This restaurant in Gamla Stan serves up a superb range of traditional Swedish food.
In winter there is an ice gallery right opposite where you can pop in for a shot of vodka.
Österlånggatan 26, Gamla Stan
Tel: 08 21 19 57
www.magnusladulas.se/
icehotel.com/Winter/Home/
A lovely Indian/Pakistani restaurant located next to the Poble Nou metro station. They specialise in Tandoori, but for spicy food lovers the good news is that their dishes are prepared as they would be in Ireland or the UK, and not made mild for the locals!
Prices are very reasonable, if not downright cheap.
Nearest metro: Poble Nou.
One of the smallest "Appellation d'Origine Controllée" regions in France is that of the Bellet wine, just north of Nice. It produces very unusual whites and very mediteranean reds. To be enjoyed with a slice of pissaladière (local onion tart) or stuffed vegetables à la niçoise. Le Safari restaurant is not a bad address and won't cost the earth.
Le Safari
1 cours Saleya
0033 4 93801844
Small (40 seater) and totally delightful restaurant near the port. Menu Italian/Mediterranean, and seriously good.
Amazingly, considering the quality of the food and the surroundings, it is also cheap. Menu changes daily, according to the market. First courses currently €5, main dishes €10. In addition, dishes can be sampled in "bouls".
Very good wine list.
Paulo Bonnisoni, the young Italian patron, is opening an Italian delicatessen across the street.
All tables filled with local clientele lunch and dinner, so booking is essential. Closed Sunday and Monday.
Boni, 21 Rue Berla (between the Museum of Modern Art and the port).
04 89 98 91 20
Quite the most incredible cheese restaurant ever. Head downstairs to the cellar and dine on cheese in all its possible guises.
29, rue Benoît-Bunico, Nice, 6300 France.
It's a bit tucked away but worth hunting for.
This little bar/resto is located two-thirds up the road to the right of the Palais de Justice in Vieux Nice.
It is unmissable, being adorned in red and black and by a picture of its mascot gobi fish.
This is a bar that still retains an old Nicois feel and is frequented by local families whose kids and pets run in and out freely.
Everyone is very friendly and will chat to you in Nicoise or French about Olympique Nice or the tram system - whether you like it or not.
Seating is at a premium but if you do wait, glasses of rosé are freely forthcoming. Offers a range of Nicoise classics including a great version of the eponymous salad.
The ultimate antidote to the über-rich Azuriens and general Vieux Nice gentrifiction.
Stand facing the Palais de Justice in Vieux Nice. Take the road to the right side of the building. Bar Antoine is two thirds of the way up on the left.
Renting an apartment allows you to experiment with the local cuisine - risi e bisi, fegato alla veneziana, and sarde in soar (sardines), all taken with polenta. There's two or three good cookbooks in English (mostly written by Americans, of course) available in the best bookshops (mostly behind San Marco).
Take an ombra (a glass of wine) in a bar at mealtimes, and eat the delicious snacks on offer (whose special name I've forgotten) - all classic Italian antipasti. There are good cheap bars everywhere, each with their own ambience. Our favourite was facing onto the fish market.
A beautiful art nouveau bar with traditional, hearty, Czech food. Try the moravsky hrabec, a dish of diced pork and onions, which comes with both bread and potato dumplings and red and white sauerkraut. Of course all this wonderful Bohemian fair needs washing down, this bar is owned by the Pilsner Urquell brewery and sells beer by the litre .
It was busy on the Wednesday night we went, but we had no trouble finding a table in the cellar bar, which turns into a dance club later on. This bar attracts plenty of locals, which is always a good sign, the staff are also very friendly, not always a Prague strong point. Wonderful!
Junction of Kolkovne and Vezenska,opposite The Spanish Synogogue; nearest metro: Staromestska
This is an Italian trattoria on Rua Pamplona, off Paulista Avenue. Even though it is an Italian place, do not go there to eat pasta. The best dish in this restaurant is the salada do Sargento, a salad with several different leaves, hearts of palm, tomatoes etc. What's special about it isn't the ingredients per se (although they are spectacularly fresh and tasty) but rather the seasoning. It's a well kept secret and I've never managed to reproduce it at home.
One tip: do not order anything else as the salads are huge, even the small one - they come in small, medium and large - and are expensive considering local prices. On the other hand, I don't think anyone would wish they'd had pasta or meat instead. It really is that good. Unless you're a party of four plus, order the small one. Afterwards, a nice walk in the Jardins district and perhaps some shopping can be a nice way to end a lazy Sunday afternoon.
