Although this guide dates from September 2023, it has been updated as the result of another visit in September 2024. I have added a number of restaurants and cafés, and tried to make clear whether each entry dates from 2023, 2024 or a combination of both. I have removed two entries from this list, Bar Aliatar and the Mercado de San Agustin, because I didn’t visit them in 2023 or 2024. But they are still in the original 2019 guide if you want to read about them.

Of all the city guides on my blog, the guide to Granada is the oldest and creakiest: it was written over four years ago and I’m very conscious that a combination of Covid and life making other plans meant that I hadn’t been able to return to the city, one of my favourite places on earth. It was only this month, finally, that I got to renew my acquaintance with it: it was every bit as happy an occasion as any post-Covid reunion I can think of.

The previous guide talks about my own history with Granada and I won’t rehash all that here – by all means read it if you’re interested – but instead, after four years away, I wanted to set the scene by talking about just what a magical city Granada is, and why it’s worth considering if you’re trying to decide where your next city break should be. Because I think there’s nowhere quite like Granada, and I’m going to have a stab at explaining why.

First of all, there’s the obvious stuff. By which I mean the Alhambra, an eternally beautiful place full of placid gardens, burbling fountains and stunning Moorish architecture, tiles and carvings and woodworking which will stay in your mind (and on your phone) for the rest of your days. To this day it remains pretty much the only tourist attraction I’ve ever visited to which hype cannot do justice. But the people who bus in on a coach, see the Alhambra and then sod off miss out on one of the most beautiful, and certainly the most interesting, cities I have ever been to.

The other obvious thing is tapas, and Granada’s tapas culture. Tapas isn’t unique to Granada, or even necessarily to Andalucia any more, and the word has been culturally appropriated by everyone trying to sell you not much food for rather a lot of money. But if those people ever went to Granada, if they had any shame, they might just die of it. In Granada free food with every drink is a way of life – and not just shitty lip service food but good, interesting little dishes. You could hop from one bar to the next living on whatever accompanies your caña of cold, crisp beer but often – and this is the genius of the place – it sends you scurrying to the menu. If that’s what you get for free, just how good could the other dishes on offer be? Maybe it’s just me, but that gets me every time.

But there’s more to Granada than the Alhambra and tapas – although that, alone, would be enough to justify a visit. It’s many cities rolled into one. You have the gorgeous whitewashed side streets and traversas of the Albaicin, the ancient Arab quarter of the city. There are miradors looking out on the hills the other side of the river, at the majesty of the Alhambra and the mountains beyond.

Connecting the Albaicin to the centre are steep streets lined with teterias, houses serving beautiful tea, fragrant with mint or spices. And then there’s the faux market of the Alcaiceria, a little grid of lanes which serves as a pocket version of Istanbul’s Grand Bazaar, only without the haggling. Beyond that there is the serene beauty of its cathedral and monasteries, and gorgeous tree lined squares where the birdsong is deafening as the evening begins. 

If that wasn’t enough, there’s also the Realejo, a district full of street art and scruff, busy bars, craft beer and third wave coffee. And of course there’s the Carrera del Darro, possibly Granada’s most beautiful street, hugging the banks of the river, crossed by little bridges, before it opens out into the Paseo de los Tristes, a beautiful square which affords you a gorgeous view up to the Alhambra.

I could go on. The shopping is surprisingly good, the coffee scene has come on in leaps and bounds since I visited in 2019 and the more modern parts of the city, away from the cathedral or the main drag are full of great restaurants and bars, many of which are largely untroubled by tourists. Truly I love everything about the place, from the bollards in the shape of pomegranates (the symbol of the city) to the tiny red buses that crisscross its narrow streets. Have I convinced you yet?

If I haven’t, a few final extra things might. It always used to be tricky to get to, but Vueling flies there direct from Gatwick once a week – out on a Tuesday morning and back on a Saturday evening, the perfect duration for a city break with a day to pack beforehand and a day to reacclimatise afterwards. And last of all, I struggle to think of a better value city break. Even our best meals there came nowhere near to breaking the bank and not only does the beer come with food but things like coffee are unbelievably reasonably priced. A top notch, third wave latte will set you back less than two Euros. The shops and markets are full of things you can’t get at home – you know, niche stuff like fresh fruit and vegetables. Really, for my liking, it’s pretty close to heaven on earth.

This guide is completely revamped from its 2019 precursor. I have added a number of venues and taken a couple out – in the vast majority of cases where I’m recommending somewhere I recommended in 2019 I went there again on this trip and the writing (and, where possible, the picture) is brand new. There are only two recommendations carried over from 2019 which I did not get to revisit, and where this is the case I’ve clearly said so. I hope you find it useful, or at least enjoy reading it: all I can say is that I very much enjoyed living it.

