German, Bavarian especially, portions are substantial, and may seem more than you really want. However, most German restaurants will be happy for a couple to order and share just one meal between them.

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The area just south of Central station (Hauptbahnhof) has many OK hotels, but few nice places to eat and drink. But go a bit west to the 'Westend', by St Paul's Church on the corner of St-Paul-Strasse and Schwanthaler-Strasse, and there's an excellent pub-restaurant with freshly cooked Bavarian food available late into the evening, along with draft beer and appropriate wines. Cheerfully kitsch in décor and friendly too.
It's called 'Gasthous Zur Festwiese', apparently, though the name isn't prominently displayed.

Schwanthalerstrasse 85, 80336 Munchen, Tel 089 5439050 -
by St Paul's Church on the corner of St-Paul-Strasse and Schwanthaler-Strasse

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I just moved to Munich - what a wonderful city! Fantastic mixture of historic tradition and anarchic alternatives, accessibly modern and suprisingly friendly. From the moment you arrive in the well-designed (of course!) airport -they check your passport and you pick your luggage up straight at the gate - right the way through to literaly hundreds of independent bars and restaurants it's one the nicest cities in the world!

Best bars are in the Glockenbachviertel. For good restaurants try Schwabing and Liehl. Great beer gardens everywhere.

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This gallery opened in 2002 and shows the visual arts and design of the 20th and 21st centuries. It was designed by Stephan Braunfel. It is spacious, full of natural light from a huge rotunda, and offers both a permanent collection and changing exhibitions. It is a pleasure to visit. The design work in particular is imaginatively displayed, on ramps, on huge open lifts that revolve in the air, or suspended at eye level from the high ceilings. Like the other nearby museums, it has a good cafe, and an attractive shop that sells both mementos of your visit and scholarly material. The entry fee was 9.50 euros but that covered all the shows offered in the gallery.

Museum District; tram 27 from Karlsplatz (Stachus) www.pinakothek-der-moderne.de

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The Stadtische Galerie in the Lenbachhaus is set in an Italianate villa and shows both changing exhibitions and a permanent collection of paintings and sculpture from the first half of the Twentieth century. There is an unrivalled collection of the work of Kandinsky, Gabriele Munther and Franz Marc. The building has an intimate, friendly atmosphere and, very important, a good cafeteria.

Luisenstrasse 33. U2 to Konigsplatz from Hauptbahnhof (central station). Five minute walk to Lenbachhaus.

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Excellent beer (first brewed at the monastery in 1455) and traditional Bavarian food in magnificent surroundings. You can even roam around the local countryside (including the nearby Amersee lake) to work off the extra calories.

www.andechs.de/index.asp?lng=en

www.andechs.de/englisch/service/anfahrt/index.html

A short trip on the S5 train south from Munich to Herrsching and then a walk (or bus/taxi) up to the monastery.

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Lovely park to go to when you're a bit sick of the often touristy Englischer Garten (however nice it is there too). Little lake in the middle, with a good restaurant and biergarten, where you can regularly catch a bit of live music, in the middle of that.

U-Bahn Michaelibad

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A cafe in a largely residential area which offers a wide range of drinks, a hilarious 'landlord' (inside joke, sorry), and you can even get a Guinness and have a game of bingo there on a Sunday evening. And it's not even run by anyone remotely English. Has to be experienced to be understood.

Friedenspromenade, Trudering

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Up four flights of stairs and with a most unlikely stag symbol outside (the building was once used for the processing of game animals) this proved to be a very pleasant, bright space with good vegan food. The night before we had been to Munich's most famous veggie restaurant, Prince Myshkin, where the food looked divine but unfortunately didn't taste quite so wonderful. This was better.

Ledererstrasse 3, 80331 Munich
089/23239195
www.zerwirk.de
near Marienplatz

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Meander through this peaceful public park with its huge green spaces and shady trees to a fabulous beer garden where you can choose food and beverages from different booths: sausages, fish and chips and beers or if in recovery mode, tea and huge sugary doughnuts.

U-Bahn lines 3 and 6, alighting at Universitat or Giselastrabe

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Before you can feel that you have been properly welcomed into Munich's heart, you have to sit and take in the atmosphere of a genuine Bierhalle. Nestled in among far more modern shops in Munich’s Kaufingerstrasse, leading away from the Marienplatz, is the Augustiner Bierkeller.

The Augustiner is a very large hall, longer than it is wide, on the ground floor of an ancient half-timbered building. (Whether genuinely old or simply rebuilt after the bombings of World War Two, as in many German cities, it is difficult to tell.) It is cosy and snug, relaxing, and, despite the number of customers, not crowded. The atmosphere is friendly and pleasant. Fresh cooking smells pervade the place along with the rich aroma of the beers, and this could easily become your favourite pub.

