Everybody has their happy place, and the Spanish city of Granada is mine. I first went there around twenty years ago: I was visiting my old schoolfriend Mike (who actually crops up in this blog from time to time) getting over a disastrous relationship. He lived in Madrid, but for some reason we decided to take a very long coach trip all the way across the country to spend a couple of days in Andalusia. It’s the sort of thing you do in your twenties, I suppose, like sleeping on somebody’s floor or deciding that Batchelors’ Savoury Rice and a bottle of Mars Energy Drink constitutes an acceptable diet.

Anyway, I don’t remember much about that visit but I do remember Granada. Bar after bar, beer after beer, and free tapas with every one. Beyond that, my evening was a blur – we wandered through the winding lanes of the Albaicin, the city’s Moorish quarter up on the hill, and ended up in a nightclub in a cave until the small hours of the morning. Even in our mid-twenties we were probably too old for that sort of thing, and as the sun came up we sat outside Cafeteria Lisboa on Plaza Nueva (it’s still there) and had a beer for breakfast for the first and probably only time of my life. What a city! What a place!

Since then I’ve been back many times and what began as a passing infatuation has blossomed into a love affair. I worked out recently that I’ve gone on holiday to Granada more times than anywhere else – including four times in the last five years, believe it or not – and I never tire of it. It’s not the most beautiful of Spanish cities, I’m sure. It has a certain scruffy energy (which comes partly from its student population, I suspect) and it seems to attract a lot of day trippers who come to see the Alhambra and then sod off. You get a lot of American tourists at neighbouring tables, and I think it’s quite popular on the hippy trail – lots of white people with dreadlocks, if you catch my drift. But none the less, it remains my favourite city on earth.

It’s hard to put my finger on why, but tapas is doubtless a big part of it. On my first visit Mike told me that although tapas was an Andalusian invention it was only really in Granada that the bars prided themselves on providing it free of charge. Some of the tapas is really inventive, and the bar staff always seem to remember whether you’re on your first, second or third drink, bringing out a different dish to accompany each one. Once, on a night out in Granada with my old friend Dave, we ordered a couple of glasses of sweet, gloopy Pedro Ximenez only for the staff to bring out dessert tapas – two beautiful, perfect squares of cheesecake and two tiny forks (they may have thought we were a couple: it sometimes happens).

But there’s so much more to Granada than the food and the bars – lovely, sun-flecked squares perfect for sitting, drinking coffee and watching people, stunning buildings, bazaars and tea rooms, spellbinding Moorish architecture and whitewashed churches. I’ve been threatening to write a guide to Granada for years, and given that my most recent visit was on holiday back in May I’ll probably never have a better opportunity than this. I hope it tempts you – because there are few better feelings than getting off the plane and walking across the tarmac at Federico Garcia Lorca Airport knowing that you have lazy days of sunshine, tapas and relaxation ahead of you.

Where to eat and drink

I’ve grouped these together because, really, in Granada they go hand in hand so my recommendations tend to be tapas bars. Some of them do have tables you can sit at, or even book, but more often they are stops on a magnificent barhopping journey, joining the dots across the city and having a couple of drinks and some tapas in every one. If you do want a sit-down, starters-mains-desserts kind of place, Ruta del Azafran looks out on the Alhambra, has a lovely outside space on the Paseo de los Tristes and can be booked online: I very much enjoyed my chicken pastilla last time I was there. Or, if you want a proper gastronomic treat, book a table at El Claustro and enjoy the Andalusia-inspired tasting menu there.

Both have their place, but I’ve always found my best food experiences in Granada have involved using my elbows, standing up at the bar and being in the heart of proceedings. I thoroughly recommend giving it a whirl.

