Prague Easter Meals and Easter Specials 2021

Czech Easter is a spring holiday that is still bound by a lot of traditions, although the religious aspect of it has subsided in time given the fact that Czechs don’t really do organized religion very much. (According to the latest census, only about 11% of the Czechs said they were actively religious.)

The most peculiar tradition - and one that is the hardest to explain to foreign guests of our Prague food tours without raised eyebrows or bursts of laughter - is the pomlázka, where men whip the women on their behinds with whips made of willow branches. This still goes on - if the 21st Century has arrived, the Czechs haven’t got the memo. This post is not about that, so if you want to here more about this weirdness - or “rich cultural heritage” depending on where you stand on it, click here to read our blog post about it.

In any case, there are also many traditional Czech Easter meals, usually revolving around lamb, eggs, and spring, so while we don’t do religion, we at least eat as if we did. The classics include lamb of any kind, egg salads, stuffing with nettles or wild garlic. Also, loads of baking is involved - sweet bread on the form of lamb, or the classic “mazanec”, which is a challah-like sweet bread with raisins, almonds and lots of butter.

But where can you get a meal like that without having to spend the whole weekend making it… and probably failing at it? Well, you’re in luck - we have set up a small overview of Easter menus and specials by Prague restaurants that we like. Since this is early 2021, these are all offered for take out and can be ordered online and delivered to your home. So here we go!

U Matěje

We like U Matěje, the beautiful pub in the even more beautiful Hanspaulka district run by the veteran chef (and a judge on Czech Masterchef) Jan Punčochář. His pub turns out dishes that solid and deeply rooted in Czech culinary tradition. This Easter, they offer two three-course menus, which include lamb, quail filled with veal and mushroom ragout, rabbit entree, and their infamous caramel egg. We like this menu because it is straightforward and priced well at CZK 490 each.

Výčep

The „Wallachian pub“ in the Vinohrady districts is a favorite for traditional Czech dishes that pack a punch and show touches of haute cuisine. This Easter, they’ve prepared a menu for two with a wide variety of small dishes and condiments - nettle butter, their own cheese with herbs, egg salad and so on… with the main being suckling pig with nettle stuffing, kohlrabi sauerkraut and potato gnocchi. Also included in the CZK 1450 menu: ttwo great pear jam frgále for dessert and a big bottle of craft beer.

Vallmo

The modern Czech cuisine outpost over at Výtoň is offering an „Easter feast“ with lamb roulade and nettle stuffing, egg salad, wild garlic soup and mazanec Easter bread. CZK 1390 for a menu for two without wine, optional wine pairing available at CZK 600.

Mlýnec

The elegant restaurant with a view of the Charles Bridge (if you get the right table) has taken a different approach to Easter and offers an Easter brunch. The 8-course meal for two that includes spinach-pea soup, rabbit paté or quinoa salad… and a bottle of Prosecco… costs CZK 1390. God stuff.

La Rotonde / Alcron

It’s really nice to see La Rotonde back on the scene under the leadership of the young, promising chef Lukáš Hlaváček (whom we interviewed here). This Easter, La Rotonde offers a 4-course menu with all the usual suspects: lamb, nettle roulade and rabbit paté with fennel salad. The dessert (rhubarb crumble with lemon and thyme) also sounds delicious. It can all be yours for CZK 790. They also sell mazanec bread for CZK 200 and two types of baked lamb - gingerbread and biscotti. Excellent stuff.

Next Door & Imperial Café

The seasonal game of chef Pohlreich, the ubiquitous TV chef personality (he ran the Czech version of the Kitchen Nightmares program), has always been strong, and it’s no different this Easter. What’s great and different about his offerings is that they are always a la carte, as opposed to a fixed menu, so you can mix and match everything to your liking. This Easter, the standout is the whole roasted duck, and the veal leg with morel sauce and asparagus. Also notable is the gluten-free beránek sweet bread. Kudos for that.

Červený jelen

The humungous pub in the New Town, occupying three floors of a former bank with a 700+ seat capacity (gosh we hope their landlord has waived the rent during the lockdowns), is offering some traditional Easter dishes that sound very tasty. No fixed menu but a list of a la carte dishes that hit the right spots: lamb roulade, rabbit terrine, Kaiserschmarrn and so on. Good stuff.

Krystal Bistro

Karlín’s veteran restaurant that used to feed foodies way before it was the post-industrial up-and-coming hipster haven that it is today has another great offering for Easter - their Easter bag. It’s basically a 4-course meal that includes soup, rabbit or salmon rillettes, rabbit confit or lamb on wine, and chocolate mousse or blueberry dumpling. So except the soup, you can always choose between two meals for each course, which makes it ideal for families. Price? CZK 850 for two. A steal.

Café Savoy

The only Grand Café in Prague that serves really high quality food with modern touches and specialty coffee is offering lamb specials (lamb knuckle and lamb burger), chocolate eggs, some of which include vouchers for a meal at Savoy, and mazanec and beránek breads. You can order a la carte only: no fixed menus are offered, which we like.

Pastacaffé

The Italian restaurant of the ubiquitous Ambiente group surprisingly offers a pretty great Easter meal. We’re talking wild garlic soup, lamb knuckle with spinach and potato mash, and Easter stuffing for two. Includes a mazanec Easter bread. The price for two is CZK 1150 without and CZK 1650 with Nebbiolo wine.

Mezi srnky

Mezi srnky, the Vinohrady bistro that is at once incredibly popular AND flies below the radar of most, offers a great brunch box for two this Easter: chestnut stuffing muffins, croissants, almond Danishes with raisins, eggs with potato and onion mash… it can all be yours for CZK 790. Available Friday through Sunday.

Nejen bistro

Karlín’s Nejen bistro has a well-put together yet incredibly well-priced menu with one starter, two mains (lamb shoulder and fried breaded rabbit leg, and a fantastic dessert. At CZK 590, this is a steal.

Prague Food Scene: 2019 in review

We dread the „Year in review“ articles. „Oh, nothing has opened this year. What are we going to write about? Prague is not NYC, you know? It’s not like something new opens every week. Jeez, this is gonna be boooooring!!!!“ Oh well.

But then you start counting. What the heck? 48 new places worth a mention? And we’re pretty sure we forgot a few. Which boils down to nearly… wait for it… one opening every week. Yup. Hold our beer, NYC! Prague coming through! Well, obviously, we’re not there yet, but in hindsight - and despite the perceived lack of „major“ openings, 2019 was a great year for the Prague food scene. Food and coffee in Prague flourished last year, and we could honestly write a separate version of our Prague Foodie Map just covering the openings of 2019, and it would still be a decent guide. Let’s keep that going in 2020. 

What follows is a list and a small description of the new openings on the Prague food scene in 2019, followed by a handy map and a “cheat sheet” - a downloadable and printable checklist of the 2019 openings to brag to your friends how many you’ve covered so far.

Before we get to the list, a modest disclaimer: The place you love has not made the list? Sorry! Please don’t hate. It’s just perhaps we have not noticed. We will be happy if you let us know in a private message. Thanks.

What shut down in 2019

Let’s get over this quick because the list is surprisingly short. Café Lounge was, in a way, an institution that did everything right: Chef Cerny, one of Prague’s most talented chefs, cooked what we thought were some of the best lunches in town (although we’ve heard the increased pricing did not sit well with the regulars), the coffee was as you’d expect from one of the pioneering specialty coffee shops in town, and the natural wines from Veltlin hit the mark, too. We obviously don’t know anything specific but we’ve heard the shutdown is due to possible tensions within the complicated ownership structure. Allegedly.

Milada, the neo-bistro in the Letná district, shut down so abruptly the chefs allegedly learnt on the day. What a shame. We had one of the best lunches of the year in Milada just a week or two before it closed. Probably goes to show a new reality on the Prague food scene: unless you compete on price, you cannot and will not survive without at least a bit of a marketing effort or proactive communication. 

Finally, Sólista, the tiny espresso bar in the Letná district, shut down just before Christmas. What a shame. It’s the second coffee shop to shut down on Milady Horákové street in 2019 (the Prague location of Karlovy Vary-based Café Republika being the first one), but why did it have to be this one? Anyway, the owner wants to travel more, but we know he’ll be back eventually. You can’t escape the Curse of Cheap Pilsner forever, you know. 

KRO Kitchen. our opening of the year 2019

NEW PRAGUE FOOD OPENINGS OF 2019

The list is honestly too long, so let’s start with what we think were the two major ones.

Two major openings of 2019

KRO Kitchen is our opening of the year. The team behind Chef Vojta Václavík (click here to listen to our podcast interview with Vojta) know what they are doing: fast food based on local Czech ingredients, but made in a way that feels „cheffy“, and, on occasions, dare we say healthy? (Butter is healthy, right?) No, really, this is the kind of place we’d eat at all the time - great food with some fine-dining techniques but without the fuss and wrapped in a quick, easy to digest form (pun intended). We hope to see more locations of KRO, because this is the way forward.

U Matěje is another major opening of 2019. Chef Punčochář, one of Czech Masterchef judges and a staple on the Prague fine-dining scene, has opened a „glorified pub in an area where rich people live“, as we pitch it to the guests of our Prague food tours. This is what a modern pub should be: great beer, great Czech cuisine that shows quite a bit of technique and packs a lot of flavor. U Matěje has quickly become extremely popular, and for a reason: this is what Czechs like. We are yet to dine at „Chef Punčochář’s Table“, as they call the chef’s fine dining private set menu, but will report on it soon. One minor complaint: why not more Czech wines on the menu?