The enormous floor plan is divided up into numerous sections, each the responsibility of one or a small team of waiters and waitresses. The vaulted ceilings are high, disappearing, church-like into the gloom above. The floors are of red flagstones, and the walls are richly and decoratively panelled up to about shoulder height in wood the colour of ebony, the kind of colour that only comes as a patina.

You sit down on benches at solid, light oak wooden tables. The waiters wear white shirts with black trousers and black waistcoats, some have aprons, and purses bulge from back pockets. They are not all young. If you are lucky you will get a real character, with a sparkle in his eye, who has been here decades, and is almost part of the furniture. The waitresses wear variations on the regional costume, the Dirndlkleid, usually a long, voluminous red or green dress, with a white apron, and a low cut blouse on top, their purses in belts around their waist.

A group of men in their early twenties sits in animated conversation at one table, their vase shaped glasses of beer before them. Middle-aged and well-heeled citizens sit comfortably at other tables reading, with the air of people having no need to hurry. Couples while away lunchtime over two or three courses. An elderly gentleman sits alone in one corner, reading a newspaper and gently puffing on a pipe. The waiting staff buzz around efficiently, unhurriedly and politely, nothing is too much trouble, is the food ok, how about another beer?

This is a meeting place as much as anything, but also somewhere to eat and drink as much or as little as you like. The atmosphere is remarkably hushed for so many people. Business-like, practical and unhurried. The fare is about as traditional as you can get, from powerful soups through an innumerable variety of sausages with sauerkraut and mustard, to pork, veal and beef dishes all with some style of potatoes and vegetables. This is a menu with which to fortify yourself against the cold outside. Not lacking in calories, it is top quality, traditional, basic food.

The beer is also traditional. I order a Hefeweizen, an unfiltered wheat beer that retains its yeast sediment in the bottom of the bottle, so that it pours out deliberately cloudy and very aromatic. Nectar. Agreed by most to be among the best beers on the planet. My lunch arrives. Two Weisswurst, white sausage, another speciality of Munich, that come floating in a tureen of boiling water, so that you have to fish them out to put them on your plate. They are delicately flavoured and contain herbs. I am given a choice of mustards.

You ask for the bill. “Ich komme gleich”, the waitress says, “I’ll be right with you”. And disappears for ten minutes. She returns to write out what you’ve had on a small slip of notepad and, as always, you are surprised at how little it costs, just a couple of pounds, and you are sent on your way with another piece of Gemütlichkeit in your back pocket.

In Kaufingerstrasse, just off Marienplatz in central Munich

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The Hirschgarten is the largest outdoor beer garden in Bavaria. There are endless tables to enjoy a beer, as well as traditional Bavarian food. The cosy atmosphere under the leafy trees is complemented by the deer found in a large enclosure neighboring the beer garden. The park area is family friendly, with a playground and plenty of space to picnic.

S1-S6, S8 Laim
Trams 16 and 17 Kriemhildenstrasse

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Prinz Myshkin is Munich's most well-known vegetarian restaurant and is popular with non-vegetarians, too - has a very cool atmosphere, great food, sensible prices, and best of all, the smokers have their own room, so non-smokers can enjoy their food (not always something to be taken for granted in Munich). It can be pretty busy after about 7.30pm, so if you want to go in the evening, it's a good idea to make a reservation.

www.prinzmyshkin.com/index.html
It's on Hackerstr. just off Sendlinger Str. (5 minutes walk south from Marienplatz).

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The Fünf Höfe ("Five Courts") are high class shopping passages in the heart of Munich. The area, designed by the swiss architects Herzog&deMeuron, lies directly between the Marienplatz and the Odeonsplatz in the Theatinerstraße. You can find there designer shops (especially Italy is very present...), book stores, galleries, lifestyle shops and very hip restaurants like the Vapiano (italian cuisine) or the Kaimug (thai).
Aside from shopping and eating you can enjoy art in the HypoKunsthalle which presents every year up to four temporary exhibitions.

www.fuenfhoefe.de

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A little shop selling lovely quiches, pastries, little puddings... A great place to pop by to get a picnic to eat in some park or biergarten.

U1/2/7 Sendlinger Tor, Wilhelm Str.

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A 150-year-old market hall, which was demolished in 1914 but rebuilt and reopened in September 2005. Not only food, but also handmade clothing, soaps and other handcrafts. There are a lot of restaurants (Bavarian, Italian, Thai, Vietnamese), bars and cafes. A nice and felicitous mixture of modern glass and classic cast-iron architecture.

The new Jewish Centre (museum, synagogue and community centre) is just steps away.

The Schranne is open 24 hours a day, seven days a week. Everyday there are concerts (classical, jazz, rock, world) and other cultural events (like exhibitions, readings and performances).

I suggest you first take a walk around the most popular and picturesque market, the Viktualienmarkt, then explore the Schranne, and, as a cosy end, get a nice glass of beer in the "Pschorr". This is a bavarian beer cellar and restaurant you'll find on the northern end of the Schranne.

www.schrannenhalle.de; Der Pschorr, Viktualienmarkt 15, 80331 München

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