1. Bodegas Castañeda

I visited Bodegas Castañeda on my very first trip to Granada and I’ve been back on every single visit, frequently more than once. It’s now become the first place I eat when I get to the city, the gastronomic equivalent of Pope John Paul II kissing the tarmac. Confusingly, there are actually two Castañedas – the original bar was apparently split in two as the result of a family falling out – but the one on Calle Almireciros is the one you want. Stand at the bar, order a beer from one of the staff (who, incidentally, work like Trojans) and wait for your first tapa to arrive. Then, when you’re ready, dive into the menu: there’s manchego as gritty and crystalline as any Parmesan; broad beans with big chunks of super-savoury jamon; thick, salty slabs of bacalao swamping slices of bread; mojama (sun dried tuna) drizzled with olive oil and scattered with almonds.

On the last full day of our holiday, we managed to grab a table in the sunshine outside amid all the bustle and feasted on platters of cured fish with asparagus, capers and caviar, patatas a lo pobre with sweet onion and several glasses of cold, crisp beer. We experienced one of the great uncharitable pleasures of eating in restaurants, namely watching people being turned away from the place where you’re eating because there’s no room left. Even without taking that into account, I felt like I was at the very epicentre of my happy place.

Bodegas Castañeda, Calle Almireciros, 1-3

2. Taberna La Tana

La Tana is the place to enjoy wine in Granada, a beautiful little place on the edge of the Realejo, the city’s liveliest and scruffiest district. It’s a tiny room, and people often spill out onto the street outside, but if you can get there early enough to grab its only table you do feel like you’ve won the lottery.

All the wines by the glass are quite outstanding but, as so often, the food is what transforms the experience. I still dream about the black pudding here – sweet, fragrant morcilla de Burgos served hot and topped with pine nuts. They also, incongruously, do some of the best guacamole I’ve ever tasted: you often get it as a tapa with drinks but if not it’s well worth ordering it in its own right. La Tana isn’t an unsung a place as it was when I first started going there, so prepare to hear a lot of American accents. It’s worth it, though.

Taberna La Tana, Placeta del Agua, 3

3. Saint Germain

Saint Germain always feels to me like what would happen if Granada and Paris had a beautiful child – it’s a tapas bar, yes, but with an impressive range of wine and, oddly, a Marcel Proust theme which extends all the way through to the menu. Much of the food is good enough to induce a madeleine moment many years later, too – on my last visit I really enjoyed the chorizo in honey (not a combination I’d had before) but I absolutely loved the blue cheese and wild mushroom risotto: even typing this makes me remember that divine combination of salt, starch and tang.

The staff here were lovely and friendly in the face of my stumbling Spanish, too – even more so than elsewhere in Granada. The tables outside are terrific, and badly needed in summer, but the interior is wood-panelled, conspiratorial and definitely lends itself to conversations, even ones not about À la recherche du temps perdu.

Saint Germain, Calle Postigo Velutti, 4

4. Bar Aliatar Los Caracoles

I always make time to explore Granada’s Albaicin when I visit the city (see Things to see and do, below, for more about the Albaicin) but in the past I’ve always struggled to find somewhere nice to eat around there. Los Caracoles on Plaza Aliatar was a very welcome discovery on my last visit – a lovely dappled square and an appealing menu made for a perfect lunch spot.

Caracoles means snails, and they are on the menu (many tables seemed to be having them as tapas) but if, like me, you’re not a fan there’s plenty to enjoy. I had some gorgeous hand-carved jamon and a big bowl of broad beans with (more) jamon, served with an egg on top, waiting to release its yolk into the rest of the dish. This was also my favourite people-watching spot: I became fascinated by a pair of dapper old gentlemen – Panama hats and all – at the next table eating, drinking and waving their hands around. I couldn’t decide whether I wished I could eavesdrop on them or whether knowing what they were saying would have killed the magic.

Bar Aliatar Los Caracoles, Plaza Aliatar, 4

5. Mercado de San Agustin

Although less developed than, say, Malaga’s market, I really liked the Mercado de San Agustin. There are plenty of stalls inside selling meats, cheeses, wine and all the other usual suspects, but I loved sitting outside and ordering from a menu in the sunshine.

