And it really is tasty in Albania!
First, to make calculating prices easy: the dollar-to-lek rate is 1 to 100. That is, for 1 dollar you get 100 lek.
We started our gastronomic tour of Albania at Tradicional zgara. I’d read about this small, inconspicuous restaurant in reviews of the hotel before we flew to Albania. After reading the reviews, and then hearing good things again from the guide on the bus, we headed there on the very first day, right after arriving. The restaurant has a menu in Russian, but it’s probably better to take the English one if you know even a little English. For example, the Russian menu has items like “Whether fish”, “Drink wine”, “Drink litres of wine”, “Pork chops with granite” and the like. The portions are very large and the prices are quite reasonable. On the first day we ordered French fries, a green salad and a “Small seafood mix”, and all of it cost us 1,150 lek (about 11 dollars 50 cents). That was enough for the two of us to eat our fill, with some seafood and fries left over. On other days we tried fantastic stuffed aubergines, a Greek salad, those very “pork chops with granite” (the chops were more like two big steaks than chops), squid, prawns and chicken fillet with a side dish. And we really liked how they cook there. Once we came at lunchtime and had to wait outside for any table to become free. All in all, a very tasty and popular place, even though it’s tucked away in a corner and is a really rather inconspicuous little restaurant.
We also liked Kondi Bar. We lingered there in the evenings, and in the last days we found out that besides drinks you can also order pizza from the neighbouring pizzeria. A wonderful bar, tasty cocktails, pleasant bar staff. It’s a family bar run by a mum, a dad and 2 daughters. They always serve quickly, say hello and goodbye, and sometimes bring treats on the house. We really liked it. I recommend it.
There was also a sad incident. We went to Taverna Sulejmanasi for lunch, and everything was tasty, BUT!!! One of the dishes we ordered was a beef steak, and they brought stewed beef — well, never mind, it was tasty anyway. We waited about 15 minutes for the order; afterwards we asked for another bottle of beer, but it never came. While waiting for the beer, I asked for the bill; we waited another 15 minutes, went to the waiters ourselves and asked for the bill again; 10 minutes later we asked a waiter rushing past for the bill; and another 10 minutes later they deigned to bring it. On top of that, a couple at the next table had ordered beer, but since the waiter had no bottle opener, he asked us for a knife and opened her beer with it. When another beer was brought to the next table, the waiter, without even asking us this time, just turned round, took the knife from our table to open the beer, then put the bottle cap on our table and was about to walk off with the knife. That kind of rudeness spoils the whole impression of the place, even though the food was tasty.
One evening we went to Porta Club for dinner. A very expensive restaurant compared with others nearby. But that’s not the main thing — we came to eat, not to look at prices. In the evenings there’s live music, and it’s really great: good songs, a good voice, a pleasure to listen to. The waiters are fairly quick and neat, and the menu has a large choice. As an aperitif we ordered a small antipasto (700 lek) — quite tasty. We also had a cocktail (I don’t remember the exact price, something around 700–800 lek) with not very fresh passion fruit. A salad with jamón and cheese (500 lek), which turned out to have unwashed, wilted lettuce leaves with black spots. Four-cheese ravioli — “four cheese”, as it turned out, referred to the sauce. The ravioli were, well, to my taste — I can’t say they weren’t tasty, but I can’t say they were tasty either; ordinary. A portion of ravioli cost 700 lek. All in all, a mixed bag.
Our hotel also had a restaurant on the ground floor, but we didn’t go in. There were too many reviews saying the restaurant cheats tourists by bringing bills for huge sums of 70–100 euros… I can’t confirm or deny that, since we decided simply not to tempt fate.
We went to Pizzeri Bar Restorant “Anchor” — fine, in my opinion. There we ordered a Caesar salad (500 lek), a Greek salad (300 lek), a Coca-Cola (150 lek), a beer (200 lek) and 500 grams of lamb (800 lek). The salads were very big; we couldn’t finish either of them. They also don’t salt or pepper the dishes, or dress the Greek salad with oil — but those are trifles you can do yourself. The lamb was lightly salted and seasoned with spices, but only the skin. The chicken in the Caesar was overdried, and there were no croutons in the Caesar. The meat was tasty, but it really needed some sauce. The price of 1,950 lek for dinner for two, with huge portions, I consider perfectly fine. In dollars that’s 19.50.
In Gjirokastër we went to Restaurant “The Park”. Unfortunately I forgot to take photos, but I still remember the wonderful taste of the dorado. Very well cooked, with French fries and a glass of beer — mmm. All in all, I don’t regret going in, although there’s a construction site next door and dust settles very quickly.
Not far from Vlorë, we went to the “Tropical” beach restaurant. There we had divine mussels (500 lek), an equally divine prawn salad (600 lek) and a steak with fried potatoes (1,000 lek). The drinks are a bit pricey there: 2 cans of Pepsi cost us 400 lek. Now about the food: the steak was ordinary, unremarkable. The prawn salad was ordinary too, except for the prawns themselves. The prawns were so deliciously cooked — in a sweet and spicy sauce, fried with sesame — that I really wanted to order a couple more salads, just without the other ingredients. The mussels… honestly, I’ve never tasted such delicious mussels anywhere; the sauce they were cooked and served in was just right. Unfortunately, this was the only place in Albania where I ordered mussels, so I can’t compare whether they’re this tasty everywhere in Albania or only here.
And finally, breakfasts at the hotel are served in the bar as a buffet — or rather a “buffet table” :). All the food that’s supposed to be hot is cold. The only hot things are the tea and coffee. The tea isn’t tasty, the coffee is fine, and the juice is so-so — you can tell it has nothing to do with real juice. A tasty cheese omelette (albeit cold); the fried sausages are tasty in theory, but because they’re cold and a bit dried out, they don’t taste good. There were also fried eggs, toast fried in egg (instead of an omelette), watermelon, melon, olives, fresh cucumber and tomato, and some mayonnaise salad (the same one every day, slightly picked at — it felt as though that salad sat there all 7 days without ever being cleared away). Once there was pizza (again instead of sausages; cold pizza is tastier than cold sausages). There were processed cheese spreads and ordinary cheese triangles, no more, no less. Once there were croissants instead of fruit.
Your comments