1. Atelier Casa de Comidas

Atelier Casa de Comidas, a short walk from El Corte Inglés in the newer part of the city, received a Bib Gourmand from Michelin. And as so often that accolade, far more so than the overhyped Michelin star, is a reliable indicator that you’re going to have a fantastic meal.

It’s a beautiful, tasteful dining room and a menu full of temptations. In the evenings you can get a full tasting menu but I went for lunch in 2023 and everything I had was beautiful. I loved an appetiser of patatas bravas spiked and given a new lease of life with a hefty kick of kimchee and was in raptures about a phenomenal dish of nutty green peas in a rich, savoury broth with prawn foam, pickled prawns and fried prawn heads (not the kind of thing I’d normally eat, but enough to convert any doubter).

Pluma iberica – glazed almost like char siu – was up there with the best I have ever had and a dessert of chocolate ganache with ginger and rosemary was a fantastic way to end a meal. So why, even having had one of my lunches of the year, did I find myself thinking about the savoury croissant, loaded with slow-cooked oxtail, that my companions had had the sense to order and I hadn’t? C’est la vie, I suppose.

I should also mention that the restaurant had some of the best service I’ve experienced in a long time. The staff were trilingual (some speaking English and others speaking French when our English and Spanish respectively weren’t up to the task) and the sommelier was magnificent, picking us some outstanding cava, wine and sherries for all of our dishes. The single most expensive meal of the entire holiday, it cost barely more than fifty pounds a head.

I said in 2023 that when I went back to Granada this would be the first reservation I make. And so it proved, because on my final night in the city in 2024 we returned for the tasting menu. On this occasion the staff were not as trilingual, or even as bilingual, as I might have liked so I missed the nuance of some of the dishes but there was no mistaking the quality of the execution. It was a real fireworks display, from watermelon treated almost to have the taste and texture of meat, to a fantastic sea bass tartare with kimchi and caviar, to rudely pink Iberian pork, cooked superbly.

Atelier Casa de Comidas appears to have lost its Bib Gourmand since I went there first. But on the most recent display, they seem to have loftier goals in their sights.

Atelier Casa de Comidas
Calle Sos del Rey Católico, 7, 18006 Granada
https://ateliercasadecomidas.com/en/home/

2. Betula Nana

I had another truly lovely lunch in 2023 at Betula Nana, a small chic restaurant just opposite Granada’s small and perfectly formed Botanical Gardens. It’s a great spot which reminded me a little of Bordeaux’s Echo, and its menu was also compact and bijou. But it was also brimming over with inventiveness and delicious flavours. I had huge envy for my companions’ squid ink tortilla, black as night, swimming in a garlic sauce and garlanded with clams, but had a starter, in the shape of a carpaccio of king oyster mushrooms with tiny nuggets of candied, caramelised beetroot which was unlike anything I could remember.

Main courses, if anything, induced more envy – my confit bacalao was a dish badly in need of some carbs, and I wished I’d gone for Zoë’s pork cheek curry, all retro Vesta flavours, the sauce seeping into a bed of potatoes crushed with olive oil, or Liz’s beautifully done tuna tataki. But that’s life. For dessert, because the four of us couldn’t decide, we ordered all three desserts – a wobbly tart, a gooey chocolate cake and a colossal tiramisu – and attacked them between us. Our lunch came to just over forty quid a head, helped by the fact that you can’t find a bottle on their wine list costing more than twenty Euros. I love this city.

Returning in 2024, I found that if anything Betula Nana had raised its game still further and everything I had was just terrific. I wouldn’t say the menu had changed drastically in the intervening year, but a cecina and fig salad was far more enjoyable than salad has any right to be, and squid in its own ink served on a pillow of basmati was a Stygian miracle. This time I chose more smartly, and the tuna tataki – an ever-present on menus on the continent – was one of the most memorable dishes of my trip. Betula Nana only has about 18 covers, seems to be busy every lunchtime and can only be booked by WhatsApp. But it’s well worth doing so.

Betula Nana
Calle Málaga, 9, 18002 Granada

3. Bodegas Castañeda

Bodegas Castañeda, on a random weekday night nearly twenty-five years ago, was the first place I ever went in Granada. It was love at first sight – a long bar, all the beer and vermouth you could drink and a tapa with every single one. A different tapa every time, too, because they keep track. Since then I have never visited Granada without going back to Bodegas Castañeda, usually multiple times, and it’s invariably the first place I visit. 