I ended up eating there twice, so much did I enjoy it, and everything I had was near perfect – whether it was swordfish or bacalao straight off the plancha, perfectly cooked and drizzled with oil and herbs or baby squid piping hot and waiting to be dressed with freshly squeezed lemon juice. But the revelation was tomatoes aliñado, huge things cut into slices like steaks, beautifully sweet and dressed with olive oil and big salt crystals, one of the most magical things I ate on my tip. It made the bland polytunnel tomatoes we get in the U.K. feel halfway between a disappointment and a national embarrassment.

Mercado de San Agustin, Plaza de San Agustin

6. Potemkin

Potemkin, a little bar in the Realejo district opposite the modern language school, was a real find on my last visit. It’s in a pretty square, the service is excellent and best of all, on Wednesdays they serve sushi – and that means sushi tapas, too.

When my caña arrived with some beautifully made avocado maki, I was both baffled and delighted. By the time the next one was brought to the table with some salmon nigiri, I was convinced that sushi and tapas was the combination the world had been waiting for. The tapas was more conventional, but no less delicious, on a return visit: by then I was daydreaming about living in a world where a bar like Potemkin was just around the corner.

Potemkin, Placeta del Hospicio Viejo, 3

7. Café Futbol

Breakfast in Granada means churros, and churros means Cafe Futbol (although Gran Cafe Bib-Rambla, in the more central and splendidly-named Plaza Bib-Rambla, is also worth consideration). Sitting in the square outside with half a dozen churros, a zumo de naranja and a café con leche sets you up perfectly for the day, and Café Futbol does them better than anywhere else I’ve found. The batter is perfectly sweet yet salty, and although lots of people like to dunk them in thick, gloopy chocolate I prefer to empty the contents of a sugar sachet onto my unused saucer and gently dab them in that, giving just a little crunch and sweetness. It’s not infra dig to dip them in your coffee, either, if you ask me.

Cafe Futbol, Plaza de Mariana Pineda, 6

8. Los Italianos

Only open during the summer months, Los Italianos is Granada’s legendary gelataria, conveniently located on Gran Via, pretty much opposite the cathedral. It says something about the time of year I usually visit Granada that my recent trip was the first time I’ve ever gone to Los Italianos (and the second, and the third). It’s proper old-school cool: I suspect they have been operating pretty much the same way for decades and the gelato, although maybe not hitting the heights of Italy, is still bloody marvellous and deeply welcome on a hot day (when not in Rome, and all that). I loved the gianduja gelato – enough to have it more than once – but the salted caramel was also very nice indeed.

Los Italianos, Calle Gran Vía de Colón, 4

9. Noat Coffee

You can get a café con leche or the like pretty much anywhere in Granada, and I’ve always thought they’re one of life’s great pleasures when you’re on holiday in Spain. But if you do find yourself craving a more refined, delicate coffee more reminiscent of a Tamp or an Anonymous, Granada has a few really good options.

La Finca near the cathedral is excellent, and I rather enjoyed Dulcimena Coffee in the heart of the Realejo, but my favourite was Noat, a really sweet little café also in the Realejo. They are really friendly, they serve superb latte and although they only have a handful of seats inside there’s a bench out front where you can drink your coffee and watch the city beginning to wake up from the night before. Highly recommended.

Noat Coffee, Calle Santa Escolastica, 7

10. Capitán Amargo (previously Colagallo)

Granada’s craft beer scene is very much up and coming, but Capitan Amargo, in the Realejo, is at the heart of it (it’s the only bar in Granada on Untappd). It’s more polished than some craft beer pubs I’ve been to in Spain, and it had an impressive array of beers from Spain and beyond (Belgium and the U.K., unsurprisingly, also get a look in). We tried a couple, from Basqueland Brewing and local brewery Sacromonte and loved them both.

