15 cities with the most tantalizing food scenes

Sometimes a city's cuisine enhances an already incredible trip — sometimes, it is the trip.

If you love planning your itinerary around where you can eat, we're here to help. We asked our expert team of writers and editors to share their picks for the cities with the best food scenes around the globe. Here are 15 places to start planning your next food-focused adventure.

1. Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam

Recommended by James Pham

Vietnam’s most populous city, with its many schools and job opportunities, draws people from all over the country – bringing with them their regional specialties. This great melting pot of flavors means there’s a tremendous variety, and you could eat something different every day for a year without a repeat. Small homes and a large student population have helped drive an amazing street food scene. Most meals can be had for a dollar or two, including freshly baked baguettes stuffed with fried eggs for breakfast, a bowl of steaming hot pho noodle soup for lunch (try it at Phở Hoà Pasteur, opened in 1968) and perhaps a beef stir fry with rice for dinner.

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Fans of fine dining are also spoiled for choice. The Michelin Guide arrived in Ho Chi Minh City for the first time in June 2023, honoring 55 eateries serving everything from high-end European contemporary dishes to innovative Vietnamese cuisine (Anan Saigon is considered one of the pioneers of modern Vietnamese cuisine). Startup costs are relatively low compared to other major cities, making it easier for ambitious chefs and returning Vietnamese entrepreneurs to open up their own restaurants. Multiple new openings practically every week adds to an already incredibly diverse and dynamic food scene. 

2. Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia

Recommended by Winnie Tan

Ask a Malaysian what the best thing to do in the country is, and their answer likely is “to eat.” If you’re looking for culinary experiences as vibrant and diverse as the people behind them, then the capital city Kuala Lumpur is the place to go. Featuring dishes like rice served atop banana leaf, sweet and colorful kuih confectioneries and delightfully glazed barbecued charsiew pork, Malaysian food is the wonderful combination of Malay, Chinese and Indian cooking, and all the flavors in between.

What makes Kuala Lumpur truly a food city though, is the sheer variety of food that can be found in nearly every setting, at every hour. Start the day with a breakfast of nasi lemak or fried vermicelli from a hawker stall, have lunch at a trendy cafe, wine and dine with a view atop some of Southeast Asia’s tallest buildings, and if there’s still room — supper at 24-hour mamak shop. It’s safe to say that a single trip to Kuala Lumpur may not be enough to try all the foodie stops the city has to offer, but it’s impossible to leave without having discovered a new favorite dish.

3. Bangkok, Thailand

Recommended by Austin Bush

Bangkok’s street food scene is world famous for good reason. Walk outside in just about any corner of the city, and within seconds you have access to vendors selling Hainanese chicken rice, noodle soup or wok-fried dishes, and mobile carts selling fried pork, grilled skewers or freshly cut tropical fruit. But Bangkok’s food scene is not limited to the streets. Head to the basement level of just about any mall, and you’ll find the dishes you saw on the street, but with air-conditioning, comfortable seating and a price tag that’s only marginally more expensive. And of course, Bangok is also home to countless brick-and-mortar restaurants, which range from mom-and-pop curry stalls to massive, brightly lit seafood halls.

In recent years, Bangkok has seen a shift toward upscale dining, and it’s easy to blow your paycheck on excellent Japanese (the city has a massive Japanese population), regional Italian and of course, Thai restaurants. Of the latter, several ambitious Thai chefs – think Prin Polsuk of Samrub Samrub Thai, and Tam Chudaree Debhakam of Baan Tepa Culinary Space – have taken their cuisine to levels of sophistication and creativity that can rival that of any of the world’s culinary capitals.

4. Lucknow, India

Recommended by Akanksha Singh

Of course Mumbai, Delhi, Kolkata and Bengaluru teem with swish restaurants, but few cities exist with a culinary soul like Lucknow – the birthplace of Awadhi cuisine. Lucknow doesn't promise to do many cuisines half-heartedly; it does the one (woefully unworshipped) cuisine well. Born in the erstwhile princely Muslim state of Awadh (now central Uttar Pradesh), the nawabs (royals) patronized chefs to grow the region’s culinary arts. The result? A variety of succulent kebabs, handkerchief-thin flatbreads (rumali rotis) and an attention to delicate spice blends (an estimated one hundred and sixty in total). Plus, an emphasis on technique that isn’t stuffed away in fine-dining restaurants, but affordably eaten at home and through street vendors – from tender galouti kebabs at the roadside Tunday Kebab (a century-old shop) to gulabi (rose-pink) Kashmiri chai in Chowk. A few local favorites include the nihari (meat stew) at the unpretentious Raheem’s, the kakori kebabs at Clarks Avadh, and malai paan from Ram Asray – a thin sheet of sugar-and-cream wrapped into a triangular dry fruit parcel.