U Mateje

We are happy to report that both of the two major openings of 2019 were creating modern Czech food. We hope to see more of the same in 2020. 

Asian

It was bound to happen sooner or later, and it happened in 2019: Prague has finally witnessed a full on invasion of ramen, so now you don’t have to take a drive to Berlin’s Cocolo Ramen anymore. First it was BON Fresh Ramen and Udon and Miska Ramen in the Vinohrady district, followed by Isai Ramen Bistro (who have just received a great write up in The Eater) in, of all places, the Petriny area, followed by Taiko in Zizkov. Final contender? Takumi over at Senovážné náměstí. While we would have killed for any of these a few years ago, our heart and money so far goes to Isai. Chef Yoshi trained at Ippudo, a Japanese ramen chain, whose location in Lower East Side in NY draws incredible crowds of people willing to wait for two hours, and we’re in that line, so that’s that. If you’ve ever been to Japan, this will definitely feel the closest.

Tamarind Tree, a popular pop-up and market stall that focuses on dim sum dumplings and affiliated Asian grub, has finally opened its permanent location, taking the space of what used to be known as Richard’s Kitchen, near the Botanical garden. Open for lunches and then once a month for dinner (or something like that), the team seems to have come to its own in a permanent kitchen. Good stuff. We also like J’s Kitchen, a simple Korean takeaway space that serves bowls of rice with different proteins. Probably not something we’d travel across town for for a romantic dinner (the restaurant has precisely zero chairs), but if we lived in the Vinohrady district, we could easily see ourselves getting their comforting takeaway dishes quite regularly.

The people behind SaSaZu, the upscale Asian fusion restaurant in the Holesovice market, have opened Hanzu, a smaller bistro, in the place that used to be occupied by Bistro Kaprova. It’s too early to see how this will go - while we love most of the SaSaZu dishes on Hanzu’s menu, the rents in Karlova have proved too much for a few restaurants in the past few years, while the exposure to mass tourism hasn’t proved to be much of help for upscale establishments on Kaprova. (The KFC a block away is doing just fine, thanks for asking.)

Two new places that focus on the other cuisine that you should try in Prague - Vietnamese - opened in 2019. First, Pho Bar opened early in the year in the Florenc area. It would be just another pho place (and we have quite a few in Prague) if it had not been opened by Mai, one half of the Viet Food Friends duo of Vietnamese Czech food bloggers who originally introduced Vietnamese cuisine to the general Czech public. And having tasted through the menu, it quickly grabbed „our favorite Vietnamese spot“ spot. Their pickled garlic should be served with everything. EVERYTHING! And Banh Mí Makers have opened a new location in the Letná district. It’s bigger, as a more ambitious menu and a kid’s corner. Yay! Last place: Závitkárna in Letná seems to be a cool spot for Asian-inspired rolls, feeling somewhat similar to the Onigirazu place nearby: cute, hip, fun. 

Meat

2019 was also a great year for people who love meat. (But then again, every year is a great year for people who love meat, if those people happen to live in the Czech Republic.) Anyway, 2016 called, and it wants its pastrami back: it seems that after a few years of hiatus, pastrami is back: The Bros, the symbiotic brother/sister of The Bowls next door, and the Meat Vandals operating a stationary food truck and a brick and mortar place in the New Town, both offer their version of a pastrami sandwich. And both are nice and honest. (Although Jan is an old-fashioned guy and would love to see a version on rye, with mustard and a pickle. The modern versions seem overdressed and served in bread that is too sweet.)

2019 also saw the opening of the second location of the beloved Dish Fine Burger Bistro. The new location is over at Belgická, has been beautifully remodeled and finally answers the question that probably nobody asked: “You want meat with those burgers?” Yes, there’s more meat on the menu besides the sort served in a bun, some with Asian flavors. The two locations should not be serving the same burgers going forward, and the new location will be serving Dish’s famous Fitness fries. Just writing about them adds 10 calories, so I will stop right there.

2019 brought two additions to Prague’s BBQ circuit: Bob’s BBQ opened right next to its parent, Krystal Bistro, in the summer. The owner has rained in Central Texas, and it shows. Our tray had some serious BBQ, some of which reminded Jan of his year spent in Houston. (Woot woot!) The end of November also saw the long-awaited (by us) opening of Big Smokers, the BBQ joint in the Holesovice district by the people behind our beloved Mr HotDog. The visuals are spot on, from the benches in the back, to the big barrel of water in the front. (Where’s the tub with ice and soda though?) Add craft beer and natural wines and you have a winner on your hands.

Markets

Two new markets opened in 2019: the Heřmaňák market in the Holešovice district grew on us super fast - it is fairly small but really has everything you need, and before it inevitably becomes very popular and crowded, it will feel the most neighborly of all Prague’s farmers markets. This is a place to watch affluent Prague liberals who buy organic stuff for their small kids. (So basically our gang.) 

Manifesto market has opened a second location in the Smíchov district. Thanks to the kiddie pool and several bars, this location feels more lounge-y and beachy than the original location, and thus destined to be a great summer hangout. The rest is similar to the original location: fast and comfort food, beers and drinks. We would wish for less waste (think Singapore’s hawker markets) from an organization that claims to be helping the city, but truth be told, we know nothing about running markets in the Czech Republic.  

Restaurants and Bistros

The beginning of the year saw the battle of two Italian-focused restaurants that offered different takes on pizza: Manu, by the TV Chef Emanuele Ridi, a huge, two-story place with a view of the Letná district has placed its bet on Pizza Napoletana, while Amano, another restaurant from the well-established and well-liked La Collezione group, went with Pizza Gourmet, and sharing plates. We revisited Amano recently and had one of the best lunches in town in recent memory. Manu also seems to be doing fairly well, although it might prove difficult to fit in all the concepts and all the seats of the ambitious project.

But Boldest Ambition Award must clearly go to Červený jelen, a modern pub that has opened with great fanfare in the Hybernská street. 750 seats over three floors in a former bank, the place is so big they allegedly had (and still have) trouble hiring staff for such a huge place. The reviews have been mixed but we applaud the owners just for daring and for coming with a concept that is not just another copy of a Lokál pub. Oh, and btw, a new location of Lokál, a popular collection of Czech pubs, has opened in the Vinohrady district. (Vinohradský parlament went through remodeling and a change of concept, but formally it’s not a new opening.)

A few new exciting bistros opened in 2019: The Bowls in the Smíchov district serve fun poke, Buddha and who knows what other bowls, but they’ve all been tasty, and are a great complement to the pastrami sandwiches of The Bros next door. Golden egg in the Žižkov district and their egg sandwiches are Prague’s answer to our beloved Eggslut, while Gemüse Kebab Corner in the Podolí are Prague’s answer to Berlin’s Mustafa. Both are super fun. Sisters, the bistro that focuses on chlebíčky, the Czech open-faced sandwiches, has changed ownership (now owned by the Together group) and have opened a new location in the Spálená street.

The Karlín districts saw two new openings: Spojka Karlín, which occupies the ground floor of a new development in Pernerova street, and Yolo, a lunch spot in the Butterfly office building at the end of Březinova and Pernerova. Confession: we haven’t been to either yet, but we’ve heard great things about Yolo. Vinohrady have been graced with two Spanish-style tapas places by big names in the food industry: Gilda was opened by the Kogo group, and El Camino by the people behind the Medité restaurant in Mariánské lázně. They are about a three minute walk from each other, and while we liked our food at Gilda, the chef of El Camino, which was opened too recently for us to visit, used to cook at London’s The Ledbury, so we expect great things, too.

Dejvická 34 opened at, well, Dejvická 34 in the Bubeneč district, with the chef Tomáš Černý (formerly of La Finestra di Cucina and Bistro Kaprova) at the helm of the kitchen. We hope this goes well - the Sunday lunch we had was excellent, but we feel Dejvická is a cursed street for restaurants trying to be upscale. Hope this breaks the curse. Vallmo is another recent opening, taking the space formerly occupied by the popular Oliva restaurant. Vallmo focuses on local ingredients with some vegan options thrown in, sitting just under the fine dining spectrum. A great place we would take the family for a nice Sunday lunch of Czech food that pulls off being modern without intimidating your parents.

Finally, Bockem was a notable opening of 2019 simply because it was different: it opened with breakfast service only, but a three-course set menu breakfast that included the infamous soufflé Eggs Benedict the team of Bockem used to serve at their sister, the beloved Kavárna co hledá jméno. We loved the breakfast - it was refined and served in one of the most beautiful restaurant rooms in town. Now they offed dinner service, too. 

Coffee, wine and sweets

2019 was a good year for local coffee addicts. We will soon write about a post about Prague coffee, but the trend set in previous years has been pretty visible in 2019 too: specialty coffee is now mainstream. When a new coffee shop or bistro opens, regardless of the location, the odds are it will serve specialty coffee rather than the opposite. And that’s great news in itself. Another fantastic addition to the Prague coffee scene in 2019 is actually a project from the Moravian town of Olomouc started in 2018: the Otoč kelímek project that lets you buy a recyclable takeaway cup in any of the participating coffee shops and give it back for full refund at a different coffee shop. Whether you think a certain Greta is a prodigy or a teenage brat, we hope we can all agree that waste is bad, and this is a great solution to reduce it that just works given how many coffee shops have signed up for it. If you are visiting Prague and taking coffee to go, pay up for the cup and give it back wherever for a refund. Thank you.    