Craft beer must be a tough sell in Granada of all places, where an Alhambra is not only as cheap as chips but usually accompanied by free food, but the tapas in Capitán Amargo were also substantial and very tasty, especially the empanada I had. Service, as it nearly always is in craft beer places, was really charming, engaging and enthusiastic. He wanted to know what we made of the beers and once he had established that we were English he wanted to talk about our dealings with Europe (Liverpool FC, thankfully, rather than fucking Brexit).

Capitán Amargo, Calle Molinos, 28

Things to see and do

1. The Alhambra

The Alhambra is probably the single reason most people visit Granada, and it’s quite possible that many tourists bus in, visit the Alhambra, get back on the coach and head on elsewhere without ever seeing the city. It’s a whole complex of palaces, gardens and fortifications and you really do have to visit it if you ever go to Granada (and if you do, be warned: you need to buy tickets online some way in advance). Although the gardens are beautiful and peaceful and some of the other palaces are either grand or charming, the real attraction here are the Nasrid Palaces, a succession of increasingly beautiful courtyards and halls, patios and fountains.

Many words have been written about the Alhambra by many people, and I don’t think a couple of lines by a restaurant reviewer are going to do the place justice – none of my photos of the place, taken over the course of over a decade, do either. All I would say is that every time I go I see something new, and get lost in it all over again, from the beautiful, intricate carvings to the gorgeous tile work, the breathtaking ceilings and the stunning arches. The views out across the Albaicin are amazing, and even the tourists crawling round every inch of it can’t detract from its majesty. I’ve been to very few tourist attractions in my life that even come close to living up to the hype. The Alhambra easily does all that, and more besides.

2. The Albaicin

The Albaicin, the old Moorish quarter of the city, is on the hill opposite the Alhambra and is itself a UNESCO World Heritage Site. It’s a lovely place to wander and explore, all winding steep lanes and whitewashed houses with courtyards resplendent with flowers. One of the focal points is the Mirador de San Nicolas, with its iconic view out across to the Alhambra (and, usually, quite a lot of people selling beads/sporting dreadlocks/playing Bob Marley songs on a guitar). If you want a better view of the Alhambra the trick is to nip next door to the tranquil mosque, where you get the same vista but with a welcome added dose of dignity.

Half the fun of the Albaicin is getting lost in it, but it’s also worth checking out the gorgeous whitewashed church of San Miguel Bajo (and having a beer in one of the places in the square outside) and picking your way through the streets leading off the buzzing (if unfortunately named) Plaza Larga. It’s also worth mentioning the streets which lead up into the Albaicin from the city centre, Caldereria Vieja and Caldereria Nueva, because they are lined with tea houses or teteria. It’s well worth stopping in one for a fresh mint tea, poured into tiny glasses with some ceremony from a great height, or té Pakistani which is sweet, perfumed and milky like chai. As Sirat is my favourite teteria, but any of them is worth a visit.

3. The Monastery of Saint Jeronimo

The most famous monastery in Granada is La Cartuja, the Carthusian monastery quite a way out of the city. But I have a real soft spot for the monastery of Saint Jeronimo, which is a ten minute walk from the cathedral. It’s unassuming and modest at first, and walking round the cloisters, smelling the orange trees in the courtyard, you could be forgiven for wondering what the fuss is about. But the chapel, and more specifically the altarpiece, is one of the most incredible and overblown things I’ve ever seen. The photo above doesn’t come close to doing it justice and even after countless visits it never loses its power. One of my favourite things about introducing new people to Granada is taking them to the monastery, showing them the chapel and watching them try not to swear in a house of God.