On my 2023 trip I went twice in one day – once mid-afternoon with Zoë to check that it was still heaven on earth, and then in the evening with Zoë, Liz and James because few better places exist to kick off an evening. It seems to be busier every time, and now they have a lot of tables in the alleyway outside, but I still prefer standing at the bar, bustling and jostling, and enjoying it for as long as I can. 

That said, I went back in 2024 and again, sat in the alleyway, and for the first time got the sense that Castañeda was perhaps trading on past glories. The food was a little scruffier, a little lazier, a little underseasoned and lacking in finesse. The furniture was tatty, and I wondered whether my favourite place for a quarter of a century was being superseded, not just by the whippersnappers but also by the old stagers like Los Diamantes and Los Manueles which had expanded to multiple locations across the city while Castañeda, in the same place as ever, stood still.

Even saying all that, I know that the next time I go to Granada I will still go there, just to check in on it. It’s what you do with very old friends.

Bodegas Castañeda
Calle Almireceros, 1-3, 18010 Granada

4. Taberna La Tana

Like Bodegas Castañeda, I have been going to Taberna La Tana for a very long time. It is a fantastic place to drink wine and eat tapas, and for many years it was a relatively well kept secret. But Anthony Bourdain visited it in 2013 for an episode of Parts Unknown, and now that secret is out. That means it is always busy, which is no bad thing, but also that it is full of Americans, which may or may not be your idea of a good time.

On my previous visit to La Tana in 2019 it was still a place to arrive early and hug the bar – preferably at lunchtime when you could guarantee a space – and if you were really lucky and got practically the only table in the entire place you felt like the king of the world. But that has changed. In 2023 La Tana had plenty of tables in the alley outside and you could book them for a two hour early or late evening sitting. Somehow this didn’t feel very Granada, but I suppose it meant fewer people being turned away because it was full. So not the old magic but a new, different and equally valid kind of magic.

Returning the following year I found more change afoot. The front room now had tables in it too, and they had expanded further into the neighbouring room. Menus were on QR codes, and the whole thing felt brisker, slicker and more focused on maximising returns. And that’s all well and good – restaurants need to make money, and good restaurants deserve to survive, but I had a sense that the La Tana of 2024 felt a world away from the place I fell in love with over a decade ago.

Did it mean I didn’t have a brilliant evening? Absolutely not. The wine was exquisite (and having access to the whole list via a QR code was the right kind of progress), the guacamole was still the best I’ve ever had and La Tana’s tomates aliñado, tumbled in superb olive oil and studded with salt, were the best I had in the city. The anchovies and paletilla were outstanding, too.

If you’d never been to La Tana before and you visited it in this incarnation, you’d think it was the best thing since sliced ham, and you wouldn’t be a million miles off. But for those of us who have a longer acquaintance with La Tana, it’s a little more complex. It’s a wonderful place, but just not the same wonderful place I remember. I almost envy people discovering it for the first time, who never have to feel that tug of conflict between the old and the new.

Taberna La Tana
Placeta del Agua, 3, 18009 Granada
https://www.tabernalatana.com

5. Rincón de Rodri

We went to Rincón de Rodri on our last night in the city in 2023, a Friday night, and I had the best time there. It’s a seafood bar and restaurant – tall tables and the bar at the front, and more conventional tables at the back. We’d reserved a table for four, so we were at the back, and it was all a little faux nautical with blue and white striped walls. Only one other table was occupied, and I wondered if we’d made a bad choice.

But of course, it was because we turned up at half eight, when no sensible Spaniard would dine. And this restaurant is all Spaniards, to the point where they had to send over the only member of the serving staff who spoke any English. By half nine the place was rammed, and an absolute riot from start to finish.

And the food! The food was magnificent. From our opening tapa, slices of meltingly soft swordfish served with crisp white cabbage, to pert fried chipirones, golden and moreish sprinkled with freshly squeezed lemon and dipped in a thick, potent alioli, everything was fantastic. I particularly liked the hake, feather-light and impossible to resist, and a huge hunk of atun rojo, just-seared, still very pink in the middle, brought to a vacant neighbouring table and sliced thickly there and then, easily sashimi grade.

An outrageously good albarino was twenty-five Euros a bottle, and we ordered several. They brought us a shot of a liqueur the flavour of pionono, the cinnamon pastry particular to Granada, and it was like the best Baileys you’ve ever tasted. We rolled out having spent barely forty quid each, and I just wanted to do it again the following Friday night, and possibly every Friday night for the rest of my days. 

