10 Amazing Places to Eat and Drink in Kraków
The beautiful city of Kraków in Poland has lots of different kinds of cafés and restaurants to offer. From trendy coffee shops to traditional Polish restaurants, when we went to Kraków we wanted to try it all. In this blog post, we’re sharing our favorite cafés and restaurants in Kraków we’ve been to. We hope this blog post will make it easier for you to determine where to drink a cup of coffee or eat a delicious, typically Polish meal in Kraków.
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1. Metrum Restobistro
Metrum Restobistro feels like a hidden gem, despite the fact that it’s actually featured in most blog posts about Kraków. It’s a simple café that’s open during the day where you can enjoy breakfast, lunch and drinks. As it’s a self-service place, you have to order at the counter to get your drinks and a timer for the food. The prices are great. We indulged in a big breakfast with two coffees, two scrambled eggs and a chocolate croissant for just €12,50 in total. The food and coffees were really good, but the views are what make Metrum an amazing place. Metrum is located on the sixth floor of a building near Kraków’s main square. Since all buildings in Kraków’s old town are relatively low, you look out on the roofs and churches near you, such as Basylika Mariacka on Rynek Główny and Wawel Castle. There’s an outdoor seating area as well, but since it was cold and covered in snow it was closed during our visit. We can imagine that it’s a perfect spot when the temperatures are nicer. In our opinion, you can’t miss this place when in Kraków.
2. Fresh Café
Even though Fresh Café is worth the same hype as Metrum Restobistro, we accidentally stumbled upon Fresh Café and hadn’t read about it anywhere. Fresh Café is located along the Wisła River at the top floor of the building called Cricoteka, which houses a museum. With floor to ceiling windows, Fresh Café offers beautiful views of the river and the surroundings. It’s also a self-service restaurant serving Italian inspired food for reasonable prices. We enjoyed a focaccia and a hearty winter soup, which were delicious and the huge portions kept us full the entire afternoon. As the sun sets very early in Poland in December, we enjoyed golden hour during lunch time at 14:00 which was very beautiful. Even though Fresh Café is a 30-minute walk from Rynek Główny, it’s very worth the pleasant walk.
3. Charlotte
Charlotte is a café that serves French breakfast all day, from early in the morning until midnight. As French breakfast is our favorite kind of breakfast, we had to check it out. For less than €6 per person you each get a basket with bread, a croissant, spreads, butter, an egg and coffee or tea. This is less than half the price of a comparable breakfast in France. Besides the affordable price, it was also very delicious. The pieces of bread and croissants tasted just like they do in France. We love that they serve breakfast all day as we could eat a French breakfast any time of the day. They also serve non-breakfast foods such as salads, sandwiches and different kinds of cakes. Charlotte has two locations in Kraków, one in the old town and one in the Kazimierz district. We went to the one in the Kazimierz district as we hoped it wouldn’t be so crowded, and luckily it wasn’t. The location in the old town is often more crowded, especially during lunch time so you might have to wait a bit to catch a table. All in all, we can highly recommend getting a French breakfast at Charlotte.
4. Camelot Café
Camelot Café is a cute place serving a wide variety of food. It was actually hard to choose from their menu. We opted for an omelet and a carrot soup with ginger which were great choices. We really enjoyed the food. Besides great food, we also liked their tea a lot. They serve some kind of winter tea with ginger, orange slices and cardamom and it was so delicious. We’re definitely going to try to get that at home. Since the café isn’t that big, we were lucky to get a table during prime lunch time. They don’t do queues, so if there’s no free table available they send you away. The location of Camelot is very central near Rynek Główny. We loved that the place was decorated for Christmas and there were a few Christmas trees in front of the door which looked so nice. We only have positive things to say about Camelot Café and it’s a no-brainer for food and drinks.
