Northern Ireland Restaurants

Belfast has witnessed an influx of international influences with restaurants, bistros, wine bars, and—as in Dublin—European-style café-bars where you can get good food most of the day and linger over a drink. The scene has been enlivened by some trendy places: New York City itself might not have a restaurant as hip as Belfast's eye-popping "restolounge," Made in Belfast. By and large, though, hearty, unpretentious cooking predominates, with good-quality, fresh local fish and meat simply prepared. You're virtually guaranteed to find certain traditional dishes on menus here, such as Guinness and beef pie; steak, chicken and pork; champ (creamy, buttery mashed potatoes with scallions); oysters from Strangford Lough; Ardglass herring; mussels from Dundrum; and smoked salmon from Glenarm. A widespread favorite is the Ulster fry, an inexpensive pub plate of bacon, black pudding, mushrooms, sausages, tomatoes, and eggs, served with potato or soda bread—one of the reasons Northern Ireland has a high rate of heart disease. The delights of ethnic restaurants, including Chinese, Japanese, Indian, Persian, and Thai, are available in Belfast, Derry, and in some smaller cities and towns. As for the cost of a meal here, by the standards of the Republic or the United States, or even the rest of the United Kingdom, restaurant prices can be surprisingly moderate. A service charge of 10% may be indicated on the bill; it's customary to pay this, unless the service was bad.