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Restaurants in Belfast

The dining scene in Belfast is where the city is really coming into its own. From award-winning restaurants and fresh seafood to 100% locally sourced produce and farm-to-fork fare, there’s a real foodie renaissance taking over the capital. With so much competition, there are some excellent bargains to be had, especially at lunchtime. Keep an ear to the ground for new openings.

The restaurants below have been grouped into three pricing categories:
Expensive (over £45)
Moderate (£35 to £45)
Cheap (under £35)

These prices are for a three-course meal for one with half a bottle of wine or equivalent. Tax is included while tipping around 10% for good service is the norm.

Expensive

OX

Cuisine: European

Ask anyone about food in Belfast, and it won’t take long for Michelin-starred OX to drop into the conversation. Unstuffy and unpretentious, this riverside restaurant achieves its reputation from fine, European dishes, made entirely from local, seasonal produce.

Address: , 1 Oxford Street, Belfast, BT1 3LA
Telephone: +44 28 9031 4121.
Website: http://www.oxbelfast.com

Shu

Cuisine: French

Perpetually popular, book early if you want a taste of Shu’s fantastic French-influenced food. Housed in a handsome Victorian terrace along Lisburn Road, this award-winning bistro cooks fresh, seasonal ingredients in a theatre-style kitchen. Order the salt and chilli squid, and you’ll return again and again.

Address: , 253 Lisburn Road, Belfast, BT9 7EN
Telephone: +44 28 9038 1655.
Website: http://www.shu-restaurant.com

The Great Room

Cuisine: Irish, British, French

The stunning Great Room Restaurant, once the banking hall of the Ulster Bank (built 1860), is now the centrepiece of the 5-star Merchant Hotel. Only its wonderful fine dining surpasses its intricate Victorian interior with premium local produce sourced and served in traditional Irish, British and French dishes.

Address: 16 Skipper Street, The Merchant Hotel, Belfast, BT1 2DY
Telephone: +44 28 9023 4888.
Website: http://www.themerchanthotel.com

Moderate

Deanes Love Fish

Cuisine: Seafood

For great value, hook a seat at Michael Deanes Love Fish. Bright and airy, this casual dining spot has nautical touches like lobster nets and potholes mirrors and offers a very affordable lunch menu. The seafood chowder and Guinness wheaten is wonderful as is the simple but rollmop herrings on toast.

Address: , 28-40 Howard Street, Belfast, BT1 6PF
Telephone: +44 28 9033 1134.
Website: http://www.michaeldeane.co.uk/love-fish

Made In Belfast

Cuisine: Irish

Chalking up the providence of its meat on blackboards, Made In Belfast (as the name suggests) takes considerable care in sourcing local ingredients, though its thrown together furniture – junk shop chairs, chunky tables, cubist tiles – gives an impression of fashionable indifference. The flat-iron steaks and ginger beer-battered cod are great but don’t leave without trying an earl grey mojito.

Address: , 1-2 Wellington Street, Belfast, BT1 6HT
Telephone: +44 289 545 8120.
Website: http://www.madeinbelfastni.com

Mourne Seafood

Cuisine: Seafood

This stylish but simple restaurant offers the freshest local mussels, oysters and seafood classics as well as more creative concoctions, all at very reasonable prices.

Address: , 34-36 Bank Street, Belfast, BT1 1HL
Telephone: +44 28 9024 8544.
Website: http://www.mourneseafood.com

Cheap

Brights

Cuisine: Irish

As well-lit as its name proposes, bustling Brights is where locals chomp down on hearty Irish meals like Ulster fry and cider-poached gammon with champ (spring onion mash potato). It also does the best belly-filling Irish stew in the city, which comes mounded high in a bowl with soft wheaten bread. Arrive early to avoid the lunchtime rush.

Address: , 23-25 High Street, Belfast, BT1 2AA
Telephone: +44 28 9024 5688.
Website: http://www.brightsrestaurantbelfast.co.uk

The Morning Star

Cuisine: Irish

Pub food is a staple of the Belfast restaurant scene. This classic Belfast inn (a 200-year-old coaching house) serves the best pub food in the city. It is famous for its steaks, homemade pies, and liver pate.

Address: , 17-19 Pottingers Entry, Belfast, BT1 4DT
Telephone: +44 28 9023 5986.
Website: http://www.themorningstarbar.com

The National Grande Café

Cuisine: British

This former bank now looks like an artist’s warehouse: the industrial girder over head is bright yellow with lights hanging from exposed wiring. Ideal for breakfast, it does an excellent eggs Benedict and filter coffees with daily papers available too. For something wholesome, try the porridge with rum and cacao cream.

Address: , 62-68 High Street, Belfast, BT1 2BE
Telephone: +44 28 9031 1130.
Website: http://www.thenationalbelfast.com
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Featured Hotels

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Tara Lodge

Located in the heart of the Queens Quarter, near the vivacious Botanic Avenue, this stylish 4-star hotel offers affordable luxury. With 34 rooms to choose from, all come with comfy beds, white and gold furnishings and large bathrooms. The breakfasts are pretty decent too.

Ten Square Hotel

Located just steps from City Hall, this 22-room boutique hotel is set within a Grade I listed building. Offering sophisticated interiors, with baroque touches and colonial finishes, its sleeping quarters stick to the modern. Cubist art and chaise longue make rooms unique, while its renowned restaurant is worth booking too.

Ravenhill House

This beautifully restored Victorian guesthouse, near leafy Ormeau Park, is a 10-minute bus ride from the city centre. With only five guest bedrooms, it exudes a homely, intimate ambience. Each room has handcrafted furniture and there is a library of books and music, plus Wi-Fi and award-winning organic breakfasts.

Ramada Encore Belfast City Central

A short saunter from St Anne's Cathedral, this recently opened Ramada offers all the quality you'd expect from a large chain hotel. Rooms are snug, with all modern amenities, and the breakfast offers a mixture of hot and cold choices.

Malmaison Belfast

Occupying a handsome converted mid-19th-century seed warehouse in the Cathedral Quarter, Malmaison is a stylish boutique hotel that combines period features (iron pillars, beams and stone-carved gargoyles) with its trademark contemporary style (Bordello-style bedrooms with mood lighting). Expect long, heavy velvet drapes, red and purple over-sized suede chairs, and a sleek bar.

The Merchant Hotel

One of the city's most luxurious stays is the sumptuous Merchant Hotel built in 1860 as the Italianate headquarters of The Ulster Bank. Located in the Cathedral Quarter, the Grade 1 listed property features classically styled interiors, sculptures and antiques throughout. The pièce de résistance is the stunning Great Room Restaurant where meals, including traditional afternoon teas, are served beneath its grand dome.