Malta’s native cuisine, with dishes like ftira flatbreads and long-braised rabbit, make it one of my favorites. However, most restaurants on the tiny Mediterranean island nation owe more to its conquerors over the years than what’s cooked in home kitchens. In other words, many visitors leave with a bad impression, thanks to restaurants serving an unappealing mishmash of poorly made pizza, pasta, and burgers, plus full English breakfasts that just don’t hit right.
What does this have to do with NoVA? A new restaurant opened early this year in Old Town Alexandria with the name Valletta Port, an homage to the Mediterranean blend that’s offered on menus in Malta’s capital. The menu initially gave me flashbacks to exactly the kind of restaurants that I’ve avoided on my visits to the country.
But restaurateur Lana Makarovskaya — who grew up in the Czech Republic — and her chef, Daniel Goriev, have done the near-impossible. They’ve put together an experience so thoroughly pleasant — from the relaxed allure of the patio to the well-prepared, inexpensive eats shuffling out of Goriev’s kitchen — that I have been compelled to stop and take a bite. Then another, and another.
Photo by Michael Butcher
International Influences
There is nothing groundbreaking about Valletta Port. Though Makarovskaya says that she hopes to add some Maltese dishes to the menu following many diner requests, when I ate there in May during the restaurant’s soft opening, the menu looked primarily to Goriev’s native Türkiye, as well as Italy and the United States. At dessert, there’s more than one variety of honey cake, a nod to the Central Asian heritage of employees from Turkmenistan, Kyrgyzstan, and Kazakhstan.
Goriev is at his best with beautiful takes on utterly simple recipes. For example, a grilled squash appetizer features spears of the vegetable, blackened to a light char then stacked with slices of tangy, blistered halloumi cheese. A pool of sweet-and-sour pomegranate molasses on the bottom of the plate gives each bite a level of unexpected frisson.
The Mediterranean dip spread features six scoops of colorful homemade appetizers, served with warm, chewy pita. The best of these are the spicier-than-usual muhammara, cumin-rich hummus, and tzatziki with an especially liberal helping of cubed cucumber.
Photo by Michael Butcher
I regret getting this dish at a different meal than the one at which I tried one of Goriev’s Turkish pides. These boat-shaped breads are filled with cheese and, in the case of the one I tried, earthy sucuk beef sausage. As much as I enjoyed my gooey pide and its crispy corners, it would have been even better dipped in muhammara.
At the top of the main dishes menu, Chicken de la Casa was a surprising addition; it’s a dish that I make often at home. I know it as Marry Me Chicken, a creamy Northern Italian–inspired concoction that combines thin chicken breasts with sundried tomatoes and cream to such mouthwatering effect that it rightfully gained its legendary name.
Goriev’s chicken is slightly different from my recipe, inspired by one published by Delish in 2016. His is sweetened with finely chopped and caramelized shallots and features a heavier hand with the white wine than the cream, meaning more acid and a less velvety mouthfeel. It’s still uncompromisingly delicious, though I would prefer it with pasta rather than the mashed potatoes with which it’s served.
Still craving noodles, I ordered the pappardelle. The wide, flat pasta is woven with beef braised in a garlicky beer sauce and topped with a shower of grated Parmesan. The pappardelle itself wasn’t as al dente as I would have liked, and I found the sauce slightly bland, but its meat-and-starch interplay kept me grazing. I had similarly agnostic feelings about the lemon-scallop risotto. Though it seemed to be totally devoid of lemon, I enjoyed the sweet, seared quartet of scallops and grainy, cheesy rice.
Photo by Michael Butcher
I preferred the lamb chops, which Makarovskaya says is her favorite dish on the menu. With crisp fat, the medium-rare lamb is piled with its bones resting on grilled asparagus. The meaty end reposes in a puddle of refreshing mint chimichurri, and the plate is drizzled with raspberry red-wine reduction. It sounds like it shouldn’t go together, but it does.
Sweet Additions
Desserts include those layered honey cakes, which are softer and have a more pleasant bite than other versions I’ve had in the area. I found the apricot one oversweet, but I still finished it and its accompanying berries.
The best bet for completing the meal, however, is the kunefe. Goriev’s take on the crisp-and-oozy sweet made from stretchy cheese covered in kataifi pastry is an especially fine specimen. It is brought to the table in a hot pan, with a wash of subtly sweet simple syrup and a layer of lightly salted pistachios on top. I added ice cream to my order and was glad to enjoy it melting atop the dessert.
I look forward to seeing how Valletta Port will grow in its first year. Makarovskaya plans to make the adjacent coffee bar into a Euro-style café, and I’m eager to try the menu once it’s further solidified. One thing that I hope doesn’t go away is the value. Most entrées are in the $20 range and boast hearty portions.
If I had seen Valletta Port in the real Maltese capital, I probably would have skipped over its blended menu in favor of pea-filled pastizzi and gbejnet ravioli. And I would have missed out.
Valletta Port
See This: Enter on one side, and you’ll be greeted by a bustling café. On the other, a quiet wine bar. At this time of year, it’s best to sit outside on the black-and-white woven chairs.
Eat This: Grilled squash with halloumi and pomegranate molasses, Chicken de la Casa, kunefe with ice cream
Appetizers: $7.85–$15
Entrées: $17–$33.99
Dessert: $8–$10
Open for lunch and dinner, Tuesdays through Sundays. 682 N. St. Asaph St., Alexandria
Feature image by Michael Butcher
This story originally ran in our July Issue. For more stories like this, subscribe to Northern Virginia Magazine.