Visit Greece > Athens Restaurants

Going out to restaurants is an important part of Athenian culture. Greeks are enthusiastic about their cuisine: the freshness of local products, countless local specialties and new takes on traditional dishes combine to form an exceptional culinary scene. The restaurant market is presently seeing a significant upswing, evidenced by the arrival of myriad new trendy cafés and restaurants.

But keep in mind the time difference! In Athens, people dine about 10 p.m., and it's not unusual to sit down to dinner around midnight, particularly on the weekend. Many restaurants don't open until 9 p.m. Some of them are also bars and begin to fill up very late in the evening. Most restaurants in the Plaka and Acropolis neighborhoods are aimed at tourists and offer fairly similar traditional menus. You'll find more hip modern establishments near downtown, in Psiri, Kolonaki and the old industrial areas that are being reborn. Near Gazi and Rouf, the restaurant culture is very seasonal, meaning that many of the best restaurants close for the summer, often to the advantage of twin restaurants located on the islands. In the summer, people always eat outdoors on the patio, while winter is the time to discover another side of Athenian restaurants.

Along with meze (generally consisting of five varieties of appetizers) and the famous Greek salad to begin the meal, in Athens you can sample all the Greek specialties: moussaka, giouvetsi (braised lamb or veal), stifado (meat and onion stew), soutzoukakia (spiced meatballs in tomato sauce), etc. Grilled or fried fish is generally sold by weight. And then there's ouzo, Greeks' favorite apéritif, and the famous resiny Retsina, their favorite wine. But the ouzeris of the old days are slowly dying out in Athens, to be replaced by big cafés with flashy decor.