Best and worst countries for food?

One of my pet hates are touristy restaurants with a board outside covered in photos of the food . I won’t eat there. I know what a paella or a mousakka looks like . And if I don’t know a dish I’ll ask the waiter .

In my opinion wherever you go, you should avoid the so-called Tourist menus. Usually, these have very little to do with the actual dishes served in the country. The ingredients are certainly the same, but seasoning and sometimes the preparation time has been adjusted to what the chef either knows will sell to foreigners or to what he assumes their taste to be. These menus are often low-price so practically everything is pasta with something else.

For instance nowhere in Spain except either along the pilgrim routes to Compostela or in the seaside towns catering primarily to foreign holidaymakers have I seen so many pasta dishes included in a menu!

The same applies in other countries as well.

If you want to eat well and eat the traditional dishes of the country you are in, find a restaurant, café, pub or cafeteria where the local population eat,

On a visit to Britain after 40 odd years abroad, I found that nothing much has changed. If you want traditional British food the normal standard of cooking is that of the average school dinner of the 1960s - marginally better in Scotland than in England and worst in London. I did not suprise me to see that most British towns have loads of Indian, Chinese, or other foreign take-aways, as quite honestly the British are still as a rule the worst cooks in the Western hemisphere.

Denmark too has regressed from being one of the best places to eat in Europe to being mediocre and it is hard to find a restaurant that dares serve traditional Danish food except for the cold table or open sandwiches.

When last I was in France, we could simply not afford restaurant prices, but looking at the dishes being consumed at tables outside in the summer, I suspect that too many chefs in France are serving the same "French cuisine" as international restaurants - the modern French cuisine that is more concerned with what the food looks like on the plate than what it tastes like. None of it looked much like the food that used to be served in country inns and restaurants.

Spanish food, particularly in the north in cities like San Sebastián and Bilbao is amazing. It’s a feast for the eyes as well as the tastebuds.
And i can’t understand why people think it’s too meat heavy — fish and shellfish is on every menu and the fish markets in many towns are a real eye-opener. Oerhaps not for the er, sensitive.
But then I think we should be well-informed about and shown the origins of our food and how it gets to the table - it doesn’t come plastic-wrapped on neat polystyrene supermarket trays.
Italian food is mostly Ok, but not always while French can be distinctly variable although there is still much great food to be had there.
I don’t think I’ve been anywhere where the food is universally awful but in the States we got very fed up with the way cold food is served at positively arctic temperatures. Salads, seafood, desserts, even sandwiches all chilled to tastelessness.

Some of the best food I have eaten is in a little restaurant in Ostend, Belgium. The menu is not extensive basically sea food and steak and one can watch the meals being cooked. OH and I both like Iranian food and we have found two or three in this country and the meals are as good as we ate in Tehran. However, I think there’s good and bad in all countries so we always try to eat where the locals eat.

I'm in Belgium and we eat very well, our cuisine is related to the French and we love to cook ánd eat with good ingredients and everything well prepared! I'm also very much into Middle Eastern cousine (oh yes, Ottolenghi, Sami Tamimi etc.) and I do love Turkish too! And furthermore everything Mediterranian, Italian on the first place but also Greec, Spanish, Portuguese. German cooking is often (too) heavy on meat but still acceptable. Switzerland is horrible, they can't cook and they charge you fortunes. I've seen like 25 € for a simple plate of pasta not even enough for a 12year old. You better go and buy some bread and cheese and have a picknick. Oh and bring your own drinks.

The worst for me is Greece, because I loathe olives and olive oil. Also the USA, I don’t understand what their problem is with vegetables! There are plenty in the supermarkets, although even the bread was full of sugar. The best for me is Italian and Thai. Also I don’t think we had a bad meal in South Africa. The very very worst was the Seychelles islands, they imported everything except bananas although I’m going back some years, maybe things have improved.

Workers' cafes have tended to be the biggest hits food-wise for us in many countries, especially Italy, Spain and Turkey. Loved all the food we had out in Greece last year. Worst of all was a trip to Dublin, where we had no self-catering option. Everywhere we went was awful, despite some good reviews online. 'Traditional Irish stew' was repeatedly tinned lumps of beef mixed with tinned carrots served with tinned potatoes; all for the bargain price of about 15Euros each. Always served by Eastern Europeans; not their fault if that's what the kitchen produced I guess.

Best would be Thailand and Italy and worst would be Germany , China and Poland.

The best for me would be Italy closely followed by Sri Lanka. The worst Hungary and Egypt, I did did get food poisoning in Egypt so didn’t eat a great deal after that.
There are good and bad restaurants everywhere, when on holiday it’s a good idea to see where the locals eat and try and go there.

Italy followed by Cambodia especially a place in Siem Reap named Haven. Here children over 16 from orphanages were trained in chef, front of house, hospitality duties. The food was so fresh and full of flavour. We try to go to night markets or eat street food the best of which was in Sri Lanka.