4. The Alcaiceria

Not far from Granada’s handsome cathedral (also worth a visit, come to think of it) the Alcaiceria is a little maze of passages offering a miniature equivalent of Istanbul’s Grand Bazaar. It’s a nineteenth century replacement for the fifteenth century original, which was destroyed by fire, and although many of the shops sell very similar goods (lots of lanterns, leathergoods and marquetry – wooden inlaid boxes) it’s a very pleasant way to amble and window shop. You don’t get hassled or invited to haggle as you would in the Grand Bazaar, either.

5. Patio de los Perfumes

Granada isn’t rife with shopportunities, although I always love a pootle round its branch of El Corte Ingles, complete with its slightly preposterously named Club Del Gourmet in the basement (you can imagine Frasier and Niles buying their sherry there). I do love Rafael Moreno Orfebre, an old-school shop that sells silver jewellery inspired by the intricate designs of the Alhambra. But my favourite shop in Granada is Patio on the picturesque Carrera del Darro, a museum of perfume which also sells beautiful fragrances based around the signature aromas of the city – so you can expect plenty of jasmine, orange blossom and pomegranate. I came away with a bottle for me and a couple extra for my friends.

Patio de los Perfumes, Carrera del Darro, 5

(Click here to read more city guides.)

A more up to date city guide to Malaga, from 2021, can be found here.

I first visited Málaga in late 2016, on an unsuccessful holiday with a vegan girlfriend. Going to Spain with a vegan was almost as bad a decision as going out with the vegan in the first place, but even as I returned home, lessons learnt, I had a feeling Málaga and I had unfinished business. The thing I’ve since discovered about Málaga is that there are two kinds of people: people who’ve never thought of visiting it, and people who have been, loved it and are keen that not too many people find out about it.

I should start with an apology to the second kind of people, because it really does deserve to be better known. It’s compact, it has a beautiful historic centre, loads of art galleries (covering traditional and more modern forms), a waterfront with a beach close by, excellent shopping and terrific street art. Returning this month with my other half and some friends, enjoying temperatures of nineteen degrees in March and seeing the sun again, I got the feeling of barely scratching the surface.

It’s almost like they plonked a miniature Barcelona in Andalusia, with all the gastronomic benefits of being in that blessed region. And my goodness, the food! I ate better than I can remember on any holiday – not just the obvious stuff like jamon, queso and churros but beautiful, inventive tapas, fresh, superbly-cooked fish and seafood, stunning burgers (yes, burgers) and so much more. I’ve always thought any day where you get to eat octopus is a good day: on one day in Málaga I managed to eat it for lunch, dinner and an afternoon snack, and that felt pretty unbeatable to me.

My other half is not known for her delicate language, but I lost count of the number of times she tried her first mouthful of a dish and said “fuck!”, almost involuntarily. My friend James, a fellow Málaga fan, has been every year since 2016 and even before heading home I think both of us were mentally planning our next visit. I hope this piece persuades you to consider it next time you’re planning a city break of your own.

Where to eat

1. Taberna Uvedoble

I spent my birthday in Uvedoble this year, and a better place to celebrate is difficult to imagine. It’s a modern tapas restaurant close to the cathedral and the vast majority of the menu is available either as a tapa, media or racion depending on how hungry or inquisitive you are and how many of you there are. On our visit we swooned over baby squid served on a nest of squid ink fideua, a giant lake of aioli on the side. Oxtail albondigas were also phenomenal, the juices soaking into a bed of skinny chips.

But the small dishes were every bit as astounding – individual hamburgers cut with foie gras, lending a powerful punch like nothing I’ve eaten before, or miniature brioches hollowed out and completely crammed with shredded suckling pig. The truffled tortilla was so big we had to take half of it back to the apartment with us, and the red wine (Seis y Seis, from nearby Ronda) was magnificent – and ridiculous value at eighteen Euros. Dinner for three, in fact, came to less than a hundred Euros between the three of us – and if you need any more incentive to go to Málaga, bear in mind that this was easily the most expensive meal of the whole holiday.