Anyway, the year started with the opening of Café Truhlárna in the Franciscan Garden. A tiny place with a great design and even better outdoor seating. Godsend in the summer. The people around Barry Higgel’s Coffeehouse were busy in 2019, opening two coffee shops with some baking: The Miners in the Vinohrady district is large (some’d say grandiose) and airy and modern, like a Blue Bottle somewhere, and La Forme is the Bubenec district (just steps from Doubleshot’s Kavárna Místo) is small and cosy. (If you’ve ever wondered where I edit the audio files of our podcast, well, now you know.)  Coffee Source, a large roasting operation and distributor of all things coffee, has moved… a block away and opened a new beautiful coffee shop at Francouzská. Beautiful stuff and worth a visit.

Café Tout va Bien is, in many ways, our fave coffee opening of the year, although we live on the other side of town, so wee don’t visit as often as we’d like. But the beautiful design, jazzy soundtrack, cool magazines to read and the two lovely Korean girls behind the counter all come together to create a nearly zen-lie atmosphere that is hard to beat in terms of cosiness. Speaking of cosy, Café Tvaroh, inheriting the beautiful interiors and garden from Milada and Love Kidó, Pilot Café and a new location of Kiosek Kafebar (the original being a coffee stand by the bus stop to the airport at Dejvická) are three new coffee shops that opened in the Letná district in 2019, and all are very comfortable coffee shops to spend a few hours in.

When Osada opened in the Holešovice district, it was a bit of an enigma: is it part of the Ambiente group, or not? Well, the people making and serving coffee and food all worked in different Ambiente outposts, but the coffee shops is independently owned and only connected to Ambiente through the people and perhaps some consultancy from Ambiente’s part. Anyway, it has become one of our favorite spots for the summer, with a great outdoor seating separating from the street outside (a godsend for parents of a 2yo with a curious mind and quick legs). Ronin Coffee Spot is also run by a barista of former Eska/Ambiente fame, Boris, and it’s a beautiful place with fantastic outdoor seating in the back, and it has quickly become our favorite coffee spot in the area. It’s strange: Ambiente seems to have never created a big league of „alumni“ chefs that would open their own restaurants, but that does not apply to baristas, especially given Ambiente’s fairly short track record in the specialty coffee scene.

Final opening of Prague’s coffee year has been mazelab.coffee in the Bubeneč district, and in many ways, it has been the most surprising one. „No cash, no wifi, no sugar“ is the mantra in the all-white space that occupies a former tyre-change station. Jackie, the owner (and the person behind Vinohrady’s Cafefin), is a designer and it shows. The place looks like if a Tokyo Blue Bottle and Copenhagen’s Coffee Collective had a baby, and that’s a compliment. Also, the coffee (for now, beans exclusively by the Danish La Cabra roasters) is given great care, and mazelab must be one of Prague’s most generous shops when it comes to space. (The whole space would easily accommodate five coffee shops in NYC and ten in Tokyo.)

Oh yes, and one more thing: while Etapa by our friends PG Foodies has officially opened on 1 January 2020, they had so many reopening events and soft openings we must include them in 2019. Sure, Petr and Gábina are our friends but we honestly love what they do: great coffee, artisanal bread and great food with some vegan options are all informed, smart and tasty. Do visit them in 2020.

We are slapping a wine place and some sweet shops to this category. Autentista wine bar has finally opened in the former Damuza in Řetězová street in the Old Town. The beautiful space is the child of the people behind Veltlin, a natural wines shop in the Karlín district, and Champagnier.cz, an importer of natural Champagnes. We like what they’ve done to the place, and despite the initially confusing pricing models of wine, we hope this will be a hit. They cook, too, with fermentation being the name of the game.

As for sweets: the super popular cronuts by Oh Deer Bakery may not be compatible with new year’s resolutions if you’re reading it in January, but you should know they opened as new, more central location right next to the Quadrium mall in the New Town. Also, Erhart café has a new location in the U Nováků house at Vodičkova, finally completing Prague’s Triangle of Sweet Death (Myšák, If Café and Erhart pastry shops all within two minutes of walking distance). 2019 also saw the comeback of Votre Plaisir, the French-Czech pastry shop, from their Brno exile. They are seated in a small shop in Klimentská and re-started their Prague existence humbly and without big fanfare.

Final mention in the sweets category must go to the amazing Kristyjan chocolatier in the Bubenec district. Their box of chocolates are of the sort brought home from Paris, at a fraction of the price (for now). Their chocolate bars are varied and tasty, and their hot chocolate will ruin any new year’s resolution if the winter is long enough. Too bad we live around the corner or two. Oh well, this will be a fun year.

Prague food scene openings of 2019 - the map and cheat sheet

Here’s a handy map of all the notable 2019 openings on the Prague food scene.

Finally, to gamify this a bit, please click here to download a pdf with a checklist of all the new openings of 2019. Print it out on an A5-sized paper, chuck it in your purse, put it on your fridge… and later show off to your friends (or us - we’ll act impressed) how savvy you are about food in Prague!

Enjoy 2020 and stay hungry!

Best ice-cream in Prague

Summers in Prague can be excruciating. Especially in the past few years, as Czechia (yup, we’re using the new abbreviated name for the Czech Republic) has been getting more tropical weather from the South. As temperatures reach 30C/85F, the cobblestoned streets heat up, and air-conditioning is hard to find in the Unesco-protected historical centre. Your answer? Ice-cream. In your face, climate change!

But where to go for great ice-cream in Prague? We’ve gathered a few of our favorite ice-cream parlors and a few ice-cream purveyors you should look out for. And a few bonus tips on how to stay cool in summer Prague. Here’s a list of what we think is the best ice-cream in Prague. 

Angelato

View fullsize

Angelato not exactly a hidden gem. Witness the insufferably long lines in front of the Rytirska and the Ujezd locations... on a good day. Our favorite is still the mango sorbet, although it's been fun trying their seasonal extras, although not all of them are winners. We tend to stop more often in their Ujezd location near the bottom station of the Petrin funicular, which is really nice, has more room to hang out in and the lines are somewhat shorter. For those intolerant to lactose, Angelato offers sorbets. Plus they also have gluten-free cones for those who care. (Looking at you, Gwyneth!) Cheapo tip of the day: Go for the girl behind the counter in the Ujezd location. She’s not shy to give big tasting portions. You’re welcome.

2AD ICE-CREAM

This ice-cream powerhouse - and our favorite ice-cream in Prague - is seated in Kacice, a tiny village just a mile off the main road from Prague to the Carlsbad spa, but the shop attracts ice-cream addicts from near and afar. But you don’t really have to leave the town if you want to try a scoop: 2AD delivers to many great Prague coffee shops. Their standard is high for most ice-creams, but we keep coming back for the luscious, wonderful pistachio. Their rowanberry is wicked, too. Never had rowanberry? Well, there just may be a hole in you that you never new about and only rowanbery ice-cream can fill it. Where to have it? 2AD ice-cream is served in some our favorite cafes in town: EMA Espresso Bar, Kavarna Místo, or Muj salek kavy, and in other cafes like Novy svet or Alza.  

View fullsize

ZMRZLINAR

But you don’t need to go through a caffeine-rich run around the town to get a taste of different 2AD flavours. Just visit Zmrzlinar. The shop opened in Prague's Vinohrady district with a bang and a fresh marketing campaign earlier this year, and appealed to the wider public with a wide array of 2AD ice-cream and a minimalist aesthetic (think bare concrete and a nearly non-existent color scheme but, sadly, air-conditioning was forgotten somewhere in the design process, so the interiors are insufferably hot on a hot day. A horrible omission… or a strategy to sell more ice-cream?). Nevertheless, we do love that place: it’s simple, serves probably the widest assortment of 2AD ice-cream in town, is devoid of any mass tourism, and the ice-cream-against-bare-concrete is a great Instagram shot. A must for an ice-cream aficionado in Prague. Their scoops are on smaller side, but for those who cannot make up their mind (yes, ahem, we’re looking at you), Zmrzlinar offers a tasting bowl with five flavors.

View fullsize

Creme de la Creme

Creme de la Creme, is your haven of good ice-cream if you find yourself in one of the most touristy places in Prague, the pretty dismal Karlova street. The flavors are bold and easy to recognize: the chocolate-and-chili was probably the spiciest ice-cream we’ve had. Their vegan ice-creams are a tiny bit sweeter and have a slightly „chewy“ feel to them, but the flavors are great and hey, vegan ice-cream! We will leave the „fitness ice-creams“ with no sugar and limited fat, to someone braver then us. On the other end of the my-body-is-a-temple scale, the bottomless cup is a great choice if you want to commit suicide by brain freeze. Yes, all-you-can-eat ice-cream option for CZK 200 manages the feat of being awesome and kinda gross at the same time. (But hey, we don't judge.)

View fullsize

Puro Gelato

Puro Gelato occupies a great little corner shop near the Vyton tram stop underneath the Vysehrad fortress near the Naplavka farmers market, and another one in the Kaprova street in the Old Town. These places are very popular and the service is generally very nice, but the different flavors have been a hit or miss affair for us: we really liked the blueberry with sour cream, the banana, the poppyseed, the ricotta with figs was okay, and we’d skip the salted caramel and carrot gelato the next time we’re there. We generally prefer their sorbets to their gelato. But that’s truly beside the point here: just get a flavor you like, and sit down in the shady side street in front of the shop, or take it on a stroll through Prague’s Old Town, and you’ll be happy.

