Pere Ubu is the restaurant of Kalesma Mykonos, and it stands at the highest point of it. The address is Aleomandra, above Ornos Bay, Mykonos, on the spine of a hill in the north-west of the island. The table is open-air, beside the upper infinity pool, with the Aegean in front of it.
The position came with the plan of the place. The village is by K-Studio, with interiors by Studio Bonarchi, laid out in 2020 as a Mykonian village of whitewashed studios and villas set around a central plateia, the communal square of a Greek settlement. The social rooms, the wellness area and the boutique all went at the uppermost part of the site so that every guest could have the views, and the restaurant took the best of them. Morning light rises over the sea and evening settles behind Delos, the island across the water, so a day at Pere Ubu passes between two horizons.
The hotel it serves is small: Kalesma Mykonos, 25 suites and two villas, each with its own pool terrace and a view of the sea.
The kitchen
Costas Tsingas is executive chef. His training was in New York and Athens, and New York is where he kept and ran restaurants for much of his working life. In 2004 the kitchens of the Olympic Village in Athens were his to direct. He is also a doctor of sociology. Back in Greece, he builds the cooking out of what the island season gives him, and a share of what the kitchen uses comes from a garden he keeps himself beside the sea.
The kitchen names where things come from. Fresh cheeses and yoghurts arrive from Mykonian farms. There are anhydrous cucumbers and almyra greens, from the Greek word for salty, octopus caught daily, broad beans, and artichokes grown by an old lady on Tinos, the neighbouring island.
Service runs breakfast through dinner, daily, and the hours move with the season. The restaurant publishes its menus in full: breakfast, lunch, dinner, vegan and dessert, with a wine list and a cocktail list beside them. The cooking is seasonal and Cycladic, and the dishes read that way. Fresh octopus comes under a Mykonian sausage dressing. Fava beans reach the table with peas and artichokes, cooked down slowly in olive oil and lemon. Taramasalata is built with shad roe, caviar and cauliflower, and there is a sea urchin cream with butter, honeycomb, miso and lemon.
Tsingas describes the result as inheritance refined rather than reinvented. “For me, food begins with memory,” he says. “It recalls summers by the sea, simple ingredients and the instinct to gather. At Kalesma, we honour Cycladic recipes shaped by generations, refining them with a contemporary perspective while keeping their soul intact. Every dish reflects place, craft and season.”
The other tables at Kalesma
Pere Ubu is the formal room among several settings at Kalesma. Kuveda, named after the Greek word for conversation, reworks the island kafenion, the traditional village coffee house, with coffee in the morning, meze across the table and wine that runs into dusk. Aloni is the sunset lounge, named for the circular stone floor on which wheat was once threshed and ground; the structure was kept when the village was built, and the lounge is held for hotel guests, with a fire lit as the light goes. The pool bar runs all day, between swims. Dinner can also be laid in a suite or a villa, on a menu built around the season and what the guest asks for.
Pere Ubu puts on events through the summer, and those are open to visitors who are not staying at the hotel.
Who is this for
Anyone who would rather give a whole day to one place than move around the island. Lunch here is built to run long and slide into the evening, and the kitchen will cook vegetarian, vegan or gluten-free when it has notice beforehand. Visitors who are not staying at the hotel are welcome at the table when there is room, so in high season the reservation is the thing to get right. Sunset aperitivo is a sitting of its own, served between the long lunch and dinner.