Uvedoble was so good that we returned for lunch on our final day, so that Liz (who had arrived late) didn’t miss out on the food. Determined to try other dishes, we devoured stunning grilled asparagus with romesco, clean delicate ensaladilla Rusa, flamenquin all crisp with breadcrumbs and oozing with cheese, and so many other amazing dishes. We got there at 1, when they opened, and within about half an hour the place was rammed. “More 10 out of 10s than anywhere else we’ve been” was James’ verdict. My other half’s verdict? “Fuck.”

Taberna Uvedoble, Calle Cister, 15

2. El Tapeo de Cervantes

Easy to be confused – there’s also La Taberna de Cervantes, Vineria Cervantes and El Meson de Cervantes – but El Tapeo de Cervantes is the one you want, a small, intimate place with high tables, a regularly changing menu and absolutely charming staff where I had one of my very favourite meals of this or any year. You order lots of dishes – easily two per person, more if you’re greedy – and they pace your meal perfectly, bringing them out one at a time like a gastronomic firework display.

This was James’ suggestion, and he evangelised about it from the off before getting nervous that it wouldn’t live up to the hype (a feeling I know better than he realised). But he needn’t have worried – everything was so good that it was difficult to pick out highlights. Duck cooked so expertly that it was more like fillet steak, slow-cooked pig’s cheek in a rich stew topped with fiery guindilla chillies, intense sweetbreads with the crackle of salt crystals served on crisp cubes of potato, soft tender octopus offset with smoked mash, every single dish every bit as good as the last.

But the humdinger, a dish which reduced James to wordless rapture, was secreto iberico: pink and tender, scattered with salt and served with a sweet pineapple relish which shouldn’t work but did. Boy, if only Hawaiian pizzas were like that. We had everything with a couple of bottles of Orben, a magical rioja which, I’m told, you can get on Amazon Prime (what will they think of next?). It was a meal I’ll remember for quite some time, and it cost just shy of thirty Euros per head.

El Tapeo de Cervantes, Calle Carcer, 8

3. Wendy Gamba

We had lunch at Wendy Gamba, in the heart of the old town, and I could happily have eaten there again for dinner, lunch and dinner again. In a gorgeous, tiled, relatively traditional room we had some of the finest dishes of the entire trip (but for the fact that you could also say that about all the other places on this list). The signature dish here is the bull burger, a miniature burger with slow-cooked oxtail which matched any burger I’ve ever had, but other dishes gave it a run for its money. I especially loved the octopus with plenty of char and salt, prawn and avocado pinchos topped with strands of saffron and gambas pil pil in a brick red oil steeped with sweet slices of garlic. A generous lunch for four came in at under eighty Euros. We walked past the following evening and, unsurprisingly, the place was completely packed: best to reserve a table if you’re going there for dinner.

Wendy Gamba, Calle Fresca, 10

4. Meson Mariano

Meson Mariano is a very traditional, family-run restaurant, all dark wood and beams, a million miles away from the clean contemporary look of Taberna Uvedoble. My holiday companions were a little (well, quite a lot) younger than me and when we went to Meson Mariano they described themselves as “turnt up to the max”, whatever that means. Regrettably, this means we didn’t order the full three courses – but it also means that they were so full that I managed to try a little bit of everybody’s meal and confirm my suspicion that Meson Mariano really was a very good restaurant indeed.

The salt cod was beautiful, either served fried with tons of garlic or cooked in tomato with potato, but the meat was the real high point, whether it was shoulder of lamb on the bone (though so beautifully tender that it didn’t stay there for long) or spot-on sirloin with an astonishingly good goats cheese sauce. When I go back, I’ll try the deep-fried goats cheese starter: I remember it fondly from a previous visit.