AMATO

A nice place in the beautiful and cool Letna district that has a nice neighborly feel to it. They make their own ice-creams from scratch, and sometimes offer interesting flavor combinations. We like some of the flavors less than others, so please make sure you will taste them all before you order. That said, the texture is right and the flavors are nice, if not always precise. A great after-dinner snack if you’ve had our favorite sliders at Mr Hot Dog just down the road. 

PARLOR

Part of our Prague food tours on a particularly hot day, Parlor in the Karlin district (not to be confused with Parlour, our favourite cocktail bar in Prague) satisfies on soooo many levels and, in a way, is the perfect place for a big family outing. Just think about it: ice-cream sandwiches… and gin and tonics. What else would you want on a hot day? Exactly. The ice-creams are customised creations by Creme de la Creme, which is a good thing. The cookies are a bit on the crumbly rather than the chewy side, but that’s okay. Just sit down in the very floral, shady and relaxed room, get an ice-cream sandwich and a g&t. Enjoy the moment. Repeat. You’re welcome.   

View fullsize

ONESIP COFFEE

Sure, one may argue we push onesip coffee in every post. And they would be right. One of our favourite coffee shops in Prague is a place close to our hearts in more than one way, and on a hot day, they deliver, too. Jan opts for the "First Kiss", a scoop of cold ice-cream, a shot of delicious espresso, and a small shot of rum. (To be historically accurate as a first kiss for Jan, you’d have to triple the shot, and add a healthy dose of awkward.) Zuzi likes the iced popsicles by Fruteama. They are artisanal, small-batch, vegan and all the other things young people like today. Zuzi swears by the strawberry. 

View fullsize

TRIKO KAFE & KOLONIAL

There’s more to life than McDonald’s if you crave sinful soft-serve. Triko Kafe & Kolonial, a little bistro just above the Smichov district opened by Michal, the owner of Tribo, a famous tattoo parlor, serves some pretty nice soft-serve, too. The owner, has been playing with recipes from David Leibovitz’s book of ice-creams, translating them into the soft-serve form, and he’s been mostly successful. Heck, he served his poppy seed and plum soft serve with a healthy dose of Slivovitz, a plum brandy, on Zuzi and Jan’s wedding party for a reason. So if you find yourself underneath the Malvazinky hill (perhaps on your way to see Lenka, the owner/designer of the fantastic 27 Jewelry studio), sweeten your stroll with a bit of soft-serve.

View fullsize

Affogatos

If you’re in for an ice-cream treat in Prague - and perhaps a bit of buzz - ice-cream parlors are not your only option. Virtually all great cafes in Prague offer an affogato: a scoop of ice-cream with a shot of espresso. These range from the standard plain ice-cream to more adventurous options: if you haven’t tried Hazelnut ice-cream (the peanut well do, too) affogato and like Nutella, this could be your summer treat game-changer (they sometimes have it in Kavarna Místo). Ask your favorite Prague barista for more details.

View fullsize

And to finish the list, one unique Czech supermarket bonus:

Misa ice-cream

Misa ice-cream has been a staple of Czech supermarkets for decades. It has a very specific, slightly acidic taste due to the fact that the ice-cream is not made of cream but of a combination of cream and farmer's cheese. The whole thing is then covered in chocolate. The recipe for the bar has not changed since the product was first unveiled in 1962. Jan is not a fan, for instance, but Zuzi likes the ice-cream bar (because it’s not so sweet) and it is the one unique ice-cream money can buy here in Prague. If you want to explore different tastes, this is what you are looking for. 

View fullsize

How not to eat Czech food

As you might have expected, we eat out a lot when we do research for our Prague food tours, the Prague Foodie Map and this very blog. (Hey, we have an Instagram account and we try to post a picture a day, which means a meal out a day. Yeah, it’s hard to be us.) But in doing so, we often see foreign visitors do things that clearly identify them as foreign visitors and set them apart from the locals.

So we have investigated the phenomenon, asked around some of our favorite restaurants and came up with a list of “Czech food fails”: things done to Czech food by foreign visitors that make the locals either shake their head in disbelief, or straight out cringe. Here’s how you don't eat Czech food in Prague restaurants.

The smartest Prague food tours. Cool rental apartment. Awesome pocket wifi device. We’ll turn your Prague trip up to eleven.

Book a tour Get the guide Rent the apartment Rent the pocket wifi

How not to eat Czech food

Folding a chlebicek

Mistake: folding a chebicek
Degree of offense: 2/5
Correction: just don’t fold it

Chlebicek, the classic Czech open-faced sandwich, is not open-faced for nothing: it is styled in a specific way and should lure the customer to buy and eat it. Sure, the sandwich does seem to miss the top bread and the handling is a bit more difficult, but that’s the whole point: the bread-to-topping ratio is higher in favor of the topping, and that’s not a bad thing. But this ain’t a pizza. Folding the chlebicek for better handling clearly reveals you as a foreign national. You could as well slap a big “tourist” sticker on your forehead. Of course, some of the topping may end up on you, but hey, you wanted a souvenir, anyway, right? (And remember, the best one is the classic ham-and-potato-salad combo, and the best place for it is the Sisters bistro.)   

Eating a chlebicek with knife and fork

Mistake: eating a chebicek
Degree of offense: 3/5
Correction: drop the knife: this is a fingers-only affair

Talking about the chlebicek, the Czech open-faced sandwich, there’s another thing where Czechs and foreigners differ: according to the staff at the Sisters bistro, while a negligible fraction of the Czechs eat the chlebicek other than with their fingers, nearly every foreign visitor eats the sandwich with a fork and knife. No. You wouldn’t eat Oreo cookies with cutlery, would you? A part of the pleasure of eating a chlebicek is derived from the fact that you hold it in your hand and deliberate on the best course of action: do you start with the ham? Or potato salad first? How do you eat the pickle and the egg on the top? These are all decisions that simply make eating a chlebicek the special event that it is. So drop the knife, apply some Purell, and go at it!

Pouring beer from glass to glass

Mistake: pouring beer from a glass to another
Degree of offense: 5/5, deportation imminent
Correction: just share the glass, okay?

Czech bartenders in Prague’s beer halls are not the kind of folk prone to fainting very often, but if there’s one thing that can make make them weaker in the knees, it must be when they see their patrons pouring beer from one glass to another. The classic scenario: a couple orders two beers and one does not want to finish the whole thing, so they pour some of their beer to the partner’s glass. This is not only wrong, it also feels and looks wrong: most Czechs cringe just at the idea of someone pouring beer from one glass to another. Why? Because you are mixing beers of different temperatures, the whole thing just foams up, and you are loosing the sparkle and the kick Czechs prize so much about their beer. And it’s just wrong. If there’s one food-related thing that might get you deported, it’s this one. The right way to share? Just offer your partner to have a drink from your glass. Easy.

Making sandwiches out of things

Mistake: making sandwiches out of beer snacks
degree of offense: 1/5
Correction: alternate between bites of bread and meat

Czech cuisine has a specific type of dish: “things that go well with beer”, or “beer snacks”. These are usually smaller plates of meat and condiments that go well with - you guessed it - beer. They are usually served with slices of bread in a basket. What Czechs never - but foreign visitors often - do, is putting the meat, cheese or condiments on the bread, making a sandwich out of the whole thing. Sure, the marinated cheese is soft to the point of being spreadable, but Czechs usually eat these separately: you have a bite of ham with horseradish cream, for instance, followed by a bite of bread. That’s the Czech way.

Incorrect handling of dumplings

Mistake: eating dumplings without sauce, with hands
degree of offense: 4/5
Correction: soak the dumplings in sauce!

We could honestly write a separate post on what foreign nationals do wrong with dumplings. Dumplings, a staple of traditional Czech cuisine, come in different shapes and sizes, and are probably the most confusing element when foreign visitors try to order Czech food in Prague. First of all, dim sum dumplings are not part of Czech cuisine. With a horrible degree of simplification, Czech dumplings come in two varieties: potato dumplings, which can be - very roughly - compared to bigger gnocchi, and bread roll dumplings, which are basically cooked bread and come in thick slices. A bread roll dumpling is basically 100% gluten - Gwyneth Paltrow would pass out at the mere sight of it - but the key to understanding it is the fact that it has no particular flavor of it’s own, and is used exclusively as a vehicle for a sauce or gravy that comes with a dish. There are two basic offenses involving the dumpling.

1. Pairing dumplings with dishes that have no sauce.
2. Eating dumplings with your hands.

These are both variations of the same misunderstanding: dumplings, and especially bread roll dumplings, serve as the vehicle for sauce. Therefore, ordering dumplings with the likes of schnitzel or fried cheese or - the horror - steak tartare makes absolutely no sense. (BTW, schnitzels pair best with the potato salad, while fried cheese is the best with cooked potatoes or fries.) The second offense only shows you have not really flipped the dumpling around in the sauce and haven’t soaked enough of it in the dumpling: if you did, you couldn’t really take it in your hand. When properly soaked in sauce, dumplings can only be eaten with cutleries.

Trim the fat off

Mistake: trim the fat off ham and meat in general
degree of offense: 2/5
Correction: fat is flavor! Leave it in.

Czechs do love their fat in all of it’s forms: be it fried cheese, pork belly or crackling spread, Czechs subscribe to the notion that fat is juice and flavor. Trimming the fat off is not a serious offense, and a few Czechs have been convicted of it, too, but we just think it’s a cry-out shame. So the next time you order Prague ham or pork belly, try the fat layer, too. Maybe you’ll realize that this is the thing you’ve been missing from your diet all along. (Just don’t forget to jog after it, okay?)

