For some, visiting Chios might include outdoor activities. For others, it might entail visiting the most beautiful villages in Chios. But if you belong to the Greece Foodies community, we know it means just one thing: sampling the Chios traditional dishes!

For a tiny area of land, Chios offers a wide variety of local cuisine, including seafood, meat, homemade pasta, and of course, sweets! Here are the 6 Chios traditional dishes you must taste on this beautiful Greek island!

• Slow-cooked goat

It can take an expert palate, and vegetarians should avoid it. However, if you enjoy eating meat, you wouldn’t want to pass up the chance to try this. To the point that it melts on your tongue, your tender heart has been patiently simmered for hours in a crimson tomato sauce. It is typically served with potatoes or spaghetti.

• Avgokalamara: a favorite Chios traditional dish

You are bringing up a treat! This classic delicacy is essentially a tiny omelet that has been folded into a cylindrical shape and filled with ground pork. Most of it may be found in central Chios’ Volissos region. And if you believe that this typical dish is unremarkable, you need to reconsider. Ever richer or tastier, eggs. After trying, you’ll understand.

• Herisia Makaronia (Chios traditional pasta)

We are all pasta lovers! Why would you not? But eventually, eating anything with pasta becomes impossible since it all tastes and feels the same. This is because they lack one essential element: the pasta dishes you have been eating weren’t cooked by hand from scratch.

For the creation of the Chios traditional pasta, every little detail is crucial. The dough, the distinctive shape, the length of time it must dry in the sun… It tastes like nirvana because of this.

• Malathropitakia

Malathropitakia are fennel-filled mini fried pies in the form of balls. Typically, this Chios traditional dish is offered as an appetizer. They taste perfect because of the particular species of fennel that grows in Chios. We strongly advise treating yourself to this delicious fennel fried ball!

• Kopanisti

Cheese that is soft and creamy and has a peppery flavor. It’s always made from scratch using the finest milk and spreads smoothly on toasted bread or regionally distinctive rusk. It is typically consumed with a “meze” plate, but it is also a component of many other classic dishes, such as small pies.

• One of our favorite Chios traditional dishes: Maridopita 

This Chios traditional dish is essentially a fish pie that has been fried. Marida, in case you were wondering, is a little fish. This dish is not your typical fare, as you can tell. You can never truly forget the flavor since it is so distinct. Unquestionably one of the local meals you must taste when in Chios!