Spilia is a seafood restaurant in the cove of Agia Anna, on the east coast of Mykonos, immediately next to Kalafatis beach. A rock platform over the water carries the tables. Live shellfish in a sea-water pool sit between them, held there until somebody orders.
Spilia is the Greek word for cave, and the room stands on a natural platform on the rocks in the cave of Agia Anna, hanging over the sea. Agia Anna Beach, Kalafatis, 84600 Mykonos is the address, in the Ano Mera district of the island.
There are two ways in: by boat to the dock, or on foot from Agia Anna beach, along a floating wooden path and over the hill. Reservations are taken for lunch and dinner.
About 30 years, refurbished since, is the record behind the room, and the makeover came in black and white.
The pool among the tables
The pool is semi-natural, filled with sea water, and it sits between the white tables in the dining area rather than out of sight behind a kitchen door. Oysters, mussels, urchins, crayfish and lobsters wait in it for an order, to be prepared in front of the guest who placed it. Octopus hangs outside the entrance, waiting for the grill. The restaurant says it buys only locally caught seafood from certified suppliers, and puts that in terms of traceability and environmental impact as much as flavour.
What the kitchen cooks
Two dishes carry the menu: lobster pasta, sea urchin pasta. The kitchen puts the first of them ahead of everything else, in a lightly cooked white wine sauce or the classic tomato. The sea urchin version comes on golden egg linguini and is harder to find elsewhere. Oysters, lobster and sea urchin are on the list as the catch allows, and the kitchen sets classic Greek recipes against modern technique. The meze run to fava spread with caramelised onions and capers, grilled octopus with fresh rosemary, a pomodorini tomato salad with Cretan rusk, caper leaves and Mykonian xinomizithra, the island’s soft sour cheese, and a seabass carpaccio over grapefruit zest with fresh basil and chilli flakes. The salads are built on summer tomatoes from Greek soil, and the fish and shellfish come in from the Aegean. The cooking is Mediterranean and Mykonian, and the plates are put together simply, on the view that a short list of good ingredients needs little done to it.
Through the afternoon
The venue runs all day, and lunch is the long sitting, taken late, with the octopus going on the grill as people arrive. The tables look out across the Aegean, and the later ones catch the sunset over Agia Anna. The sun goes down, the music comes up, and by dusk the room is lit by candles against the rock of the cave.
Two venues under one name
The restaurant and Spilia Beach are reserved separately. Spilia Beach is the lighter of the two, set on golden sand along its own stretch of water: sunbeds, music and a menu of fresh salads, sushi, tacos, beach bites and mini burgers, with cocktails, chilled wines and juices beside them. Whole seafood and the rock platform stay with the restaurant. Both are listed among the restaurants and bars of Anastasia Village Hotel at Kalafatis, which Spilia’s own site names as its sister property.
Who is this for
Spilia suits anyone whose idea of an afternoon on Mykonos is seafood and the Aegean breeze, out in the Ano Mera district rather than in town. It takes a sunset dinner as readily as a casual lunch by the beach, and it holds a table of six as well as a table of two. Kalafatis is next door if the day wants a second stop, and between the two Spilia addresses a party can spend the whole of one on the same water.