Okay, all that being said, Czechs don’t judge. We all got our dirty secrets, don't we? The founder of the restaurant group that owns Lokal, Mr Tomas Karpisek, drinks his beer with soda water. Ms Hana Michopulu, the owner of the Sisters bistro, eats mayonnaise with and potato chips in bed. Hey, we’re all people and the Czechs, one of the most atheist societies in the world, understand that we all make mistakes. But if you’ve read through the post up to here, there’s a few mistakes you will not be repeating in Prague anymore. Enjoy your stay!  

Nase maso's Czech meatloaf recipe

You see, traditional Czech cuisine is all about guilty pleasures. You know you should not do it. You know it’s bad for you. But once in a while, when no-one’s looking, you just need a bit of sweet satisfaction from a pice of juicy pork belly or a crunchy schnitzel. It’s just so damn delicious, and nobody can stay so strong for long.

The smartest Prague food tours. Cool rental apartment. Awesome pocket wifi device. We’ll turn your Prague trip up to eleven.

Book a tour Rent the apartment Rent the pocket wifi

And the same goes for the meatloaf at the Nase Mase butcher shop. Meatloaf?!? Not the first you would order when you travel, but this particular meatloaf, juicy and tender and moist and beautiful, is - believe it or not - one of the most popular meals of our Prague food tour. Yes, we later visit other restaurants for fancy sit-down meals where you can inspect chefs’ tweezer work, but when we ask at the end what was our guests’ favorite meal, the meatloaf always gets a dreamy mention. It’s just that good. Heck, when Nase maso opened, the butchers held a competition for the best meatloaf recipe: each butcher would prepare their own, and the winning recipe would become the recipe of the butcher shop. Jirka Michal’s grandma’s recipe was the clear winner.

“Good meatloaf should have the fat content of good cheese.” Yes, fat content is everything for this meatloaf. Mr Ksana, the master butcher of the Nase maso butcher shop, says that you should not be shy with fatty pork when you prepare meatloaf. Unlike in many English-speaking countries, where meatloaf is a mostly beef-only affair (our Canadian guests tell us Canadian meatloaf is served to kids as punishment), Czech meatloaf relies on pork. The result is a wonderfully tender meatloaf that just melts in your mouth. Serve with bread, mustard and dill pickles.

Nase maso's Meatloaf Recipe

Ingredients:

• 240 g marbled aged beef neck, minced
• 500 g pork belly (without bone and skin) from the Czech Prestice pig, minced (Berkshire pig will do just fine)
• 700g pork shoulder from Prestice pig, minced (again, look for a fatty pig like Berkshire)
• 100 g white roll, bread or baguette, diced
• 150 ml milk
• 2 eggs
• 1 onion, diced
• 2 cloves of garlic, crushed
• salt, black pepper, caraway seeds and marjoram

1. Heat oven to 180 °C. Put white bread in a bowl with milk and leave to soak. 
2. Mix all the meats with salt, pepper, caraway and marjoram. Add garlic and onion, soaked bread and beaten eggs and mix well. 
3. Shape 2 loafs, put them in a pan, smooth with wet hands, baste with a bit water and roast in the oven for 1 hour until the meatloaf is brown and well done.

Bon appetit!

Our guilty pleasures in Prague

We really love food here at Taste of Prague. You may have noticed that already. We do try to eat healthy: Zuzi prepares green smoothies for breakfast, we try to eat seasonal vegetables and Zuzi barely uses meat in her cooking. We try to use organic and local products. We love it. Eating healthy makes us feel good and light. But then, once in a while, we just go and have something really bad for us. Can't help it. It's delicious. Our guilty pleasures.

Hey there! Thank you for reading our blog! But it gets even better than that. You know we run pretty awesome food tours in Prague and sell the Prague Foodie Map, our curated selection of Prague’s best restaurants and more, right? Our moms recommend it, and you'll love it, too!

Our guests joining us on our tours often ask me about OUR favorite things to eat in Prague. What a mistake! We can talk for hours and will not stop. Our pleasures may be guilty but we don't feel particularly guilty when I talk about them. They are simply delicious. We actually think that people connect through their guilty pleasures. We all have them if we truly love food. And in addition: calories don't count on vacations, right? So if you like your food just like we do, here's a small list of our favorite guilty pleasures in Prague for your enjoyment. 

French toast at Cafe Savoy

View fullsize

They should serve the French toast at Cafe Savoy with a whip, because after you’ve eaten it (sharing is very difficult after the first bite) you definitely feel like you need a few dozens of mea culpas and a few slashes: the toasts, dripping with butter and maple sirup, dusted with confectionary sugar and served with some strawberries and other seasonal fruits, will definitely make you feel guilty. On the positive side, there are savings involved: once you had this piece of heaven, you are done eating for the rest of the day, or at least can easily skip lunch. We said it many times and we will say it again: Cafe Savoy serves the best breakfast in town in our book, and the French Toast is the ultimate guilty pleasure before noon. 

Smoky Dish burger at the Dish Fine Burger Bistro

View fullsize

I (Jan writing this one) am a man of simple tastes. If I could replace every meal with the wonderfulness that is the Smoky Dish burger at the Dish Fine Burger Bistro in the Vinohrady districts, I would be a happy man. A happy, fat man. Now, of course, this dream is unattainable, but I must confess that when we make a decision where to have a quick lunch in the city, Dish is always in my shortlist. It is just there. Never leaves. The wonderful, juicy patty, the bun, the pickle, the crispy bacon, the onions, the sauce. Love it all. And to top it off, their bistro fries with the smoked chili mayonnaise. Heaven.

“variace” at Nase maso

View fullsize

Sure, Jan may not be particularly proud about this, but he just might be the uncrowned champion customer of the “variace” over at the Nase maso butcher shop. What is this “variace” you keep hearing about? Well, Nase Maso serves three types of hot dog: the beef wiener, the "Nas parek” classic beef-and-pork combo hotdog, and the Debrecen sausage, which includes paprika and caraway. Well, with the “variace”, you get one each, a blob of mustard, and bread. For like three dollars. The variace gets bonus points for sheer speed. This pleasure is guilty, because nobody should eat hot dogs as much as Jan tends to do, but the “variace” gets bonus points for sheer speed - you’re eating within two minutes of the order, so the guilt does not have time to set in. And did we mention the hot dogs are juicy and delicious? Also, many of the guests of our Prague food tours love the mustard made in the Lokal pub nearby. As far as guilty pleasures eaten from a paper tray go, this is a winner.

Bubbles for breakfast

View fullsize

Sure, we’re no Kim and Kanye, but oh do we love ourselves some bubbles! Nothing guilty about that, right? Uh… the thing is we only drink Champagne… for Sunday breakfast. We’re newbies to the whole bubbles-for-breakfast game and learnt this from friends quite recently, but let us tell you: once you try it, it’s hard to go back. We have two favorite places for breakfasts with a bubbly component: Cafe Savoy, which serves one of our favorite breakfasts in town, serves a great Rosé de Saignée Brut by Fleury, which is our current favorite. If you want to go the whole way, get the Dom Perignon 2004 for CZK 700 per glass. But if you’re not a financial banker or don’t have a endowment fund in your name, we have a more sensible option: the Cremant du Jura by Domaine Labet over at Café Lounge nearby. They serve good breakfast in a calm environment, too. Bubbles for breakfast are great, but dangerous: it’s hard to feel guilty on a Sunday morning with Champagne in your hand: you sooo deserve it!

Maso a kobliha

View fullsize

Maso a kobliha, our local favorite and the best bistro in town according (not only) to our beloved We Are Burgers, should be called “Guilty Pleasue Central” because pretty much everything we put in our mouths in this joint leads to a stream of mixed emotions ranging from heavenly bliss to shame and fear of eternal damnation. It all starts when Paul Day sees us and says something like “we have a new sandwich on the menu, it’s made of organic beef and unicorn tears”, or something along those lines. Yes, the Reuben sandwich, with the toasted bread dripping of butter, the fried cheese sandwich, the crispy pork skins. Oh my. The guilt is made more bearable by Matuska beer, the stronger, the better. But nothing takes the guilt away after we finish our meal with the vanilla custard donut, the best donut this side of the Atlantic. We thought about what makes the donut so good. And it’s the fact that they only make then in batches of about a dozen, so you have them fresh nearly every time. That’s how donuts - and just anything else - should be made. 

Affogato

View fullsize

This little guilty pleasure is a bit sneaky, because it disguises itself as a never-ending search for the perfect ice-cream-coffee combo. So basically it’s science, people. At least that’s what we keep saying ourselves. And for us, the "time for affogato science" comes usually in the evening, after a long, difficult day. Coincidence? Not sure. Anyway, we have two places we like for affogato. They both serve ice-cream by 2AD. Coincindence? Not really. EMA Espresso Bar closes at 8pm, so we go there for our morning science session. However, Kavarna Misto, located about a five-minute walk from our house, closes at 10pm. We can’t stress enough how dangerous it is to have a “science lab” so near your house. Yes, the guilt generated by eating an affogato at 9:30pm can get quite intense, but it’s just so much fun. We always tell the barista to give us their current favorite. We liked the blueberry sorbet combo for a while, but our current favorite is the peanut ice-cream affogato. (You can totally taste the mushrooms as Jirka from Misto says.)

