Your culinary experience in Maldives could be, depending on your resort, anything from haute cuisine ordered from a menu you’ve discussed with the chef in advance, to bangers and mash at the all-you-can-eat buffet in the communal dining room. What it’s unlikely to be in either case is particularly Maldivian, given the disconnection of resorts from local life. However, anyone staying in Male or on an inhabited island should take advantage of this opportunity to try real Maldivian food.

Maldives has some absolutely superb eating options at its better resorts. Budget resorts and restaurants on inhabited islands tend to be rather less exciting, but quality does exist.

Restaurants Every Maldivian resort has at least one restaurant, and better ones have as many as six or more.

Guesthouses Nearly all guesthouses have restaurants and serve meals to their guests. They generally welcome nonguests as well.

Cafes & Teashops These simple local eateries serve up cheap and delicious hedhikaa (‘short eats’ or snacks) and are the best place to try local dishes and interact with Maldivians.

Staples & Specialities

Essentially all that grows in Maldives are coconuts, yams, mangoes, papayas and pineapples; the only other locally occurring products are fish and seafood, which explains the historical simplicity of Maldivian cuisine. However, as trade with the Indian subcontinent, Africa, Arabia and the Far East have always brought other, more exciting influences, the result is far less bland than it could be.

The Indian influence is clear in local cuisine above all; Maldivian food is often hot and spicy. If you’re going to eat local food, prepare your palate for spicy fish curry, fish soup, fish patties and variations thereof. A favourite Maldivian breakfast is mas huni, a healthy mixture of tuna, onion, coconut and chilli, eaten cold with roshi (unleavened bread, like an Indian chapati) and tea.

‘Maldive fish’, is a big export of Maldives, a tuna product that is cured on the islands and often sold abroad, where it is widely used as a supporting ingredient in Sri Lankan cooking. It is also used as the principal ingredient of several Maldivian dishes such as mas huni.

For snacks and light meals, Maldivians like hedhikaa, a selection of finger foods. In homes the hedhikaa are placed on the table and everyone helps themselves. In teashops this is called ‘short eats’ – a choice of things like fihunu mas (fish pieces with chilli coating), gulha (fried dough balls filled with fish and spices), keemia (fried fish rolls in batter) and kuli boakiba (spicy fish cakes). Sweets include little bowls of bondi bai (rice pudding), tiny bananas and zileybee (coloured coils of sugared, fried batter). Generally, anything small and brown will be savoury and contain fish, and anything light or brightly coloured will be sweet.

A main meal will include rice or roshi or both, plus soups, curries, vegetables, pickles and spicy sauces. In a teashop, a substantial meal with rice and roshi is called ‘long eats’. The most typical dish is garudia, a soup made from dried and smoked fish, often eaten with rice, lime and chilli. The soup is poured over rice, mixed up by hand and eaten with the fingers. Another common meal is mas riha, a fish curry eaten with rice or roshi – the roshi is torn into strips, mixed on the plate with the curry and condiments, and eaten with the fingers. A cup of tea accompanies the meal, and is usually drunk black and sweet, sometimes with frothy powdered milk.

The Maldivian equivalent of the after-dinner mint is the areca or betel nut, chewed after a meal or snack. The little oval nuts are sliced into thin sections, some cloves and lime paste are added, the whole lot is wrapped in an areca leaf, and the wad is chewed whole. It’s definitely an acquired taste, and the kind of thing that few foreigners try more than once!

In budget resorts you won’t usually have any choice about where to eat, as most cheaper resorts have just one restaurant. Midrange places typically have two or more to afford some variety, and top-end resorts often boast three or more. Buffets (nearly always for breakfast, sometimes for lunch and dinner too) allow for lots of different cuisines and plenty of choice. À la carte dining is more popular for lunch and dinner, and is nearly always the case in finer establishments.

In Male, where there’s a much broader choice, the most obvious place for authentic Maldivian ‘short eats’ is in a teashop. In recent years traditional teashops (confusingly sometimes also called ‘hotels’) have modernised so that they look less forbidding and are now more pleasant places at which to eat, with air-con and an attempt at interior decoration. Larger towns elsewhere will also have teashops and these are a great way to sample real Maldivian food.

If you’re staying on a smaller inhabited island though, guesthouses will be where you eat for the most part, as so few islands have sufficient restaurants for you to eat comfortably elsewhere. Even in places where independent travel is now well established, such as Maafushi, eating options, while common, are rarely particularly good, with all-you-can-eat buffets being the norm.

Ithaa Undersea Restaurant

For a unique experience, patrons of the Ithaa Undersea Restaurant, part of the Conrad Hilton Rangali Island resort in the South Ari Atoll, can enjoy contemporary European cuisine five metres below sea level. The intimate restaurant, whose name means ‘mother of pearl’ in the native Maldivian language Dhivehi, offers a luxury six-course set dinner featuring such delicacies as, Malossol imperial caviar with sour cream potato blinis, and yellowtail kingfish with a saffron champagne risotto and beurre blanc foam, followed by vanilla chocolate vantage with mango sorbet. While definitely high-end dining, the view of beautiful coral gardens and the possibility of seeing a passing reef shark or manta ray make the Ithaa experience an unmissable treat.

Muraka

Situated in the idyllic South Ari Atoll is the Mirihi Island Resort, home to Muraka, a rustic, wooden restaurant built on the end of a jetty over the island’s lagoon. The restaurant serves an international menu with a focus on seafood; dishes include the pink peppercorn-crusted Maldivian tuna loin with fried bok choi and crispy potato wanton, as well as lobster bisque with papaya salad and papaya seed dressing. Muraka also offers special dining experiences such as the Whole Fish Delight, where the chef prepares and fillets a whole fish of a guest’s choosing at their table. The restaurant has stunning views over the ocean and Mirihi Island, and features an open-floor section with views of the sea below.

Sala Thai

Sala Thai, which is part of the small six-room Sala Boutique Hotel, serves healthy and fresh food in authentic Siamese surroundings, amid tasteful wooden furniture and beautiful Asian artwork. This quiet restaurant, popular with native Maldivians, provides a relaxing escape from the bustling streets of Malé and features an outdoor courtyard area with overhanging trees perfect for an al fresco meal. Sala Thai’s experienced chefs fly in fresh ingredients on a weekly basis, creating generously portioned dishes such as the shrimp marinated in a spicy fish sauce with Thai herbs, flavorsome Penang curry or the traditional Thai dessert, sticky jasmine rice with mango.

Shell Beans

The Shell Beans café company has been operating in Malé for over ten years and has two premises on the island; one on the northern edge overlooking Malé’s jetties and one on the other side of the island, on Ameenee Magu. The relaxed and friendly atmosphere of the Shell Beans cafés attracts a diverse crowd of young local Maldivians, expats and sightseers, and it also provides free Wi-Fi for patrons. The menu offers a range of main courses from around the world, including salads, such as tandoori chicken and teriyaki beef, and the café’s signature ‘croissantwiches,’ croissants with a sandwich filling. The café also serves what has been dubbed as the best coffee in Malé along with a range of delicious cakes.