Restaurant Ca'n Gallet

Ca'n Gallet sits in the Es Guix urbanisation in the municipality of Escorca, high in the Serra de Tramuntana, just past the petrol station at the Coll de sa Batalla. Anyone coming up from Caimari has the hairpins behind them by the time they arrive; anyone carrying on reaches the monastery of Lluc shortly afterwards. It is not a spot you pass by chance. The house is a family business. Toni, whom everyone on the island calls Gallet — a malnom, a Mallorcan house name that originally comes from Campanet — runs it together with his wife Magina Maria and their son Miquel. Toni is rooted in Lluc and has spent his whole working life in the restaurant trade. Ca'n Gallet began inside the buildings of the monastery itself; only later did the family move down to the urbanisation where the restaurant stands today. Gallet means little rooster in Mallorcan, and the guests have taken that literally. Over the years they have brought the landlord close to a hundred roosters, which now stand around the room — a collection that says nothing about how the house sees itself and everything about how the regulars see it. What is on Ca'n Gallet's menu The cooking is Mallorcan country food, without detours. Arròs brut, the spiced rice pot with meat and vegetables in its own broth, is the dish people drive up here for. Alongside it come caragols, snails, served with potatoes and plenty of meat, and frit de me, the Mallorcan lamb fry. The second pillar is the rice pans: paella mixta, paella negra, paella de verdures and the paella cega, the blind one — no bones, no shells, nothing to pick out. Unusually, the kitchen will also cook a paella for a single guest. Most houses will not. Out of the oven come cabrito, young kid goat, and in the cold months llom amb col, pork loin cooked in cabbage leaves. There are lamb chops. And there is a dessert the kitchen came up with itself: the fried ensaïmada, set on custard and covered in chocolate. Vegetarians will find the frit de verdures and the vegetable paella; the Guía Repsol also notes vegan and gluten-free options. Mountain, berenar and racing bikes Ca'n Gallet is not an evening place but a daytime one, and a good share of the guests are not here for lunch at all. They come for breakfast or for the berenar, the Mallorcan meal between meals: pa amb oli, a berenar pagès, something solid after the first stage of the day. That explains who fills the dining room. The climb from Caimari over the Coll de sa Batalla is one of the best-known ramps on the island, and Ca'n Gallet sits exactly where it ends — at the top, just before the road tips over towards Lluc and then downhill again. Walkers setting out from Lluc or coming back belong to the crowd just as much as the cyclists. Solete, dining room and view The Guía Repsol lists Ca'n Gallet with a Solete. The Mallorcan chef Andreu Genestra named the house there as his favourite: his preferred place in the mountains, best of all when snow falls on the sierra, over a good arròs brut or a plate of lamb. The dining room is large and usually well filled, and there is a terrace outside and a sheltered one as well; from there you look across to the Puig Roig and the Puig Ciuró. Children are expressly welcome, groups and celebrations can be arranged, and you can book a table — which on busy days is the better idea.