Antasia Restaurant

Antasia is Paphos hospitality in its most generous form. Walk through the door and the instinct to overfeed you kicks in immediately. Bread arrives before you've sat down. The meze ordering process — which involves selecting a path through somewhere between fifteen and thirty dishes — is not a transaction but a conversation: the owner or head waiter will want to know your preferences, what you've eaten before, whether you've tried koupepia (stuffed vine leaves) prepared the slow way, with the lemon-egg sauce that takes twenty minutes to make properly.

The kitchen's strengths are traditional: afelia (pork braised in red wine and coriander seeds), stifado (rabbit or venison slow-cooked with onions and allspice), and the sheftalia — Cypriot sausages wrapped in caul fat and grilled over charcoal. Vegetables are not an afterthought; the yiachni — okra or beans slow-cooked in tomato with olive oil — are standards that would embarrass a more famous kitchen.

The wine list is dominated by Cypriot bottles and is priced fairly. The dining room can absorb large groups without losing its character; the long shared tables make strangers comfortable and friends celebratory. For a team dinner, Antasia achieves what few corporate restaurants manage: it makes everyone feel equally at home.