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Cafe-Restaurant Metamorphis
Metamorphis is the place to go if you want romantic outdoor dining (April to October) with a view of the Týn Church spires, but without the crowds and inflated prices of places on Old Town Square. The menu is mainly Italian, including good pizzas and pasta dishes, and gorgeous ice-cream sundaes. The more formal restaurant in the atmospheric Romanesque cellar downstairs offers crisp linen, candlelight and attentive service.
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Cantina
Convivial Latin eatery, just opposite the Petřín Hill tramway, where you can dine under a ceiling of coffee-sacks on the usual array of chilli con carne, enchiladas and quesadillas. They've catered for the Mexican Embassy, won the Prague Post readers' choice for the city's best Mexican restaurant, and have a well-stocked cocktail bar! Who could ask for more?
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Casa Argentina
This relatively new place seems designed to tease Prague carnivores. The service is ditzy, the parilla -theme interior is kitsch, but the place serves such tasty grilled steaks that people find themselves returning, despite themselves. Local restaurant critics suggest you ask for your steak without butter and apply any sauce yourself.
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Cheers
This bright and smiley bar-restaurant serves an eclectic range of dishes from around the world, with Thai, Greek, Italian, Japanese and Mexican cuisine represented. Try the tofu salad, kebabs, fish and chips, duck or tasty pasta with blue cheese sauce. There's an equally tempting drink list.
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Chez Marcel
There's an authentic French bistro atmosphere at this peaceful back-street café-bar, from the blue haze of cigarette smoke hanging over the dark wood tables to the copies of Le Monde and Le Figaro and the escargots on the menu. Stick to the simple dishes - steak au poivre, grilled chicken, quiche lorraine, the daily specials - and you won't be disappointed.
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Country Life
This veteran health-food outlet belongs to the old, hair-shirt veggie (in fact vegan) school. Its pay-by-weight buffet of salads, tofu burgers and hot dishes is by no means gourmet, especially later in the day. However, it's ridiculously cheap and quite popular. There's an attached shop too.
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Cowboys
There's a fine line between chic and kitsch, but this upmarket steakhouse manages to walk it, even in clunky boots and slightly tacky staff outfits. Its Dolce and Gabbana-style cowhide seats and adult-orientated rock soundtrack is offset by soft lighting, exposed brick and a simple but deftly executed menu. There are succulent steaks and tasty fish, plus pasta and Portobello mushroom burger for nonmeat eaters. The outdoor terrace, 70 steps up, overlooks Prague's rooftops.
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Cremeria Milano
For very little money, make believe you're rich by popping into this upscale café and grabbing some out-of-this-world Cream & Dream gelati - unrivalled in Prague. While here, don't forget to swoon over the cakes too. The original Cream & Dream (224 211 035; Husova 12) is still going strong, although it's on a thoroughare that's even more ridiculously crowded in summer.
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Cukrkávalimonáda
This 20-seat gem is as sweet as its name, sugar-coffee-lemonade (also the Czech equivalent of eeny meeny miny moe). Its historic ceiling beams' floral pattern caps a fairly bare wooden interior while the blackboard menu offers delicious pasta, pancakes, salads, wines and cakes (eggs and omelettes aren't so good.) The 'superior' hot chocolate of 70-percent melted dark chocolate is positively primordial; apparently some even manage to finish it.
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Ebel Coffee House
The 30 different sorts of coffee aren't really as good as received wisdom would have it, but this courtyard café makes a charming bolthole to avoid the crowds around the corner on the Old Town Sq.
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El Centro
Delicious tapas, paella and lots of Spanish-style seafood dishes are served at this rustic little bodega. Alternatives include lamb and pork, not to mention a sensational gazpacho. There's a good choice of wines, multilingual staff and a friendly, casual atmosphere.
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El Gaucho
Fancy some meat with your beefsteak? El Gaucho is carnivore heaven - a rustic, rug-draped basement serving charcoal-grilled steaks, beef heart, liver, pickled tongue and all the other bits of a cow you just never knew what to do with - waste not want not! For the offally adventurous only.
