Málaga.

Antigua Casa de Guardia on the Alameda pours on a Sunday morning. Start the day there. Rachel McCormack found people crowding in for plates of cold prawns and tiny tube glasses of Málaga and Moscatel wines directly from the barrel. The cold case stands in the middle of the room: conchas finas, prawns, anchovies and banderillas. People often mistake it for part of the same order. It has its own counter and its own bill. José de Guardia opened the bodega in 1840. The barman writes what you owe in chalk on the wooden counter. Monday to Saturday it pours from mid-morning into the evening. On a Sunday get there before lunch.

After the prawns, spend the afternoon at Espigones in Pedregalejo, because the espetos there are grilled on a fire built into a boat hull pulled up on the sand. It is a chiringuito and takes no bookings. Walk in. The salmonete goes over the same fire. The small kitchen inside does garlic prawns and steams clams open. Order the espetos with a caña. The promenade outside has been a building site since October 2025. The city now expects to finish late in 2026, so do not plan a walk along the front.

Mercado Central de Atarazanas trades mornings from Monday to Saturday and shuts all day Sunday. Leave the market for the Saturday. Paco Murillo's fried boquerones at stall 185 took the city's fritura contest in 2025.

Málaga runs a championship for the dish, and Uvedoble Taberna has won it. Willie Orellana took the fourth edition with the prawn version, and it still opens a card of more than fifty tapas on Alcazabilla, at the foot of the Roman theatre. A meal runs about thirty-five euros a head without drinks. The house fills and the terrace goes first, so book or come early.

El Refectorium beside the bullring has served it longest. Francisco Ramírez opened the bar in 1973 and the plates have circulated along the high tables since, and the Academia Gastronómica de Málaga says trying one is obligatory. Curri Ramírez now sits on the championship jury. Stay at the bar for it. The dining room behind takes the longer lunch, off a classic wine list. Three restaurants trade under this name, and this is the original one on Calle Cervantes.

La Cosmo makes the argument against the orthodox version. Dani Carnero builds his with hake, which is not what anybody else here does. Sit inside at the counter where the open kitchen is, and order the gilda beside it.

Yes, it is dug up, and Espigones is still the place to eat espetos. The fire is a boat hull pulled up on the sand, and the sardines and the salmonete go over it on skewers a few steps from where you sit. Malagueños will tell you the fish is better in the months with no R in them, which is May through August, though the espetos are worth ordering the rest of the year too. The city started work on the promenade in October 2025 and now expects to finish late in 2026. Miguelito el Cariñoso, open on that stretch since 1975, has shut for the duration and says it means to come back.

If you would rather sit down for the same fish, go further east to Hermanos Alba in El Palo. Juanma Alba checks the winds and the vessel trackers each morning, then drives to whichever lonja will have what he wants, working five markets from Caleta de Vélez to Barbate. The fried boquerones took the city's frying prize in 2024. After them, the quisquilla from Motril, which arrives raw in lime, boiled, seared and as tartare on one plate. An ordinary meal runs around fifty euros a head and the tasting menu is ninety. Hand the order to Alba instead of reading the card. Shut Sunday and Monday, so book for the rest of the week.

Go to Mercado Central de Atarazanas and eat standing up at stall 185. Paco Murillo buys off the stalls around him and fries what he buys, and his boquerones won the city's fritura contest in 2025. Have them with a concha fina off the ice and a glass of generoso. The building is a fourteenth-century Nasrid shipyard, and the white marble horseshoe arch in the front wall is its original door, rebuilt into Joaquín de Rucoba's iron market of 1879. Buy custard apples from the Costa Tropical and Ronda pata negra on the way out. Mornings only, and shut all day Sunday.

Walk a block to Antigua Casa de Guardia on the Alameda for one glass. The Pajarete comes out of the barrel and the barman chalks the bill onto the counter. There is no booking and no seat. You stand.

Then Picnik on Vendeja, for something to carry. Aura Damián and Cristian buy every wedge themselves: Siete Lobas from León, Olavidia from Quesos&Besos in Jaén, Torta del Casar out of Cáceres, and La Hortelana from Coín up the road. There is a counter at the back to taste at. Shut Sunday.