At the front, the celebrations were barely getting started. Sitting at a table for four is the civilised thing to do – and, when you’re in group that size in Granada, the only way you can guarantee that you’ll get enough space – but I think the thing to do is go there as a pair and stand outside when it opens, angling for two stools at that bar and all the albarino and tapas you can manage.

I tried to do exactly that on this visit, only to find it was closed and that they were having work done inside. It was my single biggest disappointment of the trip, and I will be back there as soon as possible to rectify that.

Rincón de Rodri
Calle Músico Vicente Zarzo, 3, 18002 Granada

6. Potemkin

When I first visited Potemkin, a little bar in the Realejo, it was a tapas bar that, possibly as a gimmick, served sushi – and sushi tapas – on Wednesdays. Well, they were obviously on to a good thing because when I made a point of returning five years ago I found they now serve sushi – and sushi tapas – all the time, along with some other Japanese dishes.

I don’t think I’ll ever get over the novelty of ordering a beer or a gin and tonic and just randomly being brought a delicate plate of avocado maki. Or ordering a subsequent drink and getting a plate of some other sushi. Going with friends in 2023 I remembered why I had loved the place so much in the first place, and so we ordered some of their other dishes and found their sushi selection remarkably good (and, yet again, cracking value). The gyoza were some of the best I’ve had anywhere.

But more than that, the staff were just marvellous. When we turned up all the tables looked to be booked. But they said we could have one, just for the two of us, until ten pm. And then as our friends joined they found more space, and brought more chairs, and nothing was too much trouble. One of the people looking after us had spent two years living in London and wanted to practice her English and talk about it, and of course we congratulated her on living in the best city in the world. 

At one point there was a spot of rain and with military precision the staff mobilised, grabbed umbrellas and put them up, and within two minutes everybody was back at their seats, ordering more drinks, getting more sushi. And, for the umpteenth time that week, I stopped and thought Can’t I just live here?

Returning in 2024, I decided I’d had enough of only using Potemkin for pre-dinner drinks, so we booked a table on the terrace and bedded in for the evening. Everything was as brilliant as I remembered and, unlike many places in Granada, the tapas doesn’t stop coming just because you’re also ordered from the main menu: maki after maki after maki.

Potemkin
Placeta del Hospicio Viejo, 3, 18009 Granada
https://potemkinbar.es

7. Saint Germain

Saint Germain, tucked away not far from the cathedral, is a cracking little bar, buzzy but conspiratorial. I’ve eaten inside, in a room with stools and a ledge, framed pictures all over the walls and not much else, and had a wonderful time. But on my most recent visit, as when I went in 2019, I was at one of the tables in the alleyway outside and I just had an enchanting time.

Previously I’d been there as a group of five, desperately trying to commandeer space, gradually nicking more stools, using one as a makeshift table. That might be your idea of fun – it was mine, many years ago – but for me a proper table in the dusk, reading menus by the light of our iPhones was much more like it.

Saint Germain has countless wines by the glass, and truly expert servers who will tell you you’ve absolutely picked the wrong one and you’d like something else better. They are, in my experience, correct without exception about that, because they know their wine list and their menu inside out, and have no qualms about ensuring that you make the most of both.

In the past I’ve adored Saint Germain’s chorizo cooked in honey, and I nearly ordered it on this visit, but the specials were calling to me: I don’t think Saint Germain has ever had specials on the menu before, and that fact alone was enough to make me sit up and take notice. And they were stunning: red tuna, surely sashimi grade and barely cooked, arranged in a ring around a gloriously verdant puck of avocado quite captivated me. Beef rib, cooked low and slow until it almost leapt from the bone, was even better, served with a sweet potato purée that rather changed my mind about sweet potato.

I thought we had enough room for the chorizo after that, but our server was just as authoritative about portions as he had been about our wine choices; he plonked down a piece of cheesecake for us to share, as if to say that’s your lot. So all that was left was to ask him for a couple of glasses of Pedro Ximénez to go with it. This time he didn’t suggest something else, so we at least got that right.

Saint Germain
Calle Postigo Veluti, 4, 18001 Granada

8. Bar Minotauro

I first visited Minotauro in 2015, would you believe, with my old friend Dave. It’s a scruffy, lively bar just off Plaza Nueva, in the less beautiful bit of town and I really loved it – full of life, full of beer, no tourists, napkin art on the wall. It was how a bar manages to be cool without trying, which is of course the only way to be cool.

