9 cities that should be on every foodie’s bucket list

Djemaa el Fna square full of crowd at sunset, Marrakech, Morocco

Food can define a holiday. If it’s bad, it casts a shadow. But, eat well and you will deepen your connection with a place. Here, we’ve chosen nine world cities where the food isn’t just good – it’s one of the big reasons to go.

Cape Town, South Africa

South Africa’s wines are famous for a reason. In Cape Town, you’re within easy reach of the best growing regions – including Stellenbosch and the Cape Winelands – and there are plenty of companies offering day trips to the most storied vineyards (try the Franschhoek wine tram). We suggest an overnighter at Babylonstoren, the original sister property to The Newt in Somerset. A modern wine producer, the garden hotel has a gorgeous selection of accommodations, a spa and lots of overnight guest-only experiences, including one of the most varied and delicious breakfast buffets we’re ever had (we still think about the five varieties of butter).

Back in Cape Town itself, the restaurant scene is popping. Down at the V&A Waterfront, Pier offers a high-end heritage experience; Salon serves a highly rated 13-course tasting menu; over in Paternoster, Wolfgat brings together foraging, fermenting and storytelling to create a 20-seat culinary retreat; and Ryan Cole’s Salsify at the Roundhouse rightfully won ‘Restaurant of the Year' at South Africa's latest Eat Out Restaurant Awards. Locals will tell you that Arthur’s Super Mini is the place for breakfast, while the terrace at Belmond’s striking pretty-in-pink hotel Mount Nelson is the spot to book for sundowners.

Hong Kong, Hong Kong

Hong Kong has so many incredible places to eat, it’s hard to know where to start. So we’ll begin with the first meal of the day. For something sweet and savoury, make a beeline to Cheung Hing Coffee Shop for freshly baked pineapple buns filled with ham and a fried egg. Lin Heung is the oldest dim sum restaurant in Hong Kong and draws a queue from 7am. Its traditional breakfast is served from a vintage trolley, piled high with bamboo steamers filled with siu mai dumplings. While you’re in Hong Kong, you’ll also need to try milk tea and a bright-yellow custard tart. The best we’ve found are at Lan Fong Yuen and Bakehouse, respectively.

One of our favourite spots for lunch is Yat Lok, which opened in 1957 and is still loved today for its crispy goose legs, which are served with noodles and a clear broth. Eating here is a no-frills affair, but it deserves its place in the Michelin Guide. Round the corner, Mak’s Noodle is famous for its prawn wonton soup and is a great spot for a filling lunch. Three-floor Luk Yu Tea House is a historic must-visit – we respect its no-phones policy as well as its crispy chicken. And, you can’t visit Hong Kong without a meal at Duddell’s, a Michelin-starred dim sum restaurant that serves dumplings in distinctive goldfish shapes alongside sautéed lobster with sugar peas in black bean sauce. The Chairman is another much-awarded restaurant that should be high on any foodie’s must-book list.

For something more high energy, Ho Lee Fook is a fantastic, neon-filled spot in Central, where head chef Archan Chan serves fun, modern takes on Cantonese classics such as sweet-and-sour Kurobuta pork with perfume lemon tea, Tetris-cut pineapple, onion and crispy tea leaves; while Yardbird Yakitori puts a flavour-filled twist on a Japanese izakaya in Sheung Wan. For one of the best views in the city (The Peak on one side, the cityscape and water on the other), book a hotel room at The Upper House. Its 49th-floor bar serves excellent cocktails and it’s almost worth staying here for the incredible dim sum breakfast alone.

Los Angeles, US

There are many cities in America we could have chosen for your bucket list: Chicago has always been famed for its unique pizza (and The Bear has added the city's beef subs and high-end restaurants to the global map), while New York will always be high on our list for memorable meals. But, nowhere does variety and glamour quite like LA. From XL martinis at the Maybourne Beverly Hills’ beautiful rooftop bar Dante, to more martinis, plus spaghetti and meatballs, at Musso & Frank Grill – a gorgeously evocative grand dining room that’s graced Hollywood since 1919 – a night out in Los Angeles is always a good time.

