard times that the Maltese people have been through over the years, [countless foreign occupations, poverty and war], the Maltese have always managed to cook good food for their loved ones at home – food that has been passed down from generation to generation and is still loved today.”
Why the identity of Maltese food is so diverse
To know what it means to eat Maltese food you need to know something about the small nation’s .
Over time, Malta has hosted the early Phoenicians, Eastern Romans, Arabs and Sicilians (initially run by the Normans). The islands were handed to the Order of St. John, as a vassal state of Sicily in 1530. The French under Napoleon took Malta from the Order in 1798, before being expelled by the English in 1800 with Portuguese and assistance. Finally, in 1974, the islands became a republic.
The diverse history of Malta is reason why its cuisine features so many bespoke recipes that adapt foreign ingredients and cooking techniques. The cuisine’s dishes tell fusion stories of its many occupiers and their influences on the Mediterranean islands’ peoples.
“Maltese cuisine is a mixture of a lot of cuisines – Sicilian, French, Spanish, North African and English created with a local, Maltese twist.”
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Bread and butter pudding (puddina)
Take Maltese kannoli for example, the close cousin of Sicilian cannoli. My mother used to make it using a crunchy shell with Masala wine, filled with sugared ricotta, chocolate pieces and lemon peel.
“Corned beef was also quite popular in Malta, because of the British influence,” Sultana adds. “The Maltese even make a pie out of it called torta tal-bulibif.”
Malta adapted the English bread and butter pudding, adding an Arabic twist. The result is puddina – stale bread soaked in water and mixed with dried fruit, almonds and cocoa. “It’s a bit different than the English version but it's the same concept.”
Imqaret, a traditional Maltese diamond date pastry, has ties to Tunisia, Algeria and Morocco. The North African-Arabic influence continues with the Maltese soup, kusksu, which is made using pearl couscous.
Edible land snails are a big hit in Malta. Called, bebbuxu, collecting and eating snails is as normal in Malta as it is in France, a former occupier.
“Some people also say that the flaky dough of the pastizzi was based on French pastry, which came into Malta during the French era. But it was modified with the addition of local Maltese cheese inside: ġbejna or ricotta.”
Home-cooking: rustic and celebratory
Beyond the external influences on Maltese food, it’s important to recognise its independent essence, born of farming land, the Mediterranean Sea and home gardens. The food is rustic – there are a lot of stews, soups, pastas and fruit-based sweets.
“There were also hard times where people didn’t have a lot of options for food, so they’d cook rabbit from their barns. Or, they would rely a lot on what the fisherman caught.” The most popular fish on the archipelago is lampuki (the Maltese word for mahi-mahi), which is the main ingredient in lampuki pie (torta tal-lampuki).
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Maltese kapunata
Religion also sways what the people in Malta eat. “There’s nearly a different sweet for every month, made for a different religious ceremony or tradition.”
Village biscuits (biskuttini tar-rahal), decorated with blue or pink icing, are served at christenings. There is the Maltese carnival cake prinjolata eaten in February before lent. Zeppoli (deep-fried eclairs filled with sweet ricotta) are made for St Joseph's Day in March.
Then there’s my favourite: biskuttini tal-lewz or almond macaroons, which are usually prepared over Christmas, Easter and other festive holidays.
My mother made this almond cookie whenever she could: it’s the reason why I feel nurtured every time I taste almonds. The macaroon reminds me of my mother’s warmth and the sweetness of life.
Lined with rice paper on its base, the almond biscuit embodies Maltese home cooking. It’s wrapped in memories of casual conversations in the kitchen, baking smells resonating from the oven and al fresco dining in our garden every time the sun shone.
Although almond macaroons are distinctly Maltese and most macaroon-shaped memories feature my mother, the mental impression of what they represent comes from me: a half-Maltese, half-Irish, first-generation born Australian.
So now, when I am asked ‘what is Maltese cuisine’, maybe I will answer the following based on my own diverse cultural heritage and experiences: Maltese food is home cooking, a vegetable garden, maternal love, a complicated history of foreign invaders, local adaptations of recipes, independence and a serve of Mediterranean flavours. Today, to me, it’s the fusion of my Australian culture with my Maltese heritage. It is yet another chapter in a multicultural history.