No. The two counters to go to are inland, and the first is Marisquería El Cateto up in Ciudad Jardín, north of the river. Nieves Ortiz fries boquerones in oil kept clean and clear, and the prawns come with their addresses attached: gambas blancas from Málaga, gambas rojas from Garrucha, quisquillas boiled from Motril or La Caleta with their blue roe on them. The lobster arrives with eggs, potatoes and peppers. Ask Ortiz what came in and let her set the order. Expect fifty euros a head without drinks, less if you stay off the shellfish. Shut Sunday.

The other is Marisquería Jacinto in Cruz del Humilladero, a long way from any beach. You order off a glass case at the door that carries the day's buying, and the coquinas are the plate to test the kitchen on. Jacinto Rojas kept livestock before he sold shellfish, which is why a marisquería here roasts Málaga suckling kid. Expect sixty euros a head without drinks. There is no terrace to wait on, so book.

If you want to be near the water anyway, Hermanos Alba in El Palo is the one. Fish and shellfish and nothing else, and seven hundred wines behind it.

Kaleja, if you want to eat this province. Dani Carnero cooks over a wood grill in an alley of the old Jewish quarter, and the tasting menu carries gazpachuelo, the Málaga soup of fish broth loosened with mayonnaise, and maimones, the bread-and-garlic soup of the province. A red pepper goes into the embers and stays there until the flavor concentrates. Ask for the counter when you book, because it faces the kitchen and seats seven. Expect about a hundred and thirty euros a head without drinks. Leave the hare with tomato alone. Shut Sunday and Monday.

Palodú, if you are happy to let the kitchen choose. Cristina Cánovas and Diego Aguilar cook side by side with no head chef between them, there is no carte, and the two menus move with what the Atarazanas market sends them that morning. The Palodú menu was a hundred and thirty-five euros a head in September 2026, and the pairing adds eighty-five. It served Wednesday to Saturday in July 2026, so do not plan a Tuesday around it.

José Carlos García has the longest record of the four. Two tasting menus and no carte on the quay at Muelle Uno, and the long one was 235,50 euros a head in June 2024. Blossom moved to the fourth floor of the Museo de Málaga in October 2025, and I haven't found a price or the opening days published for that address, so go through the house's own site first.

La Cosmo, beside the cathedral, is the one they all name. Willie Orellana, who cooks at Uvedoble up the hill, takes his lunch there and orders the gilda and the chicken wings. Dani García, who held three Michelin stars down the coast in Marbella, comes for the aperitivo. The gilda is tuna, confit tomato, anchovy and a spicy pepper crowded onto one skewer, and it takes several bites to finish. It holds a Bib Gourmand in the 2026 guide. Expect about fifty euros a head without drinks. Sit inside at the counter, because the terrace misses the open kitchen.

Dani Carnero, who holds the star at Kaleja, puts his own dinner at Uvedoble Taberna. Order the brioche de cochinillo, suckling pig under an alioli built from its own cooking juices, and the fideos tostados, toasted noodles with the small local squid. Expect thirty-five euros a head without drinks.

Carnero names Ta-Kumi in the same breath. Toshio Tsutsui and Álvaro Arbeloa opened it in 2017, and Guía Repsol has carried it at a Sol since 2021 for the cut of the nigiri. Manolo Villanueva of Utopía Ramen comes for one dish, the bluefin belly tartare. Say whether you want the counter or the terrace when you book.

Out of the barrel at Antigua Casa de Guardia, which has poured its own on the Alameda since 1840. The wine is the family's, bottled under DO Málaga, and the denomination itself was created in 1933. Drink the Pajarete first, then the Moscatel or the Pedro Ximénez. The Moscatel Guardia spends twenty-four months in American oak and the house vermouth spends forty-eight. Order the conchas finas from the cold case in the middle of the room, which has its own waiter and its own bill.

Renard on Duque de la Victoria shows what a bar does with it. Manolo Villanueva of Utopía Ramen ends his own day there: If you like a Bloody Mary, they have the Málaga version, with vino trajinero. The Shangri-La runs on Málaga red wine with sherry brandy and a Timur berry cordial. Order the fried Málaga almonds under truffle oil alongside. Drinks ran 7,50 to 10 euros on the December 2022 card.

For the deep list, La Taberna de Mike Palmer, out in the pines at the foot of the Montes de Málaga. It runs past four hundred references, seventy of them fortified and about fifty of those poured by the glass, with the province's own growers on it: Huerto de la Condesa and Friedrich Schatz out of Ronda, Samuel Párraga in Coín. Shut Sunday and Monday.