Mexican food is a must. Some of the best places to sample the most authentic tacos and tostadas are the city’s roaming taco trucks. Locations change day to day, so check socials, but the best we tried were from Leo’s, a colourful truck on Sunset Boulevard where we sat at a picnic bench and dived into al pastor and asada fries. For special-occasion dining, look to The Ivy on the Shore over in Santa Monica, Nancy Silverton’s excellent Osteria Mozza and Avra for cracking seafood.

For unique LA-exclusive experiences, lunch-only Destroyer in Culver City is a no-reservations ‘café atelier’ that serves the likes of organic duck confit ciabatta with crispy duck skin, wild rocket, preserved shishito peppers and roasted kale emulsion. Or, book a table at Poltergeist, which serves a signature Thai caesar salad and octopus burrata. Finally, you can’t go to LA without trying the Hailey Bieber strawberry glaze skin smoothie from Erewhon – we don’t make the rules.

LA Skyline,High angle view of buildings in city against sky during sunset,Griffith Park,United States,USA

Tokyo, Japan

The most populous city on the planet has a unique way of upholding tradition while exploring the cutting edge of everything, including food. Naturally, sushi comes very high on most people’s list of things to try when they visit, and Sushi-Ya in Ginza is one of the very best places to try it in all of Japan. A small sushi shop down a side street, Sushi-Ya has an eight-person counter where lucky diners are presented with the likes of octopus sashimi and traditional handrolls. Other top affordable sushi restaurants include Kagurazaka Yokota in Shinjuku (a meal of 15 handrolls and miso soup will cost around £30) and Sushi Mikata in Minato, which only has stand-up tables to encourage guests to stop in for just a few plates and a beer. Sushi and sashimi are available by the piece and served swiftly – ideal for a pitstop lunch as you spend the day exploring Minato’s shrines, parks and museums.

You’ll struggle to find bad ramen in Tokyo, but it doesn’t get better – or more traditional – than Japanese Ramen Gokan, a small shop in Toshima. As at most ramen joints, you place your order on the ticket machine before being shown to a seat at the bar. Soy sauce or traditional ‘salted’ bowls of ramen feature nori dried seaweed and soft noodles made by a local, topped with pork chashu, wontons, egg or steamed chicken. Meanwhile, Butagumi in Minato is a tonkotsu shop in a beautiful old house, where the team serve up noodles in bowls you’ll want to take home as a souvenir.

Tokyo has the highest concentration of Michelin stars in the world. One of our favourites is Sézanne, where French chef Daniel Calvert fuses the food of his homeland with the ingredients of Japan. On the seventh floor of the Four Seasons Hotel Tokyo at Marunouchi, it has three Michelin stars and last month won Best Restaurant in Japan on Asia’s 50 Best Restaurants List. For something similar, Narisawa in Minato is a two-Michelin-starred restaurant with a simple, inventive focus on sustainability, drawing on chef-owner Yoshihiro Narisawa’s French-led training.

Sydney, Australia

Melbourne might get more cool points, but we think Sydney just edges its local rival for restaurants. Between days spent swimming (we love Clovelly and Wylie’s Baths) and shopping (don’t sleep on Lee Mathews and Poepke), the food scene here has plenty to keep visitors sated. One such top spot is relaxed and unpretentious Sean’s on Bondi Beach. The menu is local and seasonal, with most ingredients sourced from chef Sean Moran’s Blue Mountains farm. There are also tons of top Italian spots: Ragazzi is the place to for a late-night pasta fix (order the anchovy with whipped chive butter on sourdough), while Pellegrino 2000 is a warmly lit, neighbourhood trattoria and bar in Surry Hills serving homemade pasta that transports you straight to the narrow streets of Italy. Leave room for the crème caramel, which comes with a dramatic silver platter of banana-infused whipped cream.