It wasn’t in my plans to return in 2023 but we had time for a caña at that end of town before a late lunch reservation so we went in and I’m so glad we did. It was its usual noisy, authentic self, full of locals getting beers in at the start of their Saturday. One table at the end, raucous and joyful, was a dozen ladies of different ages drinking and laughing. Not because they were a hen party or anything purgatorial like that, just because they were out for drinks.

I didn’t stay long enough to venture past the tapa, a little bagel full of just-fried steak and mayo, but even that had me looking at the menu and asking my companions if we could cancel lunch and stay here. They told me we couldn’t, we kept our reservation and went on to have the worst meal of the entire trip. The memories of that bagel, and the exquisite pleasure of saying I told you so were all I had to show for it.

I made sure we went back in 2024, for just the one, and a tubo of cold beer and another of those bagels cost less than 3 Euros. Enough said: next time I’m having lunch there.

Bar Minotauro
Calle Imprenta, 6, 18010 Granada

9. Bar Lara

This place also falls into the category of “a quick drink before lunch” but it also happens to be in one of the prettiest squares in the city. Placeta de San Miguel Bajo is up in the Albaicin, just along from the Mirador de San Nicolas, the place to look out on the Alhambra. It is ringed by bars and restaurants on one side, with a beautiful, humble church at one end with a tall whitewashed tower. Take a seat on a terrace, drink your beer and watch those little red buses trundle past from time to time – it really is a fantastic spot.

In 2023 we did that at Bar Lara and, again, the tapas was so much better than it needed to be. The first, a beautiful plate of waxy sliced potatoes and green pepper, cooked in industrial quantities of olive oil with just enough salt, was one of the simplest, most effective things we ate all week. The second, little fried fish with diced tomatoes, was both gorgeous and generous. “This is going in the guide”, I said to Zoë. And it did.

Bar Lara
Placeta de San Miguel Bajo, 4, 18010 Granada

10. Poetas Andaluces II

Poetas Andaluces was without question my favourite discovery of my 2024 visit. It has a more conventional restaurant out back, but I loved standing outside when it opened, sitting in the bar and eating and drinking for a happy, blessed evening. In that respect my approach to it was like the one I always take at Málaga’s outstanding Meson Iberico and Poetas Andaluces reminded me more of that wonderful spot than anywhere I’ve been in Granada.

It’s an asador, but unfortunately a lot of their most tempting-looking dishes – suckling pig, roast leg of lamb and what have you – all need to be ordered in advance, which I didn’t know. But even forced to slum it with the stuff you can order on the day I had a meal for the ages. Home-made pheasant pate and foie gras mi cuit were silky and opulent, a revuelto with mushrooms, jamon and garlic shoots quite blew me away. But best of all was rabo de toro expertly stripped off the bone at the table, sticky strands of oxtail mixed in with beautifully made chips and plonked in front of you, a dish of rich, robust comfort. I ate, I sipped an exceptional Ribera del Duoro, I sighed with joy.

The only way to perfect such a meal would be to finish it with a portion of chocolate mousse seemingly the size of my head and a big glass of Pedro Ximénez. And would you believe it? That’s exactly what happened.

Poetas Andaluces II
Calle Pedro Antonia de Alarcón, 18002 Granada
https://www.poetasandaluces.es

11. Bodega Los Tintos

I picked Bodega Los Tintos, a little joint tucked away just behind El Corte Inglés, based on a tip-off on Threads having originally intended to go to Casa Mol, a more modish place on the corner. And I loved it for lunch – a solid, unshowy spot with a great list of wines by the glass and the tapa of your choice with every glass. They do Seis E Seis, one of my favourite Spanish reds, and to have a glass with a huge piece of fried morcilla, served on a piece of bread (as if that made it any less over the top) at no extra charge was one of my favourite moments of my 2024 trip.

The stuff you had to pay for was also good, if more of a mixed bag. Strands of roasted peppers, ever so slightly blackened, with plenty of ventresca on top, was a delight, and I quite enjoyed the torreznos, little cubes of pork belly, even if they made me miss the chicharrones I always had in Malaga. But Bodegas Los Tintos’ berenjanas con miel are meant to be their best thing, and I wasn’t convinced: aubergine fried in thin discs rather than matchsticks was okay, but the oil didn’t feel the freshest. I ordered another glass of wine and consoled myself with some solimillo topped with blue cheese, also technically free. That’s the joy of small plates – if you don’t like one, another is always on the way.

