Santorinia is now in its third season, and its name describes, in the most direct and almost disarming way, what it ultimately is: a profoundly Santorinian taverna, created by people who love their island and know exactly how they want to express it at the table. For Loukas and Ria Katris, Santorinia was a lifelong dream: a restaurant exactly as they had imagined it, and above all as they had held it in their hearts. That meant a place with the immediacy, generosity and deliciousness they considered essential to any Greek taverna in Santorini. Yet precisely that sense of the obvious has acquired particular value, given the way the island has evolved. In the centre of Fira, amid Santorini’s tourist clamour, the unpretentious and open-hearted Santorinia shines with unusual clarity: a taverna that knows who it is, where it comes from and what it wants to offer.
This matters because, in Santorini and beyond, the idea of the taverna has often become blurred between the easy pull of the tourist trap and the charm of a more contemporary, more carefully staged version of Greekness. On the one hand, there are many places that use tradition as a decorative code. On the other, several of the island’s classic tavernas have allowed flavour, produce and proper execution to fall into second place, if not the very last, relying instead on the sheer volume of visitors and the power of the destination itself. Within this confusion, Santorinia genuinely stands out because it hides behind no tricks and no gestures of easy spectacle. Its cooking is built on an archetypal idea: to bring Santorini to the table in its most delicious and well-crafted form, through dishes that have the generosity that makes the taverna such an important chapter in Greek culture.
Central to this evolution is, of course, the culinary oversight of the much-awarded chef Panagiotis Giakalis, a long-standing collaborator of Loukas Katris. Through his perspective too, the ingredients are allowed to shine, the flavours have clarity, the recipes gain consistency, and the result remains authentically taverna-like, yet with a level of refinement rarely encountered in such an unpretentious setting.
In truth, I hardly know where to begin with the food. The tomato fritters, for instance, are crisp and aromatic, with Santorini’s dry-farmed tomatoes bringing both intensity and sweetness. They are made with technique and care, remaining light while feeling deeply rooted in the island. The smoked aubergine dip has depth and a pleasing texture, while both the saganaki, arriving from the pan with a golden crust, and the duo of grilled sausages, one of them Santorinian, are irresistibly indulgent.
The value of the kitchen becomes even clearer in the more broadly popular dishes. The meatballs with french fries have all the joy of home cooking, combined with the precision of a professional kitchen that knows how to keep juiciness, crispness, herbs, salt and frying in perfect balance. The fried eggs with runny yolks and french fries, an almost archetypal Greek taverna dish, are deeply satisfying. The Greek salad is exactly as it should be, the fava is outstanding, and the garlic pasta arrives perfectly cooked, aromatic and full of depth. Every time I visit, I find it impossible to resist their excellent lamb chops, while the kid goat with roast potatoes, cooked in a casserole, is deservedly one of the menu’s great hits. The fish, meanwhile, is one of Santorinia’s major strengths, as Katris has built a sourcing network with local fishing boats that bring the restaurant the very best of the sea.
I do not think I need to go on much further. It is worth adding, however, that wine lovers will find a genuinely extensive list of Santorini wines, alongside other gems from the Greek vineyard. And for those who feel like a little extravagance, the Champagne selection is truly remarkable. Santorinia is an outstanding taverna for many reasons. The most important, however, is that it manages to make the simple feel significant. It shows that a taverna can stand at the forefront of a place’s gastronomy when it cooks with absolute respect and devotion to tradition, allowing Santorini to speak its own language again.
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