Algerian cuisine has being influenced by many cultures. For hundreds of years, Berbers, Arabs, Turks, Romans, French and Spanish have contributed to create an eclectic gastronomy by mixing flavours and scents.

Their exotic sweets surround you with a flavour that takes you to exotic places from One Thousand and One Nights, with a great variety beautifully presented. Vivid colours sweets with precisely detailed ornaments, often made of almonds, pistachios, walnuts and hazelnuts, flavoured with orange blossom water and sweeten with honey or fruit pulp.

Among the most popular cakes, you should try makroud, samsa, hrisa, sfenj or halwa cookies, usually served with a cup of green tea and mint, one of the most consumed beverages in the country.

Algeria is, along with Tunisia, one of the largest producers of dates, specially deglet nour variety, soft, translucent light touch and smooth, like honey flavour that is grown mainly in the provinces of Algeria Biskra, at Tolga and M'Chouneche oasis, served to elaborate different sweets. Between both countries, they produce 90% exports of its kind. Algerians are also the largest consumers of honey in the world, which is not surprising, since almost all their sweets contain this liquid gold.

Qualb bel louz is a speciality from North Algeria and the name means “almond hearth”, highly consumed during Ramadan nights, along with mint tea or coffee. It’s made of semolina, almonds, orange fragrance and bathed in honey syrup.

Makroud is another typical dish from the Algerian gastronomy. This sweet is made also of a semolina base filled with date paste, cut on shaped diamonds or triangles to be fried and bathed in syrup. You'll find it in thousands different colours and varieties.

Among this delicious Eastern food, you should also try Samsa, an old and traditional Algerian sweet made of triangular layers of brick mass filled with almonds and sprinkled with sesame seeds. Or sweeten with ghribia, a round cake prepared with flour, sugar and cinnamon just flavouring or orange peel and lemon.

M'halbi is one of the most habitual desserts. It’s fresh and creamy, with a unique decoration of brown drawings made with cinnamon powder. El zlabia, which most popular version is Boufarik, was made after the carelessness of a bakery apprentice who couldn’t remember well the recipe.

Baklawa, originally from Turkey, is consumed in the Middle East. They are cupcakes made of nut paste and thin pastry, bathed in syrup or honey to finally incorporate any kind of nut. They can be a bit cloying, but certainly with an exotic and delicious flavour.

With all these recipes, we can assure you a sweet flavoured trip with you visit Algeria.

Picture ghribia by Waran18 | picture griouche by Arnaud25 | picture makrout by Latyyy

A place well worth discovering! Check out our flights here.

There’s so much more to Menorca than just idyllic beaches, fishing villages and charming paths by the sea. The island offers amazing food and a busy cultural programme throughout the year.

Eddy Lara Brito
DestinosActuales.com

The district of Eixample offers a variety of options. As seen from the above the latticework of streets seems to be infinite and here you will find hidden corners that reveal the most outgoing and multi-cultural side of the city.

The Small Food Corners of Barcelona could be counted in their thousands and their nationalities in the dozens. One of them is Kuks, a tiny corner located – for lack of a better term -some way off the Barcelona’s mainstream, beaten track. The place offers its patrons a more traditional taste of far off Argentina: pasties.

The success and secret of this place lies in the laid back way in which it was set up. Flor, originally from Buenos Aires but who has lived in Barcelona for several years, decided to make her pasties for the famous Bar Absenta. They were accompanied by a tango show. In very little time, the tango dancing was outshone by the pasties as they gained legendary status.

An improvised success meant that Flor became a clandestine star of gastronomy in just a few months. She made her pasties at home and even sub-let the basement of a hot-dog joint to make them. Eventually, she found the right place for her business – a place at 167 Calle Roger de Flor – and decorated it in a simple, yet cosy, style of her own.

Her pasties, pizzas and quiches complete the décor. Anyone who walks through the doors might think there is a little old lady out back making the pasties but in reality the creative genius behind these tasty delights is nobody else but the young and radiant Flor. With her accent and Buenos Aires smile, she’ll definitely make sure you succumb to her Argentinean temptations.

Feel like going now? Do it! Check out our prices here!

Cinque Terre (Five Lands) is the name of the 10 kilometers long seacoast that goes from Punto Mesco to Punta di Montenero, including five villages: Monterosso, Vernazza, Corniglia, Manarola and Riomaggiore, aligned in this order if you come from Genoa.

They are part of the Liguria region -with Genoa as the capital city- and not just five random villages. Along with Portovenere and the islands of Palmaria, Tino and Tinetto, the setting was declared World Heritage site and it’s considered one of the most beautiful places on Earth.

These five traditional villages have some odd architectural characteristics. For instance, most of the houses were built on the steep rocks of the coast and are somehow suspended between the sea and the land.

These are little fishing villages, very well preserved over the years, protected against the massive urban growth and not altering the delicate ecological balance.

From Genoa you can reach Cinque Terre easily by train, taking the regional train that goes from Genoa to Pisa and across all these villages. This is the best option to get to Spezia province, because traffic to vehicles in the narrow cobbled streets of the Cinque Terre villages is limited.

Therefore, the best option is to walk within the routes that connect all the five fishing villages, to discover stunning landscapes, beaches, hills and pines forests. The most famous is the Blue Route, a 12 kilometers walk. Or, if you’re looking for something easier, get the Via dell'Amore, between Riomaggiore and Manarola, with a nice view over the Liguria coast.

At Cinque Terre you’ll enjoy a colorful mosaic in one of the most beautiful areas in the Mediterranean Sea. Also the gastronomy, with regional specialties and great fresh fish from the area or wines with their own designation of origin, like the delicious Sciacchetrà.

Riomaggiore by rdesai | Manarola by Mathias Ripp | Corniglia by sailko | Vernazza by AnticheSere | Monterrosso by Mauricio Pellegrinetti

A place well worth discovering! Check out our flights here.