Bodega Los Tintos
Calle San Isidro, 24, 18005 Granada

12. Casa de Vinos La Brujidera

La Brujidera (it means something to do with witches, apparently) is a little spot round the back of Plaza Nueva and it has competition on its doorstep in the form of one of Granada’s many branches of Los Manueles. But I always favour the underdog, so on my 2024 visit I was waiting outside La Brujidera as it opened at half twelve, ready to grab one of its four tables that sit outside on that little sloping alleyway. I’d walked past it the night before, its lights glowing, I’d seen people eating, drinking and gesticulating and I’d felt that pang you sometimes get on holiday when you notice a spot and wish you’d spent your evening there. And I’m delighted to report that it was just as agreeable a place to stop for lunch in the sun.

The wine was beautiful – plenty available, again, by the glass – and if the menu leaned more towards buying well than cooking well the produce was good enough that I really didn’t care about that. Blue goat’s cheese provided a superbly intense hit of salt, the chorizo was very nice indeed and another goat’s cheese dish they brought out (which we didn’t order, though we weren’t complaining) teamed very agricultural goats cheese with the double whammy of sweet onion jam and crispy fried onion. A new one on me, but a decidedly good idea.

Casa de Vinos La Brujidera
Calle Monjas del Carmen, 2, 18009 Granada
https://casadevinosgranada.es

13. La Botillería

I’m pretty sure La Botillería used to be more a bar than a restaurant, tucked away in the border between the centre and the Realejo, but it seems to have pivoted more to sit down meals, and a very meat-heavy menu, since I went to Granada last, possibly because it has competition in the form of the extremely hip Rosario Varela next door.

I booked lunch at La Botillería on the very last day of my 2024 trip, hoping to sit outside and drink wine and eat racion after racion until I was full and happy. At that point I was going to go back to the hotel and snooze on the roof terrace until it was time for the taxi to the airport. And literally none of that happened: they stuck us inside, at possibly the room’s worst table, next to an unlovely pillar. At half-one, the place was empty. We ordered a handful of small plates to get started, thinking we’d order mains later, and when they were finished the server asked us if we wanted coffee or dessert. I felt so fat shamed that we shame-facedly asked for the bill and left: it was all distinctly anticlimactic.

So why is it in this guide at all, you might ask? Well, just for one reason: the salt cod tortilla pictured above is one of the best things I’ve ever eaten and easily my favourite tortilla of all time.

The tired tortilla you often get is cooked through, so all of it is either rubbery egg or waxy potato: nobody likes that. The next best thing, the kind you might get at somewhere like Oxford’s Arbequina is loose and liquid in the middle, a huge improvement on a solid brick but still not always what you want. But the talent to cook something like La Botillería’s, solid outside, gooey but not oozing in the middle, is quite something. Then pack it with phenomenal amounts of flaked bacalao, and you have one of the best things I ate on my holiday, or indeed all year.

So if you find yourself going to Granada, book a table inside of an evening at La Botillería, specifically ask not to be next to a pillar, make them take their time, and don’t let them fat shame you. And have the salt cod tortilla: as I know from personal experience, it’s reason enough to go to La Botillería all by itself.

La Botillería
Calle Varela, 10, 18009 Granada
https://www.labotilleriagranada.es

14. Puesto 43

I was so looking forward to Rincón de Rodri when I visited Granada in 2024, and when I turned up there at eight fifteen, ready to take my place at the front of the queue and grab a table by the bar I was quite nonplussed to find it closed for renovations. I had to find somewhere for dinner without reservations, and fast – but where? Then I remembered Puesto 43, a marisqueria just round the corner which had, until recently, been in the Michelin guide. Would it do as an alternative?

Well, it sort of did. It’s a nice, neutral space with white furniture and tiled walls – there are also tables in the square outside – and it has an extensive menu of fried and grilled fish, seafood and what have you. And I enjoyed a lot of what I had. Calamari maybe had a little too much bounce to be truly fresh, but the coating on it simply couldn’t be faulted. Huge steaks of hake, fried bone-in and served simply with aioli, were decent, though in both cases I would have liked a slice of lemon to zhuzh things up. And the red tuna, beautifully cooked and sprinkled with salt crystals, was as good as any I’ve had in Granada.

But there were still a few misfires. Tomatoes aliñado might have had the best tomatoes in the world but they needed more salt and a hefty glug of a really good olive oil to bring them to life. And our server – another of the genre Granada specialises in who tell you you’ve ordered the wrong thing – persuaded us to swap fried, battered bacalao for a different dish, salt cod on mash with garlic and chillies. It was a pleasant dish (although hard to photograph without making it look like someone had already thrown it up), but when the fried bacalao turned up at the next table I wanted to shake the guy. None the less, as a second choice Puesto 43 was first rate.

