Where to drink in Prague

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Prague Food Scene: 2019 in review

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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.


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Prague Holiday Dining Guide 2019

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Prague Holiday Dining Guide 2019

Spoiler alert: If you’re spending Christmas in Prague and are reading this in December without a reservation for Christmas Eve dinner, you’re already screwed. Panic and/or stock up on food now.

Prague dining used to be so easy. When we started our Prague food tours back in 2011, we could make reservations for a tour hours before, and restaurants would have a table. While this all has changed and now you need to book sometimes well in advance for the popular restaurants and hours in Prague, even back then there was one exception: Christmas and NYE. That is why, from the very outset of this blog, we have been compiling an annual overview of Prague Christmas and NYE dining options, and this is the 2019 edition.


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The beginner's guide to beer in Prague

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The beginner's guide to beer in Prague

You know what they say: ”The best Czech wine is… beer.”

Of course, this is disrespectful of the beautiful Czech and Moravian wine production that we are so fond of, but the undeniable fact is that the Czech beer culture is one of the strongest unifying themes in the Czech national identity. While ”Czech Republic means beer” may sound as a cliché, it is mostly right. We Czechs actually do love beer and drink a lot of it. And the Czech beer culture is unique in several ways. Beer is to Czechs what wine is to the French - just walk into any restaurant and order their “house beer”, and it will be cheap and good. It’s the default beverage. A no brainer.

So you should have a beer in Prague. Make it several beers. Not having a beer in Prague would be a mistake even if you think you don’t like beer. Honestly, don’t diss beer until you had a tank Pilsner Urquell (more on that later) on a hot night. It might be a game changer. We know it has been for many guests of our Prague Foodie Tour. We’ve had many beer converts on our tours actually.

The following is a short guide to beer in Prague. Of course, this is in no way comprehensive or exhaustive - most travelers don’t spend more than three nights in Prague, so this mostly for them. The idea here is to get you introduced to the world of Czech beer and get some basic lay of the land, teach you what you should drink and where, what to look for and what to avoid in your Prague beer experience. So let’s do this! Na zdraví! (Which obviously means Cheers in Czech!)


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Hana's Five Favorites in Prague

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Hana's Five Favorites in Prague

In an ideal world, Hana would have been the first team mate we would have hired. We did talk about her joining us waaaay back when Taste of Prague was just Zuzi and Jan. But we don’t live in an ideal world, and Hana was not ready to leave the big law she was practicing at the time, just like Zuzi did a few years before. Fast forward five years later, and we are incredibly happy to welcome Hana to our small team. She will fit in like a glove - she loves food and other people’s company. She still does practice law a bit, though. (Remember, not living in an ideal world?)

There is something about Hana. She has a calming, soothing presence, and you just can’t help but feel good when she’s around. She’s a great listener with heaps of empathy, and when she talks, you listen. We also assume she hates being bored: she’s a well-travelled fan of food, wine and coffee, an avid skier who likes to bike and hike, and has a keen interest in architecture and urban planning. Oh yes, and movies. You know, the smart kind.

What we’re trying to say she’s busy. Or crazy. One of those two things. But never mind her schedule, she was super quick to give her tips for her five favorite places in Prague and five social media accounts, and not one, not two, but four (!) secret tips for Prague. But that’s just Hanna being Hanna. So here we go!


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The new Prague Foodie Map is here! Bigger, fatter, badder.

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The new Prague Foodie Map is here! Bigger, fatter, badder.

So the day has arrived and we are happy to announce the third itineration of what our moms, and the voices inside our heads, say is by far the best food guide to Prague - the Prague Foodie Map.

This version did not come easy to us. Originally scheduled “before Christmas”, it took us over half a year to finish. And let us tell you, a lot of things can happen in six months on Prague’s food scene, which has led to many, many, many rewrites. This was the first full version we wrote as parents, and in many way, the process showed. But at the end of the day, we feel that writing the guide as parents has added a completely new dimension that the guide lacked before. (And no, we’re not talking about sleep deprivation.)


Best Cocktail Bars in Prague

Best Cocktail Bars in Prague

It is time to let the secret out. Cocktail bars in Prague are way better than you have any right to think they are. Sure, you’re thinking “Hey Taste of Prague, shouldn’t I drink beer while in Prague?” Yes, you should. The beer culture of Prague is quite unique and exceptional, and the Czechs are famous for their beers and rightfully so. But Prague’s true hidden gem is its cocktail bars, and you would be seriously missing out if you did not have a drink or two while visiting the City of Thousand Spires.

