Menorca is what Mallorca was thirty years ago: quieter, slower, less developed, and — crucially for eaters — more agricultural. The island is Spain’s least-densely-populated Balearic and has been a Biosphere Reserve since 1993, which has kept its food system local in a way that has largely disappeared elsewhere. The caldera landscape produces some of Spain’s best dairy — queso Mahón, a cow’s milk cheese with a distinctive square shape and nutty, butter-yellow flesh — and the waters around the island yield one of the finest lobsters in the Mediterranean.
The dish to eat in Menorca is caldereta de langosta — lobster stew — and the village of Fornells on the north coast is where to eat it. Es Cranc and Es Pla (where King Juan Carlos used to eat) serve versions that have not changed in fifty years. Mahón, the capital, has a growing restaurant scene around the old port: Mon by chef Felip Llufriu does creative Menorcan cooking, and the covered market on Plaça d’Espanya is where to buy the local gin (introduced by the British in the 18th century and still distilled on the island) and sobrassada menorquina. Breakfast is ensaïmada and a pomada (local gin with lemonade) — yes, for breakfast, in the summer.