Povidlove tasticky at Na Pekarne

Now, you have to go on a journey (“pilgrimage” would be a more suitable word) for my ultimate guilty pleasure. Na Pekarne, the shrine of Czech cuisine opened by Mr Vaclav Fric, a famous Czech chef, in his birth village of Cakovicky near Prague, is our favorite place for proper Czech food. We always get stuffed even before we get to desserts. Mr Fric’s wild boar with rose hip sauce and potato pancakes or the classic Svickova dish (beef with creamy vegetable sauce and dumplings) are our favorites and the portions are generous to say the least. Yet still, once the empty plates are gone, I always have a deep breath, look at Zuzi (she knows what’s coming and doesn’t even bother to shake her head or roll her eyes) and order “povidlove tasticky” - potato “ravioli” stuffed with plum jam and served with melted butter, sugar and crushed nuts. Words cannot possibly describe how delicious this dessert is: the hot plum jam oozing from the ravioli and mixing with the nuts, sugar and butter… ecstasy. If you want to get a very similar version in Prague proper (but still a bit off the centre), head over to the Kastrol restaurant, Na Pekarne’s sister.

And to finish the post, one really-bad-for-you, over-processed supermarket bonus:

Pikao and Jesenka

Oh, the glory of Jesenka and Pikao! "What are they, Jan?" I can hear you ask. Any Czech reader already knows and probably either laughs or cringes in horror. Pikao is chocolate-flavoured sweetened condensed milk, and Jesenka is sweetened condensed cream, both in the handy format of an aluminum tube. You basically pierce the foil in the opening with the piercer included in the plastic cap and suck the contents in. You can literally feel the cholesterol clogging your veins but you don’t care. You are just happy. Pikao also has the amazing ability to turn any melted vanilla ice-cream into chocolate ice-cream with a few generous drops. Both can be found in the dairy sections of any Czech supermarket. You did not hear it from me, though.

View fullsize

Our guests acting on Jan's recommendations...

Cheap Eats in Prague

View fullsize

Cheap Eats in Prague

Believe it or not, we used to be students, too. And just like any students, even we had tight living and travel budgets. Zuzi, for instance, saved some money by hitchhiking to and from Prague for university. Jan spent ten years doing his masters degree simply because he worked throughout his studies to make some money on the side (oh, and also because he was pretty lazy… and drafted, but that’s another story). But that does not mean we did not care about what we ate. We always liked good food, but simply did not have the money for fine dining.

The smartest Prague food tours. Cool rental apartment. Awesome pocket wifi device. We’ll turn your Prague trip up to eleven.

Book a tour Get the guide Rent the apartment Rent the pocket wifi

We know that many Prague visitors who want to eat their way through the city are on a budget. While we do sometimes visit fine dining venues when we travel, we think you do not have to compromise on quality even if you have a tight travel budget. And many times going for the cheap eats in Prague actually brings you the local immersion travelers crave whenever they go. Because we want you to eat well in Prague even if you do not have a gold credit card, we bring you some tips for the best cheap food in Prague.

Lunch specials

First a piece of general advice: if you are eyeing a restaurant in Prague that is a bit more expensive, make sure you look if it offers a lunch special. Lunch specials are a Czech classic associated with the concept of food vouchers. One of the most common employee benefits, food vouchers give an employee the option to pay a small amount (usually around USD 2) daily and get a food voucher worth twice as much (e.g. USD 4). Many Prague restaurants offer lunch specials that target the food voucher holders, thus putting fast food chains through some pretty tough competition.

View fullsize

Now, we can argue whether this is a good or a bad idea. Czech employees love the vouchers and the specials, but they have altered the way we see food in the Czech Republic: many employees with access to these vouchers have stopped cooking at home and have a hard time seeing the true value of food. But that’s beside the point here. While most of the food served as lunch specials is nothing to write home about, you can find a few high quality restaurants that offer the specials, too, giving you the option to try a restaurant where a dinner might be simply beyond your travel budget. 

Take Aromi or La Finestra, for instance. Two of the best Italian restaurants in Prague, the former specializing in fish and the latter in meat, both offer a lunch special at reasonable prices: Aromi at CZK 225, just slightly above the EUR 8 mark, and La Finestra at CZK 495 for three courses with coffee. Pasta Fresca (pictured above), another popular Italian restaurant conveniently located just a few steps off the Old Town Square, offers a soup and three pasta or other Italian dishes a day, all well below the CZK 200 mark. Another great restaurant that offers a weekly lunch menu is Field near the Jewish Quarter, and Aureole, with arguably the best view of the city. The former offers three courses for CZK 350 while the latter charges CZK 490 for three courses. These are not cheap restaurants in Prague. They are great restaurants, but offer amazing value for lunch.

View fullsize

One word of caution for the truly budget-conscious travelers: make sure the restaurant serves tap water for free or a small fee. Bottled water in many higher-end restaurants may cost nearly as much as the entire lunch special. The same applies to wine. The two-course lunch special at Grand Cru, another restaurant listed in the Michelin guide, may cost CZK 335 as we write this, but a glass of wine may actually cost you more.

Budget Coffee Shops in Prague

Another way of finding some great cheap eats in Prague is to eat at some of Prague coffee shops. Muj salek kavy, the flagship cafe of the local Doubleshot roasters, serves great coffee and reasonably priced lunches and snacks during the day, some of them gluten free. Just a street away, the recently opened Proti proudu bistro combines cool design with really nice breakfasts and sandwiches (the pork belly is pictured below), soup and something sweet. We would just skip the coffee and still have it at Muj salek kavy. On the other side of the river, Cafe Lounge serves consistently solid coffee, a daily soup all day and popular lunch specials up until 3pm.

View fullsize

MASO A KOBLIHA

Probably the best “bistro” in Prague at the moment, Maso a kobliha is located literally ten steps from its older sister, the famed Sansho restaurant. Maso a kobliha is a winner because of two people: Paul Day uses the best Czech protein from his butchers of The Real Meat Society and combines it with the wonderful brioche and other breads baked by Julka, a.k.a. Maskrtnica, arguably the best baker in the city (she did leave the bistro at the beginning of 2016, but her legacy lives on). Our favorites include the Scotch eggs (CZK 110 per egg), the gravlax on toast or daily sandwiches and meat pies, all under CZK 200. Finish with the best donut in town! This is cheap eats in Prague at their best.

View fullsize

SISTERS

If you want to try Czech fast food in Prague, head over to the extremely popular Sisters bistro, which serves “chlebicek”, the classic Czech open-faced sandwiches. Unlike large Czech dishes, chlebiceks give you, according to Hana Michopulu, the owner, the opportunity to try, let’s say, three different meals on a piece of bread. Our favorite chlebiceks, ham and potato salad, pickled herring with wasabi mayo, or smoked mackerel with beet roots and potato salad, cost CZK 39 each. Sisters also serves delicious daily soup for CZK 59. You can combine the soup and two chlebiceks for a rich meal. 

View fullsize

Nase maso

One of the best butcheries in town does not just sell meat to go. Nase maso also has a kitchen and serves simple, truly Czech meals that will not cost you an arm and a leg. For instance, three thick slices of the best meatloaf in town (and the world) cost under CZK 100, the same as three pieces of their delicious, juicy sausages. Their burgers are delicious and cost about EUR 5. If you are really lucky, their pork belly braised for hours with lager and onion is to die for and costs below CZK 150. Whatever Nase maso cooks can easily list among the best cheap eats in Prague. Just expect to wait in line, but the Czech beer on tap makes the wait that much easier.

View fullsize

Pho Vietnam

A bowl of Pho is now one of the most popular Prague lunches and dinners. It is also a fantastic budget meal: CZK 100 to 150 buys you a huge bowl of wonderful, fragrant beef broth with ginger, noodles, pieces of beef, cilantro, soy bean sprouts, chili and lots of other delicious things. Our favorite place to have the Pho in Prague is Pho Vietnam with its two branches: the rather dodgy stand-up only branch at Jiriho z Podebrad square is the perfect addition to a visit of the farmers market at the same square (usually Wednesdays through Saturdays), while the 15 Anglicka street branch is a quieter venue with regular tables. If you haven’t had enough food with the Pho (and we would seriously doubt that), their spring rolls won’t break the bank, either.

Home Kitchen

Although some of the items on the menu may not be the cheapest food in Prague, the soups at Home Kitchen are great and the portions are pretty generous. You also get a bowl of freshly baked bread with flavored olive oil of your choice. They usually serve three soups a day and usually all of them are good. Home Kitchen now has four branches: the tiny branch in the Jindrisska street in the centre is more of an espresso bar, whitle the newer locations copy that in the bigger branch in the Holesovice district. They all serve the same menu and their soups are some of the best budget eats in Prague in our opinion. 

View fullsize

Osteria da Clara

Osteria da Clara has been a staple on the food scene in the Vrsovice district for a very long time. You can clearly see that the English chef and owner loves what he does, turning the seemingly standard, Tuscany-inspired items on the menu into delicious dishes. Pasta dishes are their forte. The portions are huge given the price and we think you can eat well for a very reasonable price in Osteria da Clara.

Kastrol

A sister of our favorite Czech Restaurant, Na Pekarne in the Cakovicky village near Prague, Kastrol restaurant is still pretty far outside of the centre, but definitely worth it if you want to taste tranditional Czech food at its best. Big portions but the prices are still very low: the classic wild boar with rose hip sauce and potato gnocchi is less than CZK 200. Their lunch specials are a steal, with many dishes below CZK 100.  