Restaurante Meson Mariano, Calle Granados, 2

5. Mercado Atarazanas

Málaga’s food market is simply something else. An impressive structure (very striking stained glass, and a gorgeous arched entrance) housing every kind of delicacy you care to name – fresh fish of every size and shape, cheese, meat, jamon, almonds shiny with oil and studded with salt, wine and sherry, seemingly endless arrays of fruit and veg. That’s all in the middle, and then around the outside are all the places where you can stand at the bar, drink a caña or a vermut, order food and watch the world go by (there are also seated areas outside the market, but I far preferred being in the bustle).

For all I know there may not be that much to choose between them all, but I developed a huge soft spot for Central Bar, in the corner of the market, and went there several times. Over the course of a couple of visits I had baby squid, coated, fried and dished up piping hot with nothing but a spot of aioli and a lemon to squeeze, octopus served in a similar fashion, chorizo pinchos plump and crying out to be eaten with your fingers. Best of all was rosada, a white fish cooked on the plancha and plated simply with a drizzle of oil and herbs, glorious fresh tomatoes and a few spots of that aioli. It was the only other dish to render James speechless (and that’s no mean feat): we had it twice during the holiday.

When I go back I’ll try the tortilla de camarones, fritters made with flour and tiny shrimp which kept turning up on the bar for other people: they looked delicious, but I didn’t figure out what they were until it was too late. But then I could happily have spent an afternoon at that bar, drinking and eating, little and often. The most expensive bill we had was forty Euros between three, reinforcing what insanely good value Málaga is.

Mercado Central de Atarazanas, Calle Atarazanas, 10

6. Casa Lola

Casa Lola was the first place I ate at on this trip, and if everything that came after was even better that shouldn’t detract from the fact that it was a lovely place to go for afternoon snacks. The interior looks much more polished and curated than many of the other tapas bars in Málaga (almost, dare I say it, chainlike) but sitting at a high table with a caña and some food, watching the world go by is still an excellent way to spend an afternoon. The high point for me was the extensive range of pinchos, all of which were downright delicious. A spot of smoked bacalao here, some black pudding topped with quail’s egg there, that first taste of holiday octopus: all were present and indisputably correct.

Casa Lola, Calle Granada, 46

Where to drink

1. La Tranca

La Tranca, Málaga’s almost legendary vermouth and wine bar, was firmly on all our lists to visit: I’d been and loved it, and I’d bonded with James and Liz over their devotion to it. I remember going in 2016 and wishing I could stay there all evening, and that’s before Liz told me how good the empanadas were. Walking past it on our first night, something about it didn’t seem right: the inside was somehow different, the bar felt different, the vibe somehow changed. “It’s closed!” said Liz, crestfallen. Later that evening we realised it had relocated to bigger premises just up the road, and when we went in all scepticism was immediately dispelled: it was different, but recognisably La Tranca right from the off.

La Tranca is one of the world’s great bars (and I’ve researched quite a few in my time): lovably scruffy, full of bustle, serving brilliant drinks and full of people who just want to have a good time and enjoy being somewhere magnificent. Put that way, I can’t help but wonder if it shares DNA with Reading’s beloved After Dark. We went back a couple of times during the trip, jostling to find a space to set ours drink down, stand around and talk nonsense. We got into a random conversation with a lovely Italian chap, a musician, who had let his apartment in Berlin out to a woman from New York days ago and just got on a plane to Málaga to take his life in a different direction: well, Málaga is that kind of city and La Tranca is the perfect bar for conversations like that.

The drink to have here is aliñao, vermouth with gin and soda which makes the world, even at times like this, feel like a softer, more comfortable place. The tapas is also well worth trying – you order at the bar and hope you can find your way back up there through the crowd to collect it when they call out your name. The four cheese empanadas, rich with blue cheese, were things of beauty but my personal favourite was the habas con jamon, a little dish of broad beans and ham which was damn near perfect bar (or anywhere else) food.