What follows is a shortlist of what we think are the best cocktail bars in Prague.


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The 2018 Prague Food Scene in Review

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The 2018 Prague Food Scene in Review

Confession: we have been bitching about Prague food scene’s development probably for a better portion of 2018. Not enough places are opening, some great places are closing, and where’s the innovation? While Prague lost a Michelin star and a Bib Gourmand award in the spring, the world lost Anthony Bourdain and Jonathan Gold, and generally, the mood here at Taste of Prague was fairly low. (Only to be lifted by the shenanigans of JJ and Lola, the two newest members of the team.)

But looking back at the year, things look a bit more rosy now in hindsight, thanks mostly to what can be described as a strong finish. (And the pills may have finally kicked in too.) 2018 was a year that has solidified some of the trends we have had seen before. People in Prague like to go out. A lot. Booking great restaurants for our Prague food tours has become a game of long-term strategy, and booking for last-minute enquiries nearly impossible. Don’t believe us? Look at Instagram videos from Dva kohouti, which opened in December. It’s been hopelessly full from opening up until Christmas. Whatever the concept, people seem to jump on it, at least for now.

Also, 2018 saw consolidation, as two new groups seem to have emerged to challenge the market-leading, and, in a way, defining behemoth that is the Ambiente group. Czech diners want common sense, quality and transparency if they are to spend top dollar, and seem less prone to jump on hype. So when an all-avocado restaurant opens, the logic of opening a restaurant based on produce that is in no way local and has to travel the world to get here is questioned online, and when a new rotisserie chicken place opens and serves chickens from a large, industrial chicken farm, they are called on that, too. That said, both of these places seem to be prospering at the moment, so we’ll see if this awareness manifests itself only online, and not in… ahem… real life.


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Five Faves: Prague tips by locals - Marcela Vuong

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Five Faves: Prague tips by locals - Marcela Vuong

If you want to see the Sapa market, you want to see it with Marcela - project manager by day, Vietnamese food tour guide by… ehhhh… day, too (but mostly on weekends). Warm, friendly and passionate about food, she is the perfect companion to what at the beginning might seem like an impenetrable maze of warehouses and hole-in-a-wall pho places. (Did we mention she’s beautiful, too?) Heck, she gave us her own tips when we wrote about the market, and they have never failed us on our own visits.

Born in Vietnam yet raised in the Bohemian town of Chomutov (“No-one comes from there,” she claims incorrectly, not knowing that Zuzi was in fact raised there, too.), she has a unique insight into both Vietnamese and Czech food and culture, and isn’t afraid to share it. What started as cooking Vietnamese dishes for her friends (and she has many, often recruited from young fashion and design circles) eventually snowballed into one of the most popular tours to Sapa. She also seems to be travelling all the time, which we often observe on social media with thinly disguised envy. So yes, we like her, and we think you’d like her too. Here’s her five faves for Prague and social media.


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Prague food scene in 2017 - a year in review

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Prague food scene in 2017 - a year in review

Oh, what a year 2017 was. What started rather slowly has become, both for us personally and for Prague’s food scene in general, a year of excitement and hope. Here’s the year 2017 in review, as it relates to the Prague food scene.

(And yes, we did not know what picture to post as the title photo, so we put a pic from Maso a Kobliha with JJ's first hand modeling assignment.)


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The best Prague cafes (2017 edition)

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The best Prague cafes (2017 edition)

The cafes in Prague are great, and the specialty coffee they serve is seriously good. It's easy to forget that or take it for granted. But when we travel, one of the things we miss the most about Prague is coffee. It's really that good.

It hasn't always been the case. Five yeas ago Zuzi came back from the specialty coffee workshop and the number of coffee shops we could visit shrunk to about two or three, much to Jan's dismay. Now when a new cafe opens, it is more likely to have good rather than bad coffee. Sure, they rarely bring anything very new or different to the table, but they are usually good. And it's not only about the "centre" anymore. None of the residential districts that surround it are actually lacking in the specialty coffee department. 

So what makes the cafes in Prague so special? Passion. Specialty coffee seems to be a viable career in Prague, and the baristas of Prague's best coffee shops seem to genuinely like what they do. Most of the coffee shops are  independently owned and can source their coffee from wherever they wish. Prague's leading specialty coffee roaster has set the prices of coffee fairly low, which means you get great bang for your buck. And at the coffee scene's core lies a community of baristas who know and continue pushing each other. And you generally don't get any attitude or scolding when you want sugar in your coffee. 

It's time to reap the benefits. Here's the best cafes in Prague, according to us.


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