5. Napier, New Zealand

Recommended by Jessica Lockhart

There’s no question that Gatsby would have felt right at home in Napier, New Zealand – and it’s not just because of its well-preserved Art Deco downtown. In the Hawke’s Bay region, pleasure is the priority, whether that means sampling the good drop at one of the 80-odd wineries; taking a foodie tour with Juliet Harbutt, one of the world’s leading experts on cheese; or dining at one of its half dozen “hatted” restaurants (NZ’s answer to Michelin stars) including Craggy Range or Pacifica.

Hawke’s Bay’s long hot summers and fertile soils are to credit for its orchards laden with peaches, figs, kiwis, cherries, peaches and plums. There’s more to do here than stuff yourself silly, though – immerse yourself in the culture of Aotearoa (NZ’s Māori language name). Instead of terroir, producers speak of tūrangawaewae, which translates loosely as “a place to stand.” Its meaning goes deeper than provenance – it’s also about kaitiakitanga, intergenerational guardianship of the land. In Havelock North, Heretaunga Wine Studio dives into this concept during its immersive multi-sensory tastings, but you'll feel this sense of place at most establishments. At Teresa, a 25-seat speakeasy tucked behind a deli in Napier, bartenders imbue cocktails with endemic ingredients like kawakawa (a herbaceous shrub) and horopito (pepper tree), all served with a side of high drama. (Think: eight-inch-high towers of flavored foam and popping candy garnishes.) Time your visit for the region’s biggest food festival, F.A.W.C. (Food and Wine Classic), held annually in both the summer and winter.

6. Lima, Peru

Recommended by Marisa Paska

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Lima has made a name for itself as the top culinary destination in Latin America, thanks to its variety of high-quality offerings. If fusing culinary stylings is an art form, then Lima is a city of artists, as nearly every Peruvian specialty was born out of an amalgamation. Take comida criollo, a Peruvian comfort food that integrates flavors from every culture in the country's history – African, European, Chinese, Indigenous – into one pleasing, like-grandma-used-to-make culinary style. And don't miss out on chifa, a Peruvian-Chinese fusion that's a Lima staple for family-style Sunday lunches. Similarly, the city's flagship dish, ceviche, was born of a more simple fusion of fresh fish and lime juice, while the marriage of picarones (squash and sweet potato donuts) with chancaca syrup might just be enough to make you extend your stay a little bit longer.

Even in Lima's world-class restaurants, fusion is the key. At Central, a decade-long success story, chefs Virgilio Martínez and Pía León, obsessively bring together rare ingredients from across Peru to invent flavors previously nonexistent in the restaurant world; their work earned them the #1 spot on the World's 50 Best Restaurant List in 2023.

7. Belém, Brazil

Recommended by Victoria Gill

UNESCO appointed Belém a Creative City of Gastronomy in 2015, and its recipes are an explosion of history, science and art. Cultural cooking that fuses Portuguese, African and Indigenous techniques and flavors offers both an education and an indulgence for the senses. Savor maniçoba – the Amazonian answer to feijoada – in a fine dining restaurant, sip Brazilian duck soup from an island barraca (food stall) and watch vendors boil sour, punchy tucupi (manioc broth) for days in bustling Mercado Ver-o-Peso, the go-to lunch spot for Brazilians visiting Belém.

Paraense chefs are fast becoming celebrities. Thiago Castanho – whose family started their Remanso Do Peixe restaurant in their living room – presents food shows for Netflix, while Santarém-born Saulo Jennings has two restaurants in Belém and another in Rio. Cairu is among the most important ice cream parlors in the world, serving fruit flavors from the Amazon that can only be sampled regionally, while artisanal chocolatier Dona Nena draws visitors to the island of Combu with her confections featuring hyper-local ingredients.

8. Palermo, Sicily

Recommended by Nicola Williams

Forget elegant tablecloth dining in a star-spangled ristorante – Italy’s best street-food city is all about tucking into finger-licking offal dishes and plastic beakers of syrup-soaked grattatella (ice scratchings, hand-scraped from a block of ice) in Palermo’s markets. A mash-up of Sicilian, Asian and African cooking smells waft through the air at Mercato del Ballarò, an aromatic greeting that hasn’t changed since Arabs traded here in the 9th century. Join the queue at Bancarella Del Polpottavio for street-grilled octopus or stigghiola, a dish first made by Greeks in Palermo 2000 years ago that features veal, lamb or goat intestines wrapped around spring onion or leek. Sink your teeth into a pani câ mèusa – bread roll stuffed with boiled beef spleen, lung and trachea – at panini shops like La Kalsa’s Francu U Vastiddaru, or indulge in Rocky Basile’s buns, which are stuffed with boiled beef and served from his hand-pushed cart at Mercato della Vucciria. Satisfy your inevitable sweet tooth with marzipan-sculpted pomegranates at Pasticceria Costa, crunchy ricotta-stuffed cannoli at Cannoli & Co, or minne di vergine ("virgin breasts" aka white ice cakes with a candied cherry on the top) baked by nuns in a 14th-century convent at I Segreti del Chiostro. All utterly sinful, of course.