Puesto 43
Plaza de Gracia, 3, 18002 Granada

15. Capitán Amargo

Back in 2019 I went to Granada’s only craft beer bar, a place on Calle Molinos in the heart of the Realejo called Colagallo. I liked it very much – I had great beers, and the owner was very friendly – but I wondered how it would fare in a city where beer is cheap and always comes with free food. The place changed its name to Capitán Amargo and returning four years later I was really delighted to see it thriving. And in 2024 it became a regular pre-dinner spot: I got very attached to sitting outside, all the life and noise of Calle Molinos around me, as I drank beautiful beer in the epicentre of the Realejo.

Capitán Amargo has a selection which puts anywhere in Reading to shame – something like thirty lines, with an impressive range from across both Spain and Europe, along with a reasonably priced can fridge if you really can’t find anything you fancy on the wall (the likes of Thornbridge and our very own Siren Craft represent U.K. breweries)

I tried so much that I loved, especially on the most recent visit, from Spanish breweries I’d heard of – like Basqueland Brewing or Malaga’s Attik Brewing – along with a plethora of breweries I knew literally nothing about. So I enjoyed a magnificent dank DIPA from Valencia’s Sáez & Son and an immensely likeable hazy pale from SOMA, who are from Girona: the latter was probably my beer of the trip. But it didn’t stop there, with other beers by Castello Beer Factory (also near Valencia) and Pamplona’s Naparbier also represented.

Best of all, the owner was bright and personable and clearly delighted to see some beer enthusiasts in a city where Alhambra, much as I love it, is ever-present. Not to say that Capitán Amargo doesn’t serve Alhambra, because it does, but it’s a real treasure trove for beer lovers and a great advert for Spanish craft beer. When I visited in 2023 I was a little sniffy about the fact that the tapa on offer was a bowl of Bugles – proper dirty crisps – but, like everything else about the place, I got very attached to that.

Capitán Amargo
Calle Molinos, 28, 18009 Granada
https://capitanamargo.com/en/

16. Café Futbol

There are only really two places to enjoy churros in Granada. One is Cafe Futbol, the Granadino institution which celebrated its hundredth birthday last year. The other is, well, anywhere else that isn’t as good as Cafe Futbol. The inside is that wonderful mixture of dated and timeless that institutions always nail, but on a sunny day you need to be in the plaza outside, admittedly under cover, attacking a cafe con leche and waiting for your churros to arrive.

The latter are the reason to come here and are as good as any I can recall bronzed, piping hot and a true indulgence. Why they’ve never caught on in the UK I will truly never know, but it makes them a holiday treat: it’s only what’s left of my willpower that stopped me having them every day. Round it off with a freshly squeezed zumo de naranja to give you possibly your main vitamin C of the day and you’re ready to explore the city – caffeinated, caloried and fully prepared for whatever it might throw at you. It was round the corner from my hotel in 2024, so I was there often.

Café Futbol
Plaza de Mariana Pineda, 6, 18009 Granada
https://cafefutbol.com

17. Los Italianos

There are plenty of ice cream places dotted around Granada, all boasting decent credentials, but Los Italianos on Gran Via is the one they queue for. It’s only open during the summer months, it’s ludicrously cheap – a large ice cream will set you back less than three quid – and it’s truly brilliant at what it does. 

The queue is at the front off Gran Via, to pick up and go, but you can also get in round the back where they have a few tables for table service and often a shorter queue if you just want to take away. I love their two-stage method, beautifully old school, where you ask for a size from your cashier and get a token reflecting a small, medium or large. You then hand it to the person wielding the scoop, name your flavours and off you go. 

They are good at all the classics, but their off piste options are just as special. So you can have chocolate or gianduja and they will be glossy and rich, and will make you very happy indeed. But if you want something with a little more cut-through on a hot day, their frozen yoghurt is outstandingly tangy and they do a pineapple flavoured ice cream which was smooth, sweet and utterly enchanting. It’s the best ice cream I’ve had in Spain and, appropriately enough given the name, it’s up there with the best I’ve had in Italy.

Los Italianos
Calle Gran Via de Colón, 4, 18010 Granada
https://www.lositalianos.es

18. Odeimos Doughnut Shop

It can’t all be churros and ice cream, you know. Well, actually it can, and that would be just fine and dandy. But I chanced upon Odeimos on a walk back from the Albaicin in 2024 and its doughnuts looked so magnificent that I picked up a couple on a whim. It was absolutely worth it – mine had a sort of salted caramel cheesecake filling which was somehow fluffy and indecently good. My favourite doughnuts in Reading are from Pipp & Co (which used to be called Pippin Doughnuts), but the most recent ones I’ve had suggest they’ve rather lost their way: Odeimos’ knocked spots off them.