View fullsize

Las Adelitas

Las Adelitas is arguably the best Mexican restaurant in town with three branches: one, the original, in the Vinohrady district, the other, bigger one, in the very heart of the historical centre, and the third one at the border of the cool and fun Vinohrady and Zizkov districts. Their lunch specials that comprise food and their lemonade are terrific value for the centre at CZK 129. You can also watch the chefs at work while you eat at the more central location but the non-smoking section is laughable, so we still like the Vinohrady locations better. Their lunch specials differ from their regular menu. As a side note, they are also famous for their Margaritas. The central location is hardly a hidden gem: you may wait in line to get in. 

View fullsize

Mexicali Mercado

Talking about Mexican food, the recently opened Mexicali Mercado is a true gem tucked away in a courtyard very near the O2 Arena, a venue popular for ice-hockey games and rock concerts. This place packs a lot on a fairly small footprint, combining a small Mexican grocery market and a taco shop. Still, this is Mexican fast food exactly the way we like it: full of flavor, happy, joyful and affordable. Yes, it's messy, but you literally want to lick the wrapping paper. The opening hours are fairly generous and the place can get packed for lunch. The only downside? Closed on weekends.

View fullsize

Bistro 8

Bistro 8, which sometimes doubles as a reception for our rental apartment, is a great neighborly place and a popular hangout in the Letna district, namely in the uber cool Veverkova street. Eating at Bistro 8 is like eating at home: sometimes it’s delicious... sometimes... eh... not so much. But you have to love the easy-going nature of the place and the lovely staff. They have a huge selection of foods, all priced fairly low. That’s one of the reasons why the place is so popular among artsy students from the nearby Academy of Fine Arts and why it qualifies as a place that serves one of the best cheap eats in Prague. 

View fullsize

BISTRO NO 19

Bistro and shop no 19 is a tiny, tiny bistro located just in between the National Theatre and the Charles Bridge. Did we mention it is tiny? It really sits ten at best and serves three dishes a day: a soup, a vegetarian dish and a meaty dish. On top of the food, you can buy something to go: the shop sells designer pottery, glassware, home accessories and designer aprons by young fashion designers as part of the owner's Zasterka project. And if you can't find what you like, there's always the Kurator shop next door.

View fullsize

Polevkarna

First a disclaimer: we have been friends with Martin, the owner, since high school. However, this is not just a shameless plug. Polevkarna (also dubbed “Soup Opera”) in the Karlin district is a very popular yet tiny venue that focuses on soups and some Georgian-inspired Khachapuri breads. It may not be always perfect but we always leave satisfied and full. 

Czech Christmas traditions, and two Christmas cookie recipes

View fullsize

You gotta love Czech Christmas traditions. While other holiday traditions may be more fun, like the spanking of women for Easter, our Christmas traditions revolve mostly around food. But they are equally as odd and fun.

First things first: we celebrate Christmas Eve rather than Christmas Day. Yes, we do not torture our children by having them wait the entire night for the presents. Oh, the sleepless nights saved! Our main meal is fried carp with potato salad. Carps are being sold during the week leading up to Christmas on the streets from barrels full of water and fish. Today the vendors will kill and filet the fish on the spot, but when we were kids, parents would buy a live carp and have it in the bathtub until the Christmas Eve so that it was fresh when we ate it, which meant you had a little pet for a week... and then you ate it. Taught you a lesson. Never trust your friends. Zuzi's little brother used to take baths with the carp and liked to kiss it… and hasn't eaten a single one since he realized what happened to it later.

(What follows is a Christmas scene from "Pelisky", a Czech comedy. Two brothers argue about one of the brothers' ability to hold breath underwater. There is only one way to find out... At the end of the scene, the wet brother admits to not having the heart to kill the carp that swims in the bathtub.) 

The potato salad is also a serious matter that has been know to split households. Every family has its own, which creates frictions among the in-laws. Some people put ham in it, which is quite at odds with the imperative that no meat should be eaten on Christmas Eve. Also, potato salad with ham in it is much inferior to the classic Viennese potato salad, which is served in our families and is therefore clearly the best (wink wink). To top it all up, the leftovers of the cried carp are pickled and served a few days later as “Pecenace”. Sounds pretty bad but it is delicious. If you want to tried this, head over to Cestr. It is one of the most surprising and favorite dishes we serve in some of our food tours.

The cruelest Czech Christmas tradition is the Christmas Eve fast. You don’t eat anything until the dinner so that you get to see the “golden piglet”. In theory. Because in practice you are simply defenseless against the smells of the sausage with wine, the carp, fish soup and potato salad, so you simply nibble away here and there. Another tradition is the “vanocka”, the classic Czech Christmas bread that is dense and tastes a bit like brioche bread and often includes raisins and almonds. If you want to taste a great version, head over to Maso a kobliha. They sell a great version made by Juliana, arguably the most famous bread blogger around.

One of the most important, and surely the most fattening, Czech Christmas traditions is the baking of Christmas cookies. In many families, Christmas baking ends up dominating all December weekends, really, at least among moms and their daughters. All the advertisements in the media before Christmas tend to revolve around butter, cocoa powder, sugar and nuts, only to be replaced in January by advertisements for gym memberships and low fat yoghurts. Yes, the calorie intake over Christmas is huge but you know what? The cookies are delicious so who cares?

Christmas baking may at time get competitive, as people reunite at work on Mondays to top their colleagues with the number of the different varieties they prepared over the weekend. The idea is to make the Christmas cookies as small as possible and to prepare as many different varieties as possible. The most convenient storage compartment for the cookies is the humble shoe box, so when you walk through the residential parts of Prague over the holidays, you may spot a few boxes here and there on the balconies. 

Now, every family has a repertoire of “tried and tested" cookies that cannot be missing on the Christmas table. Now you can bake your own with Zuzi’s grandma’s recipes for the Linzer cookies and vanilla crescents, two of the classics. Be careful: both are highly addictive and you may end up making several more batches and putting on more weight than you had originally planned. Which is probably the most traditional Czech tradition of them all. In any case, we wish you a Merry Christmas! Bake responsibly, ok?

Linzer cookies

View fullsize

Ingredients:

for the cookies:

• 250 grams all purpose flour
• 150 grams whole blanched almonds
• 240 grams unsalted colder butter 
• 120 grams powder white sugar (divided to 40 and 80 grams) 
• 2 egg yolks 
• pinch of salt
• zest of one small organic lemon
• seeds from one vanilla bean

for the filling:

• 100grams little sour jam without lumps or seeds
• 2 cl shot of fragrant alcohol 

Preparation:

1. I always start with setting oven to 180 C° (350 F). 
2. Then I place the almonds on a baking sheet and bake them for about 9 minutes. 
3. In the meantime, I sift the flour to another bowl and then I stir in the salt and lemon zest and I put the bowl on the side.
4. When the almonds brown slightly, I remove them from oven and let them cool down. Then I place them into a food processor and grind them finely. Then I add 40 g of sugar and grind the almonds again. 
5. I put butter and the rest of sugar in the bowl of my electric mixer and beat (on moderate speed) it together until the mixture is light and fluffy. It usually takes about 2 minutes. Then I add vanilla beans and egg yolks and I beat the mixture again for about half a minute. Finally, I put in the ground almonds and the flour mix and I mix everything together again for about a half a minute. 
6. I divide the dough in half, cover each half with plastic wrap, and refrigerate the dough overnight.
7. The next day, I preheat the oven to 180 C° (350 F). I put parchment paper in three baking trays.
8. I take one half of the dough out of the fridge and cut about a quarter of it. I roll out this quarter of dough on a lightly floured surface until it is about 0.5 cm (1/5 of an inch) thick. Then I cut out my cookies – I usually like using smaller cookie cutters (2-3 cm, i.e. about an inch wide) of different shapes. The cookies have a hole in the center (remember you want to sandwich these cookies together, so choose only symmetrical shapes), but you can, of course, use bigger cutters and make the hole in the center with a smaller cutter– you’ll have fewer cookies but they will be bigger and you’ll be done sooner. ☺ 
9. I always cut the cookies and put them on the baking sheet one by one, leaving about 2 cm (about an inch) between them. Then I re-roll all the scraps and cut out the remaining cookies. When the baking sheet is full of cookies, I put it in the fridge for about 10 min before baking and I keep cutting cookies for the remaining baking sheets. I repeat this process for all the dough. 
10. After letting them rest in the fridge for 10 minutes, I bake the cookies for about 6 minutes (this depends on size of cookies, so if you do small shapes, it’ll take about 6 min, but if you do bigger shapes, it can take about 12 minutes. I always look for a nice, yellowish color with very light brown color around the edges). 
11. I remove the cookies from the oven and leave them cool. Then I mix a shot of fragrant alcohol with the jam.  
12. When the cookies are cold, I spread a thin layer of jam on the bottom surface of the full cookie (I never quite know what a thin layer is, and I love this jam with little booze in it, so the first cookies usually end up in my mouth since they are so messy I could hardly show them to anyone ;-)), place the cookie with the hole on top of the jam and gently sandwich the two cookies together. You can add a little bit of jam to fill in the hole in the cookie with a spoon.
13. I like these cookies the best when softened, which takes about a day. If you prefer a crunchy structure, I’d fill in the jam on the day of serving.  