La Tranca, Calle Carreteria, 92

2. Antigua Casa de Guardia

Another Málaga institution, this long thin bar has barrels of every sweet wine you could possibly hope to drink. You go up, order a copa and they chalk your bill up on the bar. I tried a number of the options, from moscatel to pedro ximenez, from the “Pajarete 1908” (the thing to order here apparently) to the Guinda and the Lagrima Añejo: you may well have a better palate than me but they all tasted dangerously similar and remarkably moreish. A little glass of wine here costs less than two Euros, so if you go you can try them all and tell me what I’m missing. We were there on a lazy Friday afternoon, but I imagine evenings can be quite a free-for-all.

Antigua Casa de Guardia, Alameda Principal, 18

3. La Madriguera

Málaga has a small craft beer scene, and as I was there with some real beer fans it was only fair to check it out. I suspect James preferred Cerveceria Arte & Sana on Plaza de la Merced, but my favourite was La Madriguera, which struck me as reminiscent of Bristol’s tremendous Small Bar. La Madriguera had nine beers on tap when I visited including a few from local microbrewery Bonvivant, and I really enjoyed their fruit IPA El Increible Hombre Menguente (that’s the incredible shrinking man to you and I). I was sad to move on when duty – by which I mean dinner – called, although I also found it difficult to walk past a bar called Jamones next door, which went straight on my “next time” list.

La Madriguera, Calle Carreteria, 73

4. Cafe Central

A lot of people will tell you to go to Casa Aranda, where they do huge churros, giant tubes of batter just waiting to be dunked in thick gloopy chocolate (the same people will recommend El Pimpi, Málaga’s iconic bar which I still haven’t tried). But my heart belongs to Cafe Central, where the churros are piped, have just enough salt and are crying out to be rolled in sugar from the sachet and popped in your mouth. The seating outside is perfect in the sunshine but I have a soft spot for eating inside, where it reminds me of so many grand cafes and where you can always spot some great characters, old ladies and dapper gentlemen, enjoying their “second breakfast” (it’s a thing in Spain, and really should be a thing everywhere else).

Coffee at Cafe Central truly is an art – you may have a cafe con leche elsewhere in Spain, but in Cafe Central you pick from nine different types of coffee depending on just how much milk you want in it, an idea that really could catch on here with tea (I’ve long thought that if we ever do have a national identity card it should have a swatch on it showing the exact colour you like your tea). Mine was always a mitad, half and half, and going to Cafe Central became a thoroughly enjoyable morning ritual.

Cafe Central, Plaza de la Constitucion, 11

5. El Ultimo Mono

El Ultimo Mono (the last monkey, apparently, which I assume makes sense to someone) happened to be right next to our apartment. But even if it hadn’t, I imagine I would have been there quite a lot. The interior was just the right side of the quirky/zany divide, the service was great, and the coffee – for when you want a latte or a mocha rather than the traditional strong black coffee or cafe con leche – was very nice indeed. There was a shop opposite which sold little statues of Jesus: we repeatedly had to talk James out of buying one, for shits and giggles apparently.

El Ultimo Mono, Calle Sta Maria, 9

6. Mia Coffee House

One morning I was up and about earlier than my travelling companions, and keen to go exploring. A little research and some good fortune (and tricky navigation) got me to Mia Coffee House, a wonderful little cafe in a quiet square opposite the very impressive Church of los Santos Martires. I was drawn to the canary-yellow awning, and it was lovely and serene to sit outside, warmed by the sun and watch the city slowly wake up.

Mia’s is top-notch coffee – the best I had in Málaga – made with painstaking love and care in the perfect little spot. Even the cups, little bowls without handles, are pared-down and somehow ascetic. Less pure was the pain au chocolat, the filling made even more indulgent with a spot of something like Nutella. The others joined me about half an hour later, and I did allow myself a moment of “look at this brilliant place I found!” while they very kindly humoured me. Well, I suppose it’s what I do – or try to – and what I’ve just been doing about Málaga on this little gastronomic tour. I hope you’ve enjoyed it.