Best restaurants you've been to

[VillaGuy]

I'm in Moscow right now, not in either the Turandot or Pushkin, but at somewhere far less glamorous.

[VillaGuy]

Slow cooked reigndeer, don't even want to eat it

[VillaGuy]

From where I'm eating I can see a F40 and a Bugatti right now...

[VillaGuy]

Someones gone off in the F40, he had a few photographers around him, struggled not to run one down.

[Miig]

Me and my girlfriend enjoy eating at restaurants, and even tho we're both uni students atm, we've managed to visit quite a few good places. There are loads of good restaurants here in Finland which we've been to, so if you ever come here I can recommend a few places.

We've also been to Tallin, Gdansk and Prague for vacation, and in each city we tried to eat as well as we could within our budget. In Tallin and Gdansk we ate in 5-10 places lunch and dinner. All the dinners were in the top restaurants in both cities, and the best ones were Ribe in Tallin and maybe Piwna 47 in Gdansk. Prague had loads more supply, and many of the top places were far too expensive for us. We had our best dinner in place called Monarch, which was a tapas sorta place with incredible wine selection. Best lunch was Italian restaurant Alriso or Michelin guide restaurant Maso a Kobliha.

[gavpowell]

I can neither afford nor desire to eat in top-class restaurants - I looked at Rule's in London and thought their prices were hilarious and their menu was a bit too gourmet for my tastes. I love Italian and Chinese food, but I like simple food - garlic bread, meatballs in tomato and chilli sauce, tiramisu to finish. Bliss.

I almost went for afternoon tea at the Ritz once when I was in London, but then I discovered they don't just charge a decent chunk, they insist on a dress code! I'm damned if I'm wearing a jacket and tie for anyone, especially if I'm paying to get in!

[VillaGuy]

There are lots of nice styles you can have at the non gourmet places. In Sofia I loved all the fast food eateries that served pretty much only stews, mushroom stews, sausage stews, spiced stews...very good value for money and some great flavours. Also in Greece you could have a traditional gyro for next to nothing and it would last you the day, one meal, one cheap price, tasty, not need to eat again. Perfect when you don't want to spend. I'm surprised that style of food hasn't caught on in the UK, much better than a BK, KFC or McDonalds, I never go into those places.....ever.

[gavpowell]

Alas I rarely holiday anywhere but London - Moscow, Berlin and Amsterdam are on the list for "one day" but I've gone off the idea of flying and spend too much on theatre and snooker to ever stray far from London or Sheffield. I can't bear the thought of giving up a trip to London or Crucible Fortnight!

I haven't eaten McDonalds/KFC for about 15 years, though a combination of Ed's Diner for Chocolate Malts and the Goodlife Diners for things like Southern style buttermilk fried chicken wings and hot sauce...I drool at the thought.

When I first went to Dublin on my own, the hotel had sample menus from local restaurants, one of which was a Nepalese place. Curries and the like don't interest me, but I was instantly drawn to "Lightly Spiced Tiger" - carnivore's dream! Unfortunately, I have no sense of direction and never found the place on my own. When I returned a couple of years later with my girlfriend to navigate, they'd removed it from the menu

There was an Italian restaurant on two stories near the Windmill Theatre in London, which seems not to appear on Google now but I think was Caesar's or something. I loved the place for the fact that I went in one night around 10pm and asked for a table. Having finished two courses over about 25 minutes, the manager asked if I'd like anything else "Well I would, but don't you close at 10.30?" "Doesn't matter, you want something else, have something else, is no problem" I ordered a sublime tiramisu, tipped about 25% of the bill and wandered into the night thanking him.

By contrast, the first time I ate in Chinatown, they took my order, brought four dishes...and started putting their coats on and turning the lights off as soon as the food hit the table. I raced through the crispy duck and left the rest to allow them to close, feeling like a total idiot.

[VillaGuy]

London is the best city on the planet, all others will pale by comparison except maybe Moscow with Red Square and all that. I travel for the traditions and culture, not the buildings so much. The weather is better in other places too. I'd definitely go to Moscow if you want to see somewhere different, 10 times the place New York and LA are. Berlin I've heard is much better than expectations, I know lads who've loved it there, very high tech city. Look how nice the underground is in Moscow for the first few minutes, it's immense, in fact it's above London in my book but is the only city that has more glamour https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8gSmyviu-i4

[VillaGuy]

By contrast, the first time I ate in Chinatown, they took my order, brought four dishes...and started putting their coats on and turning the lights off as soon as the food hit the table. I raced through the crispy duck and left the rest to allow them to close, feeling like a total idiot.

That's poor from them, I never eat chinese myself, I used to but it was always the Szechuan mixed meat special. I remember taking a lass to a chinese and getting the duck, every mouthful was the same without much variation. Put me off the style, I would only eat Indian or Caucasian from now on with maybe the odd venture to the Szechuan and mexican for a bit of variety.

[gavpowell]

Yeah I'm a big Russian nut, same as with Ireland - I spent about three days of my solo week in Dublin just wandering up and down O'Connell Street going "I'm in O'Connell Street! Like in Ulysses! This is amazing!" Doesn't the Moscow Underground haqve murals and the like, or is that China?

At A-level(around 1999, 2000), we studied the fall of the tsars and it furthered my interest in Russia, but as you said earlier in the thread, nothing prepares you for the sight of how they lived. They were showing the restoration of one room and the whole thing was plastered in gold leaf and jewels. The absolute audacity of these people, no wonder they got overthrown!

[VillaGuy]

Oh the palaces there, jesus, they really took the ****. There's so many, Anastasias, Peterhofs, Winter, Vladimir.....all of them out of this world whilst the rest lived as peasants. The jews also killed many hundreds of thousands there and they were inititially a part of the financial indoctrination of the country, they were the bolsheviks if I recall correctly. It's a fascinating country, I think the slavs or the Russians were originally Vikings and used the vast networks of water netways to control the largest country in existence.

[Stevo1s77]

Michael Jordan's in Grand Central Station New York, superb food within the most amazing of venues.

[sanman]

Don't know if we talking best meal or best overall dining experience but here in Durban in South Africa back in the 90s there was a small restaurant where I had a Bunny chow. Basically half a loaf of bread with curry filled into a dugout centre. Cheap. Maybe 4 quid for a mutton or chicken bunny with some side dishes like salads etc. I had the chicken bunny chow at this restaurant(pity I cant remember the name as it closed down due to the owners death not long after that) and simply put I haven't eaten anything to compare outside of my moms kitchen ever since.

[andy carson]

whatsits name up in cartmel