VANILLA CRESCENTS

View fullsize

Ingredients:

• 50g powdered sugar
• 70g roasted, peeled and finely ground hazelnuts
• 50g finely ground walnuts
• 230g fine flour
• 200g softened butter
• vanilla sugar for coating

Preparation:

1. I always mix all the ingredients together and knead them until they form a dough that does not stick. Then I wrap the dough into baking paper and leave it overnight in the refrigerator.
2. The next day, I switch the oven, set the temperature to about 165 °C and fit the parchment paper inside medium sized trays. 
3. Then I take the dough from the fridge, half it (leaving the other half in the fridge) and start rolling the crescents. Rolling and shaping the crescents is incredibly important. My grandma says: "You know the perfect crescents have to be beautiful, small and one just like the other". Well, to be perfectly honest, I have not quite mastered the beautiful and the "one just like the other" part but I am getting there. But it always gets much easier as you slowly finish the dough :)
4. When I'm happy with the crescents, I put them on the tray and when it's full, I put the tray into the oven and let the crescents bake for about 8-10mins until they get a bit pinkish.
5. I take them out of the oven and let them sit to cool down a bit (3 min) and then coat them in vanilla sugar.

View fullsize

Of course, once these are done, be ready to see them gone in a matter of days, if not hours. But hey, isn't eating what's Christmas all about? (At least here in a country where 89% of the population is agnostic or atheist.)

Enjoy the holidays and eat responsibly!

Roundup: Prague restaurants opened in September 2014

September usually means one thing for Taste of Prague: the climax of our summer season... and the wine harvest, which we are always excited about. However, September was a very interesting month for the Prague culinary scene, too. That’s great news: a few very promising places opened in September and despite this being our busiest month, we tried to visit them all. Oh, the sacrifices we have to make for you! :-)

We bring you a roundup of interesting placess that opened in Prague in or around September:

Maso a kobliha

After weeks of excruciating wait, Paul Day's pub and butcher shop, Maso a kobliha (which translates as “Meat and Doughnuts”) opened recently for soft opening. It is located right next to Sansho, and we can easily see ourselves becoming regulars there. They are now fine-tuning the menu and every time we visited, the food was delicious. Maso a kobliha serves English pub food made using the meat from the Real Meat Society, which occupies the prominent meat counter opposite the entry. This means they have organic and traceable dry-aged beef and Prestice pork grown for them, and sometimes chicken. They also serve fantastic sandwiches. The opening of Maso a kobliha is great news for Sansho, too: more kitchen space combined means more space for cooking. And the doughnuts should finally arrive by the end of this week! (Until then, the delicious apple crumble will have to do.) 

View fullsize

Grand Cru

The biggest transfer of the year on the Prague culinary scene so far has been the transfer of Chef Puncochar from Le Terroir to Grand Cru. Grand Cru has expanded its premises near the Petrske namesti square and opened a proper restaurant on top of the wine bar next door. The investor behind the whole project seems to have big plans, which was good news for Mr Puncochar. The famous chef wanted to leave Prague but this opportunity has changed his plans. Our first visit, which we described on our blog recently, has shown great promise. Grand Cru really seems to fight for a top spot on the Prague fine dining scene. The other plan of the investor involves the infamous Monarch wine bar. The Monarch is now being converted into a wine and tapas bar under the management of a Spanish Michelin-star chef.

View fullsize

Ari’s Restaurant

The Vinohrady district has not been short on good openings recently, and the trend seems to be accelerating, if anything. Ari’s Restaurant, the newest Vinohrady venue, was opened by Ari, a former chef at Mandarin Oriental’s Essensia and Hilton’s Zinc. The restaurant takes inspiration mostly from Ari’s native Indonesian cuisine. We visited the restaurant in its first week after opening. We thought our meal was mostly great and offered good value, too. The pork belly with pork cracklings in the sauce was a truly memorable dish that we keep thinking about. The restaurant is still looking for its vibe and atmosphere but if you get a good table, you can see the chefs working in the open kitchen. From October on, Ari’s restaurant plans to present a different South Asian cuisine every week. You can thus taste what’s cooking in Singapore, Borneo, Java and so on.

View fullsize

Mr Banh Mi

Prague had been long waiting for a proper banh mi place. Although more and more Vietnamese places have been cropping up around the city, Red Hot Chili in the Karlin district was the only venue serving banh mi, and for breakfast only. But it seems that the time for banh mi has finally arrived. The small counter at Spalena street in the centre was the first, but it is not worth our recommendation. We loved the banh mi at the recently opened Gao Den with its clean, modern interiors and great food. But only the most daring real estate agents would call its location central - it’s in the middle of a huge panel housing estate in Stodulky. For proper banh mi near the centre, we recommend Mr Banh Mi in Rumunska street in the Vinohrady district. Everything they serve is made in house. Although the waiting time may be a bit longer, they do try their best and the staff is very nice and pleasant. Their baguette made in house may be a bit more rustic than most but we love the crunch and the flavor. 

View fullsize

Bistroteka

La Bottega Bistroteka is the newest eatery by the well established Aromi group that runs Italian venues around Prague. Just like Gastronomica, the group’s previous opening, Bistroteka boasts great, modern design, perfect location in the Dlouha foodie passage next to Sisters bistro and Nase maso butcher shop, and a high standard of cooking. The group’s bistros have always clearly belonged to higher end, but the prices in the new Bistroteka are even higher. That said, we did like our visit and we can see ourselves returning for a special-day breakfast or a nice Italian meal in a relaxed atmosphere.

View fullsize

Anonymous Coffee

The owners of the popular Anonymous Bar have decided to open a café with a cool interior and a theme that matches that of the bar. You know you have entered hipster coffee land when the filter coffee is served in jars, just like in The Barn in Berlin. On our visit, Anonymous offered two types of coffee and you should make sure you know what you getting. One was an Italian-type darker roast, which is not our cup of tea, while the other was a lighter roast great for a flat white. In addition to espresso-based drinks, some salads and gluten-free cakes, Anonymous offers alternative brewing methods, too. You can see that the staff is mostly coffee geeks who love what they do. With a top-of-the-line 3-section La Marzocco La Strada machine, you kinda understand why. 

Woker

Woker was opened by the former executive chef at the upscale Buddha Bar and the owner of the Porto restaurant next door. It is located in the Urxova street and offers sushi, noodle and rice dishes and ramen. The diminutive eatery that sits no more than ten guests plans to do mostly takeaways and deliveries. We visited during the opening week, during which they offered everything for the low, low price of free. The staff was very nice and explained everything. We had the dry-aged Angus beef sushi and we liked it. Their ramen included udon noodles on opening as a preliminary measure, but that should change soon.    

View fullsize

Babovka - Bundt cake recipe

View fullsize

Sunday is the traditional day for cooking here in the Czech Republic. Moms and grandmas gather in the kitchen and start preparing the Sunday lunch because for the older generation, Sunday is the day for a home-cooked meal. From very early morning, you can hear the unmistakeable sound of meat being tenderized for the lunch schnitzels and smell the wonderful odors of hearty Czech comfort food. And because you need to finish your lunch with something sweet, baking is an indispensable part of the whole Sunday morning cooking tradition. And "babovka", or the bundt cake, is an undisputed Sunday lunch classic.

Babovka is recognizable by its unmistakeable shape, inspired by the large skirts worn by older Czech women. Every family should have its own form for the bundt cake. (And so should you: the most conveniently located Czech kitchen ware shop we know of is the shop on the 3rd floor of the Kotva department store right opposite the Palladium mall. You can buy your own form there.) Also, every family has its bundt cake recipe. We have recently tasted the recipe of Lukas, our dear friend, and asked him to share the recipe and the story behind it. This is what he wrote: 

"I remember it like it was yesterday: 'Are you sure you didn’t forget to grease your tray?' my grandmother asked me. Of course I did forget. Almost every single time. She was the one who taught me so much about cooking and baking. She was the involuntary taster of everything I prepared. I remember her grimace when she swallowed something seriously awful but she would still reply 'Uhhmmm! Delicious! The best thing I’ve ever had!' She passed away more than 4 months ago and I miss her so much. I’m writing my very first article in her honor - a recipe for a classic bábovka cake. And granny no, I didn’t forget this time. I will never ever forget again.

For light yet moist cake you will need:

• 250g of full-fat curd cheese
• 250g of butter
• 250g soft wheat flour
• 150g powdered sugar
• 4 eggs
• 1 sachet of baking powder (around 5 grams)

Yes, it’s that easy. And no. It’s not healthy. It’s a dessert for a typical lazy Sunday afternoon. 

View fullsize

Get your oven ready and set the temperature to 170°C/340°F. Divide yolks and whites and whip the yolks with all of the sugar. Then add melted butter with the curd cheese and mix it gently and thoroughly. Put the flour in a bowl and mix it with the baking powder, then pour the mixture into the cream you prepared. Whip the egg whites with your machine to create something we call “snow”, whipped egg whites. Be very careful and fold the snow into the dough to create an amazingly light dough. And - for the love of god - please don’t forget to grease your baking tray with butter. And that’s it! Use a wooden skewer to check whether the cake is finished - if there’s no dough on the skewer, the cake is ready. 

I can almost feel the smell of your freshly baked babovka here. The beautiful memories from my childhood are just coming back to me - me sitting in front of the oven with the task of checking when the cake is ready; me barely unable to wait for the thirty minutes required to allow the cake to cool on the table before eating; and the feeling in my chest when I carried my first babovka proudly for testing by my parents and grandmother. Enjoy your cake wherever you are and please, leave some comments if you try it!"

(Lukas' post was inspired by Petra and her amazing blog - Kitchen and the city)