Gdansk – Piwnica Rajców

This cellar bar and restaurant is located on Długi Targ, which is the city’s main street which means ‘Long Market’ in English. This road is a bit of a faff to walk down at the moment as nearly every restaurant seems to have staff members trying to get customers into their premises. I remember last time I was here that these staff members usually called out in English, as this a tourist hub, but it’s mostly Poles around the city at the moment and so there’s little English to be heard. Incidentally, I don’t like staff members trying to call me in places as I’m not likely to just randomly go in somewhere without my usual laborious checking if I might like it, so I usually detour around them. Anyway, I digress.

The steps down into the restaurant.

There’s a huge room that customers walk through to get to the restaurant, an area I imagine is probably usually used for larger groups or when they’re particularly busy. It’s not immediately apparent where to go next, but fortunately a staff member noticed me looking confused and came to assist.

Not the greatest of photos because of those lights, but the beer tanks are visible in the background. It’s sometimes a little difficult to know whether venues such as this are welcoming for those who just want a drink, but at the moment I’m fairly sure they want whatever trade they can get. The staff here were friendly and there was a comfortable and inviting vibe, with the service being efficient and timely. I was also pleased to note that there was some internet connectivity in the cellar as I needed to upload things to Untappd, although I think there’s wi-fi as well.

The venue brews its own beer, this is the Witbier which had pleasant orange notes to it, very drinkable. They list the beers that they brew in the menu and there’s seven or eight different options.

This is the Baltic Porter which they’re particularly proud of and this was an above average beer which had a richness to it. I only noticed afterwards that they offer flights of beer so I would have probably got one to try more of their beer offerings.

Although I only went in for drinks, I accidentally also ordered (this happens with an alarming regularity) a little bar snack of currywurst with fries and this was one of my better decisions, especially as it was keenly priced and tasted delicious. There are more substantial meals offered here as well, which looked well presented and appetising.

I liked it here and there were a mixture of drinkers and diners, all of whom looked content, as well as family groups and couples. The two drinks and meal came to £9, which I thought was reasonable given the central location of the bar and the general quality of the service. There’s probably a bit more that they could do with their beer options though as they state they’re after the craft beer market, so they could perhaps start getting a couple of guest beers in to offer an ever changing menu, as well as of course adding themselves to Untappd.