Rua Pamplona, maybe #70, Jardins.
Recommended elsewhere as a coffee house, it's also a source of decent food - excellent set menus, including vegetarian choices - with much more atmosphere than the sterile Sacher. And the waiters are not nearly so snooty as they used to be. There's an excellent bookshop (Morawa) across the road and another exquisite Konditorei (Heiner).
Wollzeile, not far from St Stephen's (the newer branch in the Fleischmarkt is more of a patisserie);
www.diglas.at/
Vienna’s grand coffee houses do not just serve coffee and cake, they also offer a range of meals and drinks. Try Café Bellaria (adjacent to Dr Karl Renner Ring, near Rathaus (the town hall), which may well have a pianist playing. Friendly staff.
For something completely different try Café Hawelka, the traditional haunt of artists and writers. You may be served by old Mr Hawelka himself, or one of the family.
Dorotheergasse (off the Graben one minute from Stephansplatz)
The restaurant in the Museum fuer Angewandte Kunst (Museum for Applied Arts). It is run by Helmut Oesterreicher who for many years cooked in Austria's best and most expensive restaurant, the Steirereck. Here he has changed his style completely. He cooks excellent traditional Austrian and Viennese fare which everybody can afford. It's at Stubenring 5 - get the No1 or 2 tram.
In Bologna, this is the quintessential eaterie. The menu is hand-scrawled, only in Italian, as if the Bolognese want to keep Fantoni a secret for themselves. Simple, perfect Italian food with no frills and excellent prices. Queue or book ahead as the al fresco terrace is jammed all summer long.
Go to Fantoni, it is worth a trip to Bologna in itself.
Via del Pratello, 11; tel: 051 236 358
Donde Augusto is a must if you love seafood. A true gem located inside the Mercado Central Fish Market. Being Chilean-American I can assure you this is the genuine real deal. Loved by tourists and locals alike (about a 50/50 split). Remember, lunch only.
Inside the Mercado Central Fish Market
This converted prison on the small island of Langholmen was home to Stockholm’s most notorious criminals until 1975. It now serves as an inexpensive hotel/hostel where the former cells have been turned into rooms, complete with original doors and small windows (minus the iron bars). Rooms are pretty basic, as you’d expect, but the building itself is impressive and has retained loads of authentic features. It’s absolutely vast, and has a restaurant, bar, cafe and museum. The traditional Swedish breakfast is worth paying extra for but we were disappointed not to see porridge on the menu.
Langholmsmuren 20, Gamla Kronohaktet, Langholmen; nearest station is Hornstull;
www.langholmen.com
A restaurant, café and bar built in 1998, it was the old office and residence of Sri Lanka's famous architect Geoffrey Bawa. His office is left as it was, in a small room off the main courtyard. This place is really a haven amongst the sights and sounds of main Colombo, quiet, exclusive, yet not pretentious.
The main entrance looks like the entrance to a volonial residence, over a small front garden area. Once through the door the heat seems to naturally subside and the last smells of Colombo drift away, into sweet smelling international fusion food stuffs.
The inner courtyard has a slate floor and a shallow pool, with a few carp drifting in their perfectly heated swimming conditions. The restaurant and bar lie around a beautiful open-air courtyard filled with silver pots of flowers and subdued lighting, you can eat outside or undercover.
The burning sun does not reach most parts, leaving a cool, comfortable dining area, where you can sip iced tea (Lipton's of course) and while away a good few perfect hours. The food is excellent standard and comes in good-sized portions, the staff are relaxed and perceptive enough to serve at a good pace and leave you to enjoy the calm.
2 Alfred House Road; tel: 941 582 162
Superb ice cream bar. Sculptural blocks of unusual but totally scrummy ice cream dished up by the scoop until late in the evening. Frequented by young and old alike. The word is that this is THE best place to get ice cream in Athens. Sitting outside and watching happy people munch ice cream is enjoyable as shared knowing looks of indulgent bliss cross all linguistic barriers.
Takis / Aisopou 21, Psirri
Jars of Clay is an amazing little cafe near to the Russian Market. They bake the best cakes ever, the kind of ones you always wanted your gran/mum to make, and it's air-con so you can really escape the craziness of Phnom Penh and chill out with your cake and coffee. It's perfect.
39B, Street 155
Really great food and the best milkshakes in New Zealand.
The wine bar upstairs is the best place in Wanaka for a few glasses of good wine, chat and relaxation.