Epic Prague Food Tour

A weekend was not enough time for us to explore the charming city of Prague.

As slow travelers, we like to spend a month in each city that we visit. Prague is no exception to this rule. In an ideal world, we’d hang out at Prague cafes, wander aimlessly along the city’s ancient cobblestone streets and leisurely gaze at sunsets over the Vltava River.

By the time we left the fairytale Czech city, we would have new friends as well as an introduction to Prague food.

This time, though, our visit to Prague was just a sojourn on our way from Germany to Hungary. How could we resist stopping in the city where Kafka wrote his masterpieces and beer reigns supreme?

We wanted to stroll over the Charles Bridge, gawk at the city’s 15th-century astronomical clock. And, of course, we wanted to check out Czech cuisine.

With just one weekend in Prague, we had to make our time count.

After much deliberation, we decided to spend most of our limited time in Prague on an epic food tour. Though a number of tour companies offer food tours in the highly touristed city, we instead enlisted the guidance of our friend, local expert Charlie Neville, Marketing Manager of JayWay Travel, to show us around town and introduce us to the Prague food scene.

That’s a tall order to ask of anybody. Luckily for us, Charlie was up to the challenge.

Read on to find out where we went and what Czech dishes we ate so that you can do the same when you visit Prague.

After meeting Charlie bright and early, we jumped on a tram and headed to Maso a Kobliha for breakfast. Helmed by Paul Day, a former Britt and the owner of the popular restaurant Sansho, Maso a Koliha was a butcher shop and bakery before it permanently closed. This should be no surprise since Maso a Kobliha literally translates to Meat and Donut.

Ironically, we didn’t eat either meat or donuts at Maso a Kobliha. Instead, Charlie recommended his favorite dish – scotch eggs.

Perfectly prepared and made with the finest meat (okay, we did eat meat after all), these scotch eggs reminded us of the scotch eggs we had previously eaten at Fortnum & Mason in London, except these scotch eggs were actually better with their organic free range eggs and Přestice pork sourced from heritage pigs.

Paired with fragrant elderflower juice, these eggs provided an auspicious start to our Prague food tour with one exception… we needed coffee.

Maso a Kobliha was located at Petrská 1551/23, 110 00 Nové Město, Czechia. It has permanently closed.

Sensing our need for caffeine and knowing about our passion for third wave coffee, Charlie led us to EMA Espresso Bar for our first coffee fix of the day. After finding spots inside the popular, centrally located cafe, we promptly ordered flat whites.

Expertly brewed, these espresso drinks gave us the energy we needed to continue our quest to visit as many of the best Prague restaurants in a day that our stomachs could handle.

EMA Espresso Bar has multiple Prague locations. We caffeinated at the cafe located at Na Florenci 1420/3, 110 00 Nové Město, Czechia.

Like kids at a candy shop, we fell into a state of awe as we walked into Kantýna and viewed the stocked butcher counter and glowing beer tanks inside the former bank building. Under Charlie’s tutelage, we were soon standing at the restaurant’s long communal table where we shared a loaded plate of classic Prague ham and an order of beef tartare.

As we toasted Charlie and washed our meat down with fresh Pilsner beer, we assumed that this would be the last protein we would eat during our epic Prague food tour. As we soon found out, this was not the case.

Kantýna is located at Politických vězňů 1511/5, 110 00 Nové Město, Czechia.

In an obvious attempt to kill us with too much delicious meat, if there is such a thing, Charlie ordered a gargantuan pork shoulder for the three of us to share at Pivovar Národni. Since we were eating in a beer garden, it only made sense to drink beer with this fourth course of our progressive meal. Pivovar Národni has Czech Lion beers on tap, so that’s what we drank.

As we had learned during our previous visit to a Pilsner beer spa near the German border, the Czechs love their beer. More than just Budvar, Prague has a seemingly endless variety of good beer to drink at relatively affordable prices.

We clearly need to explore the Prague beer scene to learn more about the city’s deep beer culture. The emerging Prague craft beer scene looks to be exciting and well worth a deep dive for those looking for affordable things to do in Prague.

Pivovar Narodni is located at Národní 8, 110 00 Nové Město, Czechia.

Wanting to show us another side of the multi-cultural city and knowing that we’ve been known to travel for wine, Charlie led us to eclectically designed Vinarna U Sudu so that we could sip glasses of young wine on the wine bar’s outdoor patio.

High in alcohol but low in price, the three glasses cost a total of 60 Koruna (approximately $3 USD) at the time of our visit.

Vinárna U Sudu is located at Vodičkova 677/10, 110 00 Nové Město, Czechia.

Racing to the end of our grand tour, we were fading fast and had two choices – take a nap or drink more coffee. Since experiencing Prague’s coffee scene is one of the best things to do in the Czech Republic, we opted for option two and our friend Charlie knew exactly where to go – Pastacaffé for Lamborghini coffee drinks.

This stop was our introduction to coffee beans sourced from Tonino Lamborghini, a member of the family famous for its Emilia-Romagna sports car company. It was a good choice. After drinking artfully decorated espresso drinks, we hit the accelerator and headed full steam ahead for dessert.

Pastacaffé has multiple Prague locations. We stopped at the one located at Vodičkova 676/8, 110 00 Nové Město, Czechia.

All good things must come to an end – even our epic Prague food tour – but not before we stopped for dessert at Cukrárna Myšák, a modern reincarnation of an iconic 1904 confectionary shop. Hidden inside a classicly restored building, skilled pastry chefs whip up classic desserts like the three sweet treats that we shared (pictured above).

Which did we prefer? Was it the chocolatey Sacher Torte similar to ones we previously ate in Vienna? Or was it the Savoy with marzipan, jam, chocolate cream and chocolate sponge? Or did we prefer the Vetrnik, a choux pastry with caramel cream, regular cream and caramel icing?

Just like we couldn’t pick a favorite niece or nephew, we couldn’t pick a favorite dessert. They were all that good.

Cukrarna Mysak is located at Vodičkova 710/31, 110 00 Nové Město, Czechia.

Pro Tip
One restaurant group, Ambiente, owns three of the establishments we visited on our food tour: Kantýna, Pastacaffé and Cukrárna Myšák. Once you know the wi-fi password for one of these restaurants, you know if for all of them.

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