Majorca's most typical main dish is lomo, or pork loin, the specialty in any restaurant offering Majorcan cuisine. Lomo con col is a method of preparation wherein the loin is enveloped in cabbage leaves and served with a sauce made with tomatoes, grapes, pine nuts, and bay leaf.
A local sausage, sabrosada, is made with pure pork and red peppers. Paprika gives it its characteristic bright red color. Sopas mallorquinas can mean almost anything, but basically it is mixed greens in a soup flavored with olive oil and thickened with bread. When garbanzos (chickpeas) and meat are added, it becomes a meal in itself.
The best-known vegetable dish is el tumbet, a kind of cake with a layer of potato and another of lightly sautéed eggplant. Everything is covered with a tomato sauce and peppers, then boiled for a while. Eggplant, often served stuffed with meat or fish, is one of the island's vegetable mainstays. Frito mallorquín might include anything but basically is a dish of fried onions and potatoes, mixed with red peppers, diced lamb liver, "lights" (lungs), and fennel. It's zesty, to say the least.
In the Balearic Islands, only Majorca produces wine, but this wine isn't exported. The red wine bottled around Felanitx and Binissalem adds Franja Roja and Viña Paumina to your wine list. Most of the wine, however, comes from Spain. Café carajillo -- coffee with cognac -- is a Spanish specialty particularly enjoyed by Majorcans.
A Special Treat -- Dating from 1700, Can Juan de S'aigo, Carrer Sans 10 (tel. 97-171-07-59), is the oldest ice-cream parlor on the island. Correspondingly elegant and Old World, it serves its homemade ice creams (try the almond), pastries, cakes, ensaimadas (light-textured and airy specialty cakes of Palma), fine coffee, and several kinds of hot chocolate, in a setting of marble-top tables, beautiful tiled floors, and an indoor garden with a fountain.