Odeimos Doughnut Shop
Calle San Jerónimo, 10, 18001 Granada

19. Despiertoo

Despiertoo – it means “I woke up”, it seems – was my coffee shop of choice on my 2023 trip. It’s a nondescript spot between Plaza de Bib-Rambla and Plaza de le Trinidad, and the inside is very tasteful. They serve an excellent flat white (and, I’m told, an equally good iced latte), and even in 2024 a latte will only set you back a mind-boggling two Euros. It was, I must say, far busier in 2024 than it was the previous year, so its fame must be beginning to spread.

I should also add that Despiertoo roast on site and that if you like coffee at all and make it at home, I highly recommend taking some back to Blighty with you. I had some earlier in the year from my friend Mike who lives out there and it was easily the best coffee, from anywhere, that I’ve drunk at home all year, equally special in an Aeropress or a V60. I have three bags in the cupboard at the time of writing, which will make my mornings working from home infinitely more bearable.

Despiertoo
Calle Jaúdenes, 4, 18001 Granada
https://www.despiertoo.com

20. La Finca

La Finca is the coffee place I remember from my previous visit, but I don’t remember it being this good. I don’t remember it being in this spot either, so I wonder if it has moved since 2019. Either way its spot now, just off from the cathedral, is a superb one and it gets very busy as a result, with the inside routinely rammed and the handful of seats outside at a premium. That’s because they offer some of the best people watching in Granada, in my opinion. We turned up on a Saturday morning in 2023 just as a couple vacated the bench outside, so we swooped, ordered some lattes and enjoyed all the comings and goings, the tourists and the wanderers. Why would anyone give up such a perfect spot, we thought, so of course we ordered another coffee.

And their coffee was cracking, easily up there with the best I’ve had in Granada and definitely the equal of Despiertoo. They too sell beans, and I wish with hindsight that I’d picked some up. But Finca also excels in baked goods – the cinnamon buns and chocolate buns were the most attractive I saw in the city, and I might have had one too if it wasn’t for a double chocolate cookie, crumbly where it should have been crumbly, soft where it should have been soft and shot through with thick plates of chocolate. It was a magnificent way to while away an hour in Granada, a city crammed to bursting with world-beating ways to do so.

La Finca
Calle Colegio Catalino, 3, 18001 Granada
https://lafincaroaster.com/en/home

21. Noat Coffee

Noat was in my 2019 guide, but in 2023 it had moved house and I didn’t get to it, so I reluctantly took it out. Returning in 2024 I was determined to go there, and once I had I ended up going there nearly every morning. It’s on Plaza de los Girones, which despite its name is a lovely tree-lined street heading up to the Realejo, and it has three shady tables outside which is where you want to sit, with a ridiculously affordable latte, a wonderful view for people watching and time to contemplate. I did that a lot in September 2024, and I loved every minute.

Service is a little on the grumpy side, and based on my visits the clientele includes a high percentage of Americans. I’m not saying those two things are necessarily connected, by the way. But it’s possible.

Noat Coffee
Plaza de los Girones, 4, Puerta 3, 18009 Granada

22. Perspectives

Perspectives is a little cafe right at the end of Calle Elvira, near the striking Puerta de Elvira on the edge of the Albaicin. I went a couple of times on my most recent trip, and both times my latte was beautifully made and excellent value. They sell beans on site too, and will tell you which ones your coffee has been made with.

On my first visit in 2024 I initially found the staff a tad sullen, the place was playing The Smiths – Granada maybe hasn’t got the memo about Morrissey, yet – and I wasn’t sure whether it was the café for me. But I think it must just have been my false (pardon the pun) perspective because when it came to settling up the staff were lovely and engaging and I resolved there and then to visit again.

And when I did they were playing cheerier music, there was a nice hubbub from the occupied tables and this seemed like a lovely little piece of sunshine in a part of the city I don’t always get to. They asked me to leave a Google review, but they’ll have to settle for this.

It’s also worth heading round the corner to Al Sur De Granada which sells local produce, gorgeous looking chocolate and natural wines. As I picked up some single variety extra virgin olive oil to take home, I noticed a very appealing menu on the wall. I’ll just have to come back to Granada. Again.

Perspectives
Calle Elvira, 115, 18010 Granada
https://www.perspectives.cafe

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