Dublin Food and Travel Guide: Irish Stew, Coddle and Pub Culture

Dublin's pleasures are unfussy and warm. This is a city of conversation, where the pub is less a place to drink than a living room for the whole neighbourhood, and the food is the kind of honest, filling cooking that suits a grey, breezy afternoon by the Liffey.

What to Eat in Dublin

The cornerstone is Irish stew, traditionally lamb or mutton slow-cooked with potatoes, onions and carrots into something soft and soothing. A true Dublin speciality is coddle, a humble stew of sausages, rashers of bacon, potatoes and onions simmered together, historically a way to use up leftovers before the weekend.

Potatoes appear in many guises, including boxty, a pan-fried potato pancake that bridges grated and mashed spud. Alongside almost any meal you'll find soda bread, a dense loaf leavened with buttermilk, and at breakfast the full Irish fry piles eggs, sausages, bacon, beans and both black and white pudding onto one plate.

• Irish stew — lamb, potato and root vegetables
• Coddle — sausage and bacon potato stew
• Boxty — potato pancake
• Soda bread — buttermilk quick bread
• Full Irish — cooked breakfast platter

Where and How to Eat

Temple Bar is the famous cobbled quarter and worth a wander for its atmosphere and live trad music, though prices there run high; step into the lanes around Camden Street or the older pubs near Grafton Street for better value and a more local crowd. Many traditional pubs serve excellent stew and coddle at lunch.

A drinking tip: a pint of stout is poured in two stages and needs time to settle, so do not be alarmed when the bartender lets it rest mid-pour, and never rush it. Round-buying is a social ritual, so offer to get one in when it's your turn. Daily specials are often chalked up in casual handwriting or Irish-language flourishes, so photographing the board to translate or decode it helps you order with confidence.