Eating Your Way Through Gdańsk, From Milk Bars to the Wharf

Baltic herring, śledź, is the dish that tells you where you are. You will find it pickled, in oil with onion, or under a cream sauce, usually served cold with a shot of cold vodka and a piece of dark bread. Order it as a starter and you have eaten like a local before the mains arrive.

The Motława riverfront near the Crane is lined with restaurants that lean into this. Prices climb the closer you sit to the water, so walk a street back for the same plate at a fairer price.

Długi Targ, the Long Market, is the postcard street and it earns the crowds. Eat an ice cream here, admire Neptune's Fountain and the Green Gate, then take your actual meal one or two blocks off the main drag where the menus stop having pictures.

Amber is sold everywhere along here. It makes a fine gift, but buy from a shop with a certificate rather than a folding table if you want the real Baltic stone.

Gdańsk has grown a confident new food scene, much of it around the redeveloped Granary Island across the river. This is where you find tasting menus, craft beer, and Polish cooking that plays with tradition rather than repeating it.

For something in between, look for a milk bar at lunch. These budget cafeterias serve honest plates of pierogi, soup, and cutlets for a few złoty, and they are a fast way to try a lot of Polish staples cheaply.