Table set. Night falls! Soft lights and a pattern on the ceiling reminiscent of stars. This is the atmosphere at the Galáxia Skyfood, the Savoy Palace's fine dining restaurant. In the open kitchen, the chef has long since started preparing. A la carte dishes and menus of six, seven and nine courses will be served.
Robertos Barros is in charge of the kitchen at the restaurant's new start-up. But it is the executive chef of Savoy Signature, Celestino Grave, who sums up the concept: ‘creating memories’. In other words, imagine that you were born in Madeira, ate local produce and home-cooked dishes and now find them transformed into haute cuisine.
This is the challenge, which also works for those who were not born in Madeira and do not know the dishes. These are the ones that create memories. For others, it is about reviving them.
Galáxia Skyfood believes it wants to be connected to the earth. Roberto Barros explains that the aim is to ‘create a menu that is more and more our own’. To this end, the chefs intend to go out and meet the producers more and more and they also have Savoy's vegetable garden at the Meia Légua site in Ribeira Brava.
The restaurant's menu is estimated to contain around 40 per cent local produce. Most of this is made up of vegetables or fruit, which the Executive Pastry Chef, Pedro Campas, transforms into desserts. But there is also local fish and some meat, alongside internationally renowned products such as wagyu steak, pata negra ham, truffle or scallops.
The result is, for example, a dish in which several varieties of cured fish are served, including Madeiran skipjack. Just a sample of this fusion of flavours and sensations in which the palate travels all over Portugal and the world.
The basis of the menu is the nine-course tasting menu, which is adapted every month according to the products available in each season. From here, the seven- and six-course menus are born.
For the seven and nine-course menus, a wine pairing is proposed, including Madeira wines. In all, sommelier André Ferraz has 280 references to work with, with Portuguese and many international wines.
But there are also cocktail options for aperitifs, or a cheese board, with brands from small producers, to round off the trip.
Originaly published in Essential Madeira Islands N.º 106 (February/March 2025)