9. Lyon, France

Recommended by Monica Suma

Halfway between Paris and Provence, near the imposing Alps, Lyon emerges at the confluence of the Rhône and Saône rivers. With more restaurants per capita than anywhere else, the country’s third-largest city lives up to its standing as culinary capital of France. From local bouchons serving traditional Lyonnaise cuisine (considered workman’s fare) to Michelin-star restaurants delighting with haute cuisine, the riverside city is a gourmet paradise.

Indulge in a titillating variety of quality foods at Les Halles de Lyon Paul Bocuse, a covered market supplying top chefs with the finest cheeses and charcuteries – go for a plate of luscious Fine de Claire oysters and grilled seafood. Over in the heart of Vieux Lyon, a scoop of mouth-watering lavender or velvety honey and rosemary ice cream at Terre adélice is not to be missed; this local favorite serves close to 100 flavors, including audacious ones like Roquefort or black sesame. Daniel et Denise stands out as one of Lyon’s best bouchons, thanks to Chef Joseph Viola, a Meilleur Ouvrier de France, who whips his magic into hearty dishes; his foie gras and sweetbread pastry is particularly lauded. For stellar gastronomy, iconic Restaurant Paul Bocuse pays homage to the legendary, late chef known for popularizing Nouvelle Cuisine – marvel at the acclaimed black-truffle soup served in pastry crust at this two-starred Michelin cradle of finesse.

10. Porto, Portugal

Recommended by Kerry Walker

With higgledy-piggledy medieval lanes filled with patisseries, petisco (Portuguese tapas) haunts and historic port wine lodges tumbling down to the Douro River, Porto looks good ⁠– and tastes even better. The city is hot on Lisbon’s heels when it comes to food, glittering brighter each year with Michelin stars. Top-of-their-game chefs like Pedro Lemos, Ricardo Costa (The Yeatman) and Rui Paula (Casa de Chá da Boa Nova) are raiding farms, vineyards and the Atlantic Ocean for hyper-fresh ingredients, serving them with creative flair and phenomenal wines.

Begin with a root around the recently revamped Mercado do Bolhão, a 19th-century, wrought-iron beauty of a market brimming with fruit and veg, fish, meat and cheese. It’s a few minutes’ toddle from Café Santiago, where you can demolish a francesinha, a monster-sized steak-and-ham sandwich drowning in melted cheese, egg and tangy beer sauce. For a deeper dive into Porto’s food scene, join Taste Porto for a downtown food romp or vintage port or craft beer tour. A skip over the river to Vila Nova de Gaia brings you to the barrel-lined cellars of hilltop port wine lodges like the excellent Graham’s and the World of Wine (WOW), with scores of restaurants, museums and a wine school offering themed tastings and workshops.

11. Tbilisi, Georgia

Recommended by Angelo Zinna

Food is so important in Georgian culture that the Tbilisi State University uses the country’s most iconic dish ⁠– the khachapuri ⁠– as a measure of inflation. But cheese (khacha) and bread (puri) are only two of many staples that make up the rich Georgian cuisine, which you can sample in full in Tbilisi. From succulent khinkali ⁠– Georgian dumplings filled with spiced meat and herbs that require some skill to be eaten ⁠– to vegan-friendly eggplant, pomegranate and walnut badrijani rolls, restaurant menus reflect the country’s geographical diversity.

No culinary experience beats joining a supra, a traditional festive feast, but the capital has no shortage of eateries to keep you busy while you wait for an invitation. For a contemporary take on Georgian classics take a seat in the lovely garden at Shavi Lomi or book a table at Barbarestan, which serves recipes inspired by a 19th-century cookbook. Don’t forget that Georgia is also one of the world’s pioneers in wine-making ⁠– the country’s ancient qvevri method has been listed as an Intangible Cultural Heritage of Humanity by UNESCO ⁠– and you can pair hearty Georgian dishes with a variety of dry, sweet and semi-sweet wines from ten regions.

