Laona Restaurant
Home cooked Cyprus food at its best
A recent report found the average time taken by workers in the UK to eat their lunch is a mere 3.5 minutes. Partaking of a proper, sit-down, leisurely lunch now seems to be a bit antiquated.
Even in a place where so many have so much time on their hands as Paphos, only a miserly handful of establishments now open their doors at lunchtime. This means the lunch options for office workers and residents alike are meagre unless one opts for an overpriced toasted cheese and ham sandwich, pizza, or gyro.
A proper lunch, you have to remember, is not just dinner in daylight, it is a totally different beast altogether. Lunch is also a perfect time to meet up with friends – this is the time you can get the very best out of each other, when one’s wit and wisdom has not yet been worn down by the pressures of the day.
So, what makes a good lunch venue? A place where the food is good, but not pretentious, where the staff have an ease about them and just get on with the job without interrupting you every five minutes by refilling your water glass, or by asking constantly ‘if everything is alright’. A place where the tables aren’t too close together, so other patrons cannot eavesdrop when discussing the continuing lure of Johnny Depp, and where prices can easily be afforded on a weekly visit without breaking the budget.
In my book that all adds up to lunching at the Laona, where all the elements for a good lunch are in place. Owners Chris and Koulla present a genuine and infectious enthusiasm for their work; they greet you as though your custom is genuinely appreciated (a trick most of the evening establishments have still to discover).
For the past twenty years this almost hidden restaurant has been serving up some of the very best examples of traditional Cypriot cuisine. Here I use the word cuisine in its correct connotation because rarely have I encountered this range of proper, fresh-from-the-oven, delicious home-cooked food that clearly shows the man in the kitchen thoroughly enjoys his day job.
Every day the blackboard trumpets yet another series of new and lovingly prepared dishes using seasonal ingredients. The day I went, it was a delicious rabbit stifado; the creamiest, moistest meat-filled moussaka; richly-flavoured lamb liver in a wine sauce; blindingly good meatballs each plugged with a small ball of feta cheese then served with a tomato sauce and fluffy rice; oven-baked chicken with potatoes; red-wine-roasted meat with red peppers; and a lovely, lip-smacking dish of fresh, long green beans with juicy chunks of lamb.
What more can be said, other than get on down there? But wait, there are some minor drawbacks, so take note.
Make sure you are seated at your table either inside in the relative cool, or outside under the shade of an umbrella before 1pm, as chef will make fresh every morning only a certain number of portions. The day we went he had only made ten of the rabbit, and these had all been taken by 1:20.
The blindingly good meatballs I relished may not be on offer again for days but the day’s specialities will always provide something to please.
There is also a small, plastic-coated menu offering typical tourist trade like toasted sandwiches but don’t bother with it, concentrate only on the daily specials, then you will happily rediscover what Cypriot food is really all about.
VITAL STATISTICS
SPECIALITY Lunch
WHERE 6 Votis Street, Laona
CONTACT Tel: 26 937121
BOOKING advised
PRICE well under a tenner per person with drinks
