Where locals actually eat in Gozo

The first rule of eating in Gozo: if the menu has photographs and a man outside inviting you in, keep walking. The island's best meals happen a street or two back from the water, in rooms that have been feeding the same families for generations.

Start with ftira, Gozo's answer to pizza and arguably better. The bakeries in Nadur, working wood ovens that never quite cool down, layer thin dough with potato, capers, anchovies and local sheep's cheese. Order at the counter, wait twenty minutes, eat it on the ridge looking back at Malta. There is no better lunch on either island.

For the long Sunday meal, head inland. Farm kitchens around Xaghra and Gharb serve rabbit fried in garlic and wine, slow braises and whatever the garden gave that week, with carafes of Gozitan red. In Victoria, Cafe Jubilee has been the all-day safety net since 1998: ftira, pasta, proper coffee and marble tables that have heard a century of gossip between them.

Finish at a village bar. Every square has one, the espresso costs about a euro, and around seven in the evening the older men switch to amaro and the talk switches to politics. Order a Kinnie, take a chair outside, and you have understood more about Gozo than any tour will teach you.