Our foodie friends recently paid their annual visit to us and, as last year, we enjoyed a week of eating out and sharing some of our favourite restaurants with them. The highlight of the week was undoubtedly lunch at Café Miró, one of the restaurants at the Belmond La Residencia in Deià. It was our friends’ first visit to this iconic 5-star hotel and they loved everything about it (except having to leave the place later that afternoon).

La Residencia sculpture garden

Deià village views

Café Miró’s menu is sectioned into hors d’oeuvres and salads, pasta and rice dishes, tapas, seafood and meats, vegetables and salads (to accompany), and desserts.

Our Café Miró lunch …

Having first checked the latter section and decided that space should definitely be saved for one of the tempting-sounding sweet dishes, the four of us shared a salad of warm goat’s cheese with Mallorcan rosemary-flower honey, and dried fruits (18 euros), to start lunch. It was delicious and a good recommendation for anyone who likes goat’s cheese.

Warm goat’s cheese salad

Our two friends chose the main course of sea bass medallion with fennel salad and La Residencia olive oil (28 euros); The Boss had a grilled sirloin steak with celery puree and seasonal vegetables (29 euros), and I chose grilled Sóller prawns (34 euros). If you’re a seafood fan and come to Mallorca, these delicious prawns are a must-try.

The Boss’s steak – declared succulent and perfectly cooked to his request

Famous Sóller prawns

After a short pause – during which we relaxed and enjoyed the surrounding views of mountains and the village – we had dessert and coffees. To drink, we had a glass of cava to start, a bottle of Muscat from Miquel Oliver (which has just opened their new contemporary winery just outside Petra), and a complimentary digestif of the hotel’s own moreish (and unusual) limoncello.

Meringue pastry with apricot sauce

Chocolate fondant with ice cream

Pineapple carpaccio with passion fruit sorbet – for me, the perfect summer lunch dessert

It was a superb lunch (from a kitchen headed by executive chef Guillermo Méndez), with warm unstuffy service (led by restaurant manager Onofre), in a fabulous setting. At one point our friends declared it was like being in a dream or on a romantic film set.

Belmond La Residencia is a luxurious hotel and the food and beverage prices reflect that. But, if your budget stretches to it, lunch at this renowned hotel perched above the picturesque village of Deià is likely to become one of your lasting memories of summer. It will certainly be for us and our friends …

Jan Edwards© 2016