Australia, at large, is rightly famous for its coffee scene. A local favourite spot in Sydney is Tamarama’s MyFlowerMan – grab a coffee, soak up the sun and pick up a bunch of flowers. Ever-so-slightly off the beaten track, it’s a calm spot where you can forgo the queue for your morning coffee. Flour and Stone in Woolloomooloo is another standout option, which is also much loved for its cinnamon buns and Valrhona manjari chocolate cake (we hear Nigella Lawson is a fan).

Finally, Sydney’s coastal location gives its chefs plenty of incredible seafood to cook with. Clam Bar, Ester and Saint Peter are some of the best places to try fish in unexpected ways – head to Saint Peter for salt-and-vinegar line-caught blue mackerel with olive brine, sourdough and cultured butter, or 12-day dry-aged yellowfin tuna sirloin with hand-cut chips, leaves and condiments.

Aerial Panoramic View of Beautiful Sunrise at Sydney City Skyline

Bangkok, Thailand

Bangkok is loved by foodies for two quite different reasons: the diversity of its street food and sheer number of its awarded restaurants. For the former, 120-year-old market Nang Loeng and night market Jodd Fairs are some of the best places to sample affordable dishes that run the spectrum from pad thai and moo ping grilled pork to jellyfish noodles and pineapple fried rice. There are many companies that run street food tours through the city. On A Chef’s Tour, just eight guests are shown around 15 restaurants and backstreet food stalls over four hours, taking in traditional dishes such as cured sausage curry, satay skewers and hand-rolled noodles.

Wat Arun temple and Bangkok cityscape at sunset, elevated view, Thailand

Then, there are the high-end names to know: Nahm, Gaggan, Sorn and Nusara are some of the most respected restaurants in the world, so it pays to book a table as soon as (or even before) you’ve booked your flights. In 2002, Nahm became the first restaurant in Thailand to win a Michelin star. It still impresses today, with Bangkok-born chef Pim Techamuanvivit offering a surprising take on the flavours of her country. Indian chef Gaggan Anand turned the Thai dining scene on its head when he launched his eponymous restaurant Gaggan, which is kitted out in neon and has a menu that blends colour, Indian, French and Thai flavours, and his own musical background – it's something truly individual. But for something more distinctively Thai, Sorn’s menu focuses on ingredients and modern interpretations of dishes from southern Thailand. Think: Phuket lobster or Tapi river prawns. Then, there’s Nusara: chef Thitid ‘Ton’ Tassanakajohn calls his food ‘colourful Thai cuisine’ that honours his grandmother. Tasting menu highlights include blue swimming crab curry and crispy rice noodles, Thai wagyu with holy basil and a Thai tea ice-cream sandwich.

Lima, Peru

In 2023, Virgilio Martínez’s Central came top of the World’s 50 Best Restaurants, becoming the first South American restaurant to do so. Lima has other contenders regularly on the list, including Central’s sister site Kjolle and Mayta, which both lean into contemporary Peruvian cuisine. This year, Lima’s Maido topped the list. The epitome of nikkei (Peruvian-Japanese fusion), the Miraflores restaurant is led by chef Mitsuharu ‘Micha’ Tsumura, who turns out signature dishes such as squid ramen with Amazonian chorizo. Nikkei food is symbolic of Peruvian cooking, which generally combines indigenous, Spanish, African, Chinese and Japanese traditions, all backed up by the country's incredible biodiversity, which provides a wonderful bounty from across the Andes, Amazon and Pacific coast. One of the best places to experience the full diversity of these ingredients is at the 10-day Mistura food festival, which lands in Lima every September, showcasing food from over 300 farms, restaurants and big-name chefs.

Lima is the only capital city in South America by the ocean, which partly explains how ceviche became one of the country’s national dishes. Down by the harbour, there are plenty of food stalls that serve fresh-off-the-boat seafood ceviche-style, but one of the very best places to try it is at Miraflores restaurant La Mar – a pioneering cevicheria that’s only open from noon to 5.30pm to guarantee the freshness of that morning’s catch. Another delicacy is guinea pig (cuy), and it’s served most inventively as a Peking-style meat with hoisin sauce at hotspot Astrid y Gastón, which you’ll find in a striking 300-year mansion in San Isidro. The pisco sour is another Peruvian icon – we drink ours at Hotel Bolivar and Museo del Pisco.