5. Europejska Café
Even though Europejska Café is located right on Rynek Główny, we only discovered it on our second day in Kraków. When walking past this corner of the main square, the Art Nouveau facade drew our attention. Peeking inside, we noticed that it wasn’t only the facade that’s in Art Nouveau style, but the interior is too. As we were on our way to get dinner, we decided to come back the next day for drinks. If you love Art Nouveau, Europejska Café is a must-visit. Be aware that the prices are a lot higher than most places in Kraków. We paid €10 for two teas. If you don’t feel like spending too much but still want to enjoy the ambiance, we’d recommend going there just for drinks.
6. Hevre
Hevre is a restaurant in the Kazimierz district. The restaurant is in an old synagogue and the decorations are great with a lot of chandeliers, run down walls (but in a good way!) and carpets. We thought the interior of Hevre looked so cool. We only went there for drinks so we don’t know whether the food is good. At least for drinks it’s a great place to stop by.
7. Finca Coffee
When we were exploring the Kazimierz district we walked past Finca Coffee, a small coffee shop and decided to warm up with some tea here. They serve coffee, tea and cakes/cookies. We’re not sure whether they serve food too. We appreciated the Christmas decorations as it added to that festive feel we love in December. All in all, we loved Finca for a coffee or tea break.
8. Pierogarnia Domowa
Of course we had to try the delicious Polish cuisine while we were in Kraków. Pierogarnia Domowa is a self-service restaurant serving lots of different kinds of Polish dumplings called pierogi, and that is exactly what we had. We had a hard time choosing between all the fillings, but eventually we went for 3 plates of pierogi. One filled with mint, potato and cottage cheese, another filled with spinach and feta cheese, and the last one filled with meat. They were all very good but the filling with mint, potato and cottage cheese was our favorite. Besides pierogi, they serve other typical Polish foods as well, such as bigos (hunter’s stew) and żurek (sour rye soup). In our opinion, Pierogarnia Domowa is a great place to try pierogi. Be aware that it’s like a fast-food kind of restaurant, so don’t expect anything fancy. Pierogarnia Domowa is very centrally located near the main square.
9. Pierogarnia Krakowiacy
Just like Pierogarnia Domowa, Pierogarnia Krakowiacy is a self-service fast food restaurant serving pierogi and other typical Polish food. Even the interior of Pierogarnia Krakowiacy looks similar to that of Pierogarnia Domowa. A huge difference is that Pierogarnia Krakowiacy has lots of different locations scattered throughout the city, whereas there’s only one Pierogarnia Domowa. The prices are also slightly higher at Pierogarnia Krakowiacy. Here we went with bigos and wild mushroom soup. Both dishes were served in a bread bowl, which we really loved as it’s such a unique way to serve food. The bread bowl, however, was huge so we couldn’t finish it all. Both dishes were delicious and we can highly recommend stopping by Pierogarnia Krakowiacy to try it. Since there are so many locations of Pierogarnia Krakowiacy, there’s always a place near you.
10. Pod Wawalem
Last but definitely not least, we had dinner at Pod Wawalem. The restaurant is located near Wawel Castle and it drew our attention because of the interior. Even though the place is quite big inside, you might have to wait for a table on the weekends. When we visited on a Tuesday evening we were able to immediately get a table. They have a huge menu serving different kinds of food from the region and a lot of meat. There are some options for vegetarians though. The service is very fast. We went for a wiener schnitzel (which is obviously not Polish) and a potato pancake with wild mushrooms. Unfortunately, the wiener schnitzel was a bit dry, but the potato pancake was heavenly. The portions here are huge. We could barely finish our food and when we looked around we noticed that a lot of people had even bigger plates of food. They can wrap up your leftovers in a takeaway bag so you don’t have to spoil the food in case you can’t eat it all. We would recommend this place, mostly for its delicious potato pancakes.
We hope we made choosing a place to eat or drink in Kraków a bit easier for you with this blog post. Have you been to Kraków or is it still on your travel bucket list? Let us know in the comments below!
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Visiting the Christmas Market in Kraków