I find some of the small, less showy, inexpensive restaurants often provide the best home made food.
Totally agree - we've had some of our best meals in places which didn't look particularly fancy or indeed, anything special, from the outside. In Turkey, I love the lokantas - they are very popular with local residents and workers. There's no menu - just what they have cooked that day, and you just ask for what you want, or point to it. Fresh, local food and unbelievably good value for money too.

I enjoyed the food in Turkey, Tunisia and Lanzarote.

We go to a small Turkish restaurant in Leyton and the food is excellent - and we are vegetarian. We have lentil soup, falafels with houmous, haloumi, mixed salad, Turkish bread and Turkish tea for around £22 for two, which I think is a bargain - and delicious. I find some of the small, less showy, inexpensive restaurants often provide the best home made food.

Spain is OK away from the resorts but in the resorts the menus in all the restaurants seem to be very similar, and not particularly appetising.

I enjoyed the food in the US, although I had been warned it wasn't very good. A Mexican restaurant in Florida was excellent, and a chain called Shoneys served the most extensive and wonderful brunch (don't know if it still exists).
We also had some very nice, relatively inexpensive, meals in New York.

I would love to go to Italy, as I have heard the food there (and the ice cream) is very good.

My favourite food is eaten in Thailand and I’m not a fan of Mexican food at all!

Best food from various countries and British International restaurants and takeaways. I tend to enjoy the dish rather than the country of origin.
That is except Mexican food I really hate it. It all has some sort of funny flavouring that I can't stand. If I went there for a holiday I would have to probably live on chips. Also Singapore white boiled rice was hotter than a vindaloo. I couldn't eat it, but the medium curry was nice.

Agree Peasebottom regarding the meat (diabolical treatment)

No has mentioned India. The food is amazing and so varied from region to region. I also love Turkish food. The worst, for me, was Czech food. Avoid the potato dumplings unless you are a shot-putter.

Blondiescot

Turkey top for me - people who've never been automatically think of takeaway doner kebabs in this country, and it's nothing like that. Very under-rated - there's such a wide variety of dishes from different parts of the country. We only eat Turkish food when we're there - and we eat at the little places the locals go to.
Most over-rated - to be honest, I've enjoyed the food almost everywhere we've been, but if pushed, I'd have to say Spain.

That was exactly what I was going to say. When I worked in Turkey I always advised guests to avoid the tourist restaurants and eat wherever the locals were eating. Not only would it be authentic delicious food but it was much, much cheaper too.

So much good food, so little time! I've loved the food in Germany, Belgium (so long as you get away from the touristy frituurs-with-everything places), Ireland and France.
I was disappointed in Malta and Switzerland - both very bland and uninteresting and Maltese desserts seem to be nothing but processed sugar with a squirt of aerosol cream. I was served the nastiest lasagne I've ever had at Fiumicino airport in Rome when our flight was delayed and we broke the habit of a lifetime to eat in an airport cafeteria.

It’s hard to generalise as I’ve had good and bad food in lots of countries.
My best food was in South Africa, amazing food and wine and very reasonable prices , even in top restaurants.
I’ve never had a bad meal in turkey, Greece or Italy. Spain is great if you get off the tourist track.
USA , it depends where you are , Fab food in San Francisco and New Orleans. Plus key west in Florida.
The worst , Orlando in Florida .
Cuba is a great country but the food isn’t great due to sanctions and they run out of stuff . Great molitos tho

Some wag on TV recently described paella as rice with the contents of a bin bag emptied on top.

I love France but can honestly say that the worst meals Ive ever eaten were in France. Couscous in Paris which resembled a bowl of dishwater with a huge bone floating in it accompanied by a bowl of couscous. Difficult for me being mainly vegetarian but why, with all their fabulous markets do they not serve vegetables with their main courses? You can buy them separatel y but I’ve had green beans overcooked until they had no colour left. Also an unspeakable desert which seemed to consist of cottage cheese with icing sugar sprinkled over it. My husband at the time who will usually eat anything had to send back Andoillette (spelling?) which seemed to be intestines in a skin and stank!
I used to live on mainly egg and chips in restaurants in France just so I wouldn’t go hungry. On the other hand their food shops had fabulous produce, pity it was ruined by the chefs! 😩
For the sake of balance I loved the gorgeous fish soup with croutons and aoli that you find all over the south, and that gorgeous onion and olive tart so it wasn’t all bad.

I wouldn’t want to eat anywhere where you didn’t know whether the food was halal or not, because there’s no way I would eat it. It should not be allowed it’s horribly cruel. I no longer eat red meat, just poultry and fish.

Best food Turkey, ok food in Spain, worst food Austria !

As above: tastes changed after covid and things just do not taste the same. Probably the virus and/or vaccines. Highly likely.

I agree that British food is excellent
And the best varieties on the planet to!! Were spoiled .....others critical of our food are usually those who haven't even lived here let alone visited!! As usual we absorb everything our fantastic diverse culture can dish up for us in all its glory from traditional delicious fresh fish and chips to amazing meats casseroles stews soups roasts grills breads, endless delights, I LOVE our food!