Aerial view of the dramatic sunset over the Miraflores skyline in Lima with the coastal road

Mexico City, Mexico

Mexico City is roughly the same size as London, so you’ll want to set aside five or so days if you want to really get around its world-class restaurants. We suggest starting at Central de Abasto food market. It’s where 80 per cent of CDMX’s ingredients come from, so is a great spot to immerse yourself in the colours, flavours and scents of the scene, trying fresh guava and cactus as you go. For a definitive high-end Mexican restaurant experience, book a table at Contramar in Roma Norte, which opened in 1998. Famous for its showstopping dessert trays, chef Gabriela Cámara’s buzzy kitchen turns out the likes of whole fish – butterflied, grilled and painted with parsley sauce on one side and smoky red adobo on the other – in a beautiful blue dining room. Another hero dish is its tuna tostada, which comes topped with chipotle aïoli and sushi-grade tuna.

Our favourite breakfast comes from Fonda Margarita, a no-frills café under a corrugated iron roof where diners can start their day with frijoles refritos con huevos (fried corn tortillas, cheese, beans, salsa and eggs), churros and hot sweet coffee. Get there at 7am to avoid the rush (most dishes are gone by 10am). For another traditional CDMX experience, visit Restaurante El Cardenal, a 1969 spot with dark-wood furniture, white tablecloths and a vivid mural painted on one wall, which all adds to the atmosphere. On the menu, you’ll find a wide selection of tacos, pilbil, quesadilla and four mole with braised meat.

For a more contemporary approach, Meroma in Roma served the likes of tagliolini in a beef ragout with smoked tomato and hoja santa, and adobo-marinated fish collar with coriander, bonito and avocado in beautiful surroundings. Rosetta, also in Roma, is a Michelin-starred spot that serves an a la carte menu that could feature quail with plum mole, pickled paloma mushrooms and mustard leaf or beetroot tartare al pastor. And, finally, Quintonil in Polanco is a special spot for experimental Mexican cooking. Book a seat at the counter and try the likes of grasshopper tacos, mussel tostada and coconut sorbet with plankton and caviar.

Close up of hand with black glove preparing traditional Mexican tacos on a hot griddle. The tortillas are filled with juicy meat. Street food cooking process at street

Marrakech, Morocco

Bustling souks and busy night markets remain the life force of Marrakech. Within the old city walls that define its historic Medina, there are food stalls where you’ll find steaming tagines, couscous loaded with slow-cooked meats and bowls of harira chickpea soup being ladled out to locals. Everything is best eaten elbow to elbow at communal tables, accompanied by mint tea or strong Moroccan coffee. You can find some of the best coffee at showstopping Bacha – decorated with countless colourful tiles, the café’s single-origin drinks are served alongside delicate pastries, making it the ideal spot to recharge after a morning of exploring the souks. Staying within the Medina, you’ll find Le Tobsil, a romantic dining spot in a candlelit courtyard where multi-course Moroccan feasts are served with spiced teas and traditional hospitality. There’s also Le Jardin, where mezze platters, bright salads and grilled meats, such as lamb chops with aubergine and pistachio, are eaten in a tiled courtyard shaded with palms.

Elsewhere, Sahbi Sahbi is a female-led restaurant that uses recipes passed down through generations. Interiors conjure the Arabian desert with terracotta walls and woven accents, while the menu shows off classic Moroccan cuisine. Think: lamb and aubergine tagines, slow-cooked meats and stone-baked breads. Another excellent female-run restaurant is Al Fassia (order the lamb tagine with prunes). You can’t visit Marrakech without popping into the Royal Mansour for a drink. One of the world’s most beautiful hotels, this former Moroccan palace is home to Le Jardin, a lovely courtyard with parasols and palms. La Mamounia is another hotel with heritage. We love the terrace of its Bar Majorelle bar for a saffron white negroni with garden views.