12. Bristol, United Kingdom

Recommended by Aydan Stuart

When you think about the UK, Bristol may not be at the top of your list for food, but this eclectic city is packed with flavor. There are more than 80 different nationalities of food represented across Bristol, and the city’s 13+ Michelin Guide restaurants make up a higher percentage of restaurants compared to any other UK city.

You’ll find the most variety at St Nicholas’ Market, with each market alley packed with cuisines and locals alike. Savor Nepali dumplings at Momo Bar, warm your insides with generously-portioned Caribbean curries at Caribbean Wrap, go old-school with a pie and mash from Pieminster or snag one of Matina’s kurdish wraps (if you can stomach the queue). Don’t worry fine-diners, Bristol's got something for you, too. Spots like Bulrush serve an imaginative menu of foraged and preserved ingredients, while Bybrook amazes with modern takes on classics straight from the kitchens of a 14th-century country house hotel. And while less refined, Cabot’s Circus has, in recent years, turned from shoppers' paradise into a fun hangout of well-known food chains and local must-trys.

13. Charleston, South Carolina

Recommended by Ann Douglas Lott

Every US southerner – including this one – knows that Charleston comes out on top when it comes to eating and drinking. While it’s known for Lowcountry cuisine (think Lowcountry boil, okra, tomatoes, and fish and shellfish that were caught that morning), Charleston has also perfected classic southern fare, barbecue and waterfront dining. Start in the Historic District, where you can grab all-day crepes and hot-pressed sandwiches at Queen Street Grocery, homemade biscuits from Callie’s Hot Little Biscuit, espresso martinis at The Palmetto Hotel bar and an upscale dinner in 82 Queen’s romantic courtyard. For barbecue, it’s got to be Lewis Barbecue’s Texas-style brisket and glazed pork ribs. Then for the main event, aka the perfect seafood dinner, head to Chubby Fish to sample their raw and oyster bars (with a caviar sandwich on the side), saving room for some blue crab tagliatelle, grilled oysters, or even a whole fish. Then go live out your Nicholas Sparks dreams at my personal favorite, Bowens Island (seriously, they filmed a scene in Dear John here). It’s a short drive from Folly Beach, and you can enjoy your oysters – fried or raw – and watch the sunset over the marsh.

14. Buffalo, USA

Recommended by Julia Buckley

In 1964, the story goes, Teresa Bellissimo, owner of Buffalo’s Anchor Bar, deep-fried some chicken wings for her hungry son and his student friends, then tossed them in cayenne hot sauce. That’s how Buffalo Wings supposedly originated – and today you’ll want to munch your way through the official (and lip-smackingly good) Buffalo Wing Trail. But there’s far more to foodie Buffalo than chicken. There’s beef on weck – salted, hard bread kummelweck rolls dusted with caraway seeds, stuffed with roast beef and a splodge of horseradish, and served with a pickle. Then there’s sponge candy, a honeycomb-style crunchy candy wrapped in chocolate; fish fry, similar to British fish and chips; and spaghetti parm, pasta smothered in molten mozzarella and served with a side of marinara sauce. Even the hot dogs taste different here – they’re broiled on a bed of charcoal (Ted’s has been pumping out “extra charred” classics for nearly a century). Modern Buffalo adds superb Ethiopian, Eritrean and Sudanese dishes to those classics – you’ll taste some of the best at West Side Bazaar and the Downtown Bazaar, where you can also find authentic Mexican, Thai and Filipino food.

15. Marrakesh, Morocco

Recommended by Helen Ranger

As dusk falls, delicious aromas from sizzling grills fill the air: Djemaa El Fna, Marrakesh’s famous central square, is open for business. Take your pick from stalls offering harira soup, snails in spicy broth, kebab skewers, fried fish and prawns, egg-stuffed rolls, or the city’s signature tangia – a hearty beef stew cooked with saffron and preserved lemon slow-cooked in a terracotta urn in the hammam coals. But Marrakesh’s food scene is not just about the square. Take a food tour (Moroccan Food Adventures is tops) to venture into side streets and sample dishes you didn’t know you’d like or wouldn’t dare to try on your own. Then there are the riad restaurants: fine, traditional Moroccan cuisine served in exquisite surroundings in old palaces and houses. Try the romantic Dar Zellij, or head to the restaurant at the Museum of Culinary Arts to learn all you need to know about local cuisine. Fancy a modern take on Moroccan flavors? Head for the gentrified quartiers of the medina such as Mouassine for Terrasse des Epices and Nomad, and Rue Riad Zitoun for Mandala Society and Naranj. Guéliz in the Ville Nouvelle boasts excellent contemporary cooking, including +61 and Cantine Mouton Noir.