Instead of Mykonos: Sifnos, the Greek Island Where You Come to Eat, Not to Dance

Mykonos is parties, luxury, and selfies. If you want the exact opposite — a Greek island where the rhythm is set by the slow cooking of mastelo in a stone oven, where the white churches outnumber the hotels, and where you actually sleep at night — Sifnos is your island.

Sifnos is celebrated throughout Greece for its food: it is the only Cycladic island with its own codified gastronomic tradition. Mastelo — lamb or kid cooked in a clay pot with wine and dill — is the defining dish, served on Sundays in almost every taverna on the island. Revithada — a chickpea soup baked overnight in the bakery's oven — is the Sunday lunch of Sifnos families. The sweets — amygdalota (almond biscuits) and melopita (honey cake) — are found in village bakeries.

Sifnos ceramics have been renowned for three thousand years: the local clay, red and malleable, is still worked by hand in the workshops of Vathy and Kamares. You can visit the studios, watch the potters at work, and buy unique pieces — pots, plates, pitchers — that are objects for use, not souvenirs.

Apolloonia, the island's capital, is a Cycladic village spread across three hills connected by flagstone lanes. It lacks the scenic drama of Santorini or Mykonos, but it has something better: normality. The square cafés are full of Greeks, children play among the churches, and in the evening you dine outside watching the lights of the neighbouring islands.

Kastro — the ancient capital — is a medieval borgo perched on a promontory on the island's eastern side: the outer houses form the defensive walls, and at sunset the light turns the stones gold and pink. It is one of the most beautiful borghi in the Cyclades, and very few tourists ever reach it.

Sifnos's beaches are varied: Vathy is a deep bay with sand and tamarisk trees; Platis Gialos is the longest beach on the island; Chrissopigi — dominated by the monastery of the same name on a headland — is the most evocative. None of them is ever as crowded as the beaches of Mykonos.

Sifnos is reachable by ferry from Athens (about five hours on the slow boat, two and a half on the hydrofoil) and lies on the routes to Milos, Serifos, and Paros. It has no airport: that is its natural defence against mass tourism.