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Fraktal
This low-lit cellar feels like a genuine neighbourhood eatery and watering hole, with Czech and expat regulars treating the staff like old friends. Newcomers are made to feel welcome, too. Although the nightly focus is on beer (Pilsner Urquell, Gambrinus and Kozel), the food is well-produced. Mexican dishes, steaks, salads and gourmet burgers are crowned by excellent weekend brunches (till ).
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Francouzská Restaurace
The grand main restaurant of the even grander Municipal House is a haven for fine dining. Coq au vin , bouillabaisse and swordfish are some of the gourmet offerings, or there's the cheaper 3-course 'quick lunch' menu, which changes regularly. The Art Nouveau decor is sublime.
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Gitanes
This folksy-looking restaurant - think arched ceiling and lots of patterned tablecloths, paintings of rural idylls and wall hangings - is popular for its meat and seafood grills. The choice for vegetarians is a bit slim, even among the pasta section, but couples love to book its romantic private room.
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Globe Bookshop & Café
Under new owners, this long-standing expat institution is looking good again, with its red café walls and quirky paintings. If you don't mind the Crackberry (sorry, Blackberry) and laptop owners treating it as their office, it does cheap-and-filling business lunches and American-style breakfasts, as well as dinners. Foremost, it's a bar, a place to mingle, post community ads or access the internet; its designation as a bookshop seems to be the least of it.
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Grand Café Orient
Cubism shines in this reborn gem. The 2005 refurbishment - after an 80-year closure - has followed Josef Gocar's original designs, with striking green cloth lampshades, striped green upholstery and an angular wooden bar and coathooks. The result is quite swish, and still as popular with locals as it is with tourists.
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Hergetova Cihelná
Slightly less starry and more affordable than its sister, Kampa Park, this converted 18th-century cihelná (brickworks) is rated as a better bet by many locals, despite some recent grumbles about the consistency of its food. Hergetova Cihelná also boasts fantastic riverside views, while its menu includes pasta, fish, meat, Czech specialities and interesting 'top hat' food stacks. Ask for the cheaper wine list.
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Hot
This designer venue in the heart of the tourist maelstrom is like a supper-club for the new century, as a pretty upbeat, rocky soundtrack gradually kicks in over the evening. The renovated Art Deco space looks fantastic, with leather chairs and mood lighting up front, plus a swish 1960s sci-fi movie-set appearance at the rear. The pared-down menu offers either steaks (including fish) or pastas, but the food is rather good.
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Kampa Park
Prague's single most famous restaurant since opening in 1994, Mick Jagger, Johnny Depp, Lauren Bacall, Robbie Williams and Bill and Hilary Clinton have all over-tipped here. The modern international cuisine runs from spinach soufflé to Norwegian salmon with vanilla mash to veal filet mignon. However, it's the location that's truly stunning; from the riverside cobblestoned terrace you overlook the lights of Charles Bridge. There's also a roof terrace and indoor dining room.
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Káva Káva Káva
More people seem to come to this American-owned café tucked away in the Platýz courtyard for the wi-fi (charged for) and internet access downstairs than for the middling coffee. (It's won awards, but not from us.) It's a good spot for snacking, though, including unconventional bruschetta , served on black bread, and honey cake.
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Klub Architektů
Trust an architects' society to combine a candlelit 12th-century cellar with exposed industrial ducting and modern metalwork...whatever, they're doing something right, as this place is always busy. The extensive menu caters to vegetarians and vegans as well as carnivores but, as in any place with a big menu, the daily specials are always a good idea.
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Kogo
We find it quite amusing: Many residents complain this place isn't as good as it used to be, but ask the same people for one reliable recommendation in Prague and they'll name Kogo. Its secret is authentically Italian-style relaxed chic but the top-notch pizza, pasta, steak, seafood and coffee don't hurt either. Although its shopping-mall location doesn't seem promising, there are courtyard tables in summer and high-chairs year-round for kids.
