Best bars in town: No 2 Teteria Almedina

Not strictly speaking a bar, as it doesn’t serve alcohol, this Morroccan teashop and restaurant is on my list as it’s one of my most frequented places in town, and I love it.

Just down the road from the Alcazaba, on Calle Paz, it is a little oasis among the closely packed buildings, with its lovely street garden and velvet-benched interior.

It has a sister restaurant on the main road outside the entrance to the castle, where I had lunch once, but I prefer the food and the smaller more intimate surroundings of the one off the beaten track.

It’s a family run establishment with a friendly atmosphere, and the piece-de-resistance food wise is the selection of Arab cakes and pastries on offer, with any kind of tea imaginable.

The honey-dripping sweetmeats come piled high on a cake stand, you take as many as want (and it’s hard to hold back) and pay for the number you have.

Mint tea is obviously a traditional favorite to accompany them, but when asked to recommend one of the many teas on offer, the waitress chose Pakistani tea, a milky concoction, very nice if you have a sweet tooth.

As well as being a tea room however, the Almedina is also a restaurant, open for lunch or dinner.

You can dine seated at low tables on red velvet benches, or go for the dining room at the back for more western-style high tables and chairs.

The menu is pretty much what you’d expect from a Morroccan restaurant – plenty of tagines and couscous, with both meat and vegetarian options, aswell as meat koftas and bastela, the special sweet chicken pie.

I went there recently with my friends Richard (as in former boss Costa Almería News editor Richard Torné) and Susana, and we spent a pleasant couple of hours catching up over the couscous.

I had my usual – the couscous ‘dulce’ with chicken and raisins – and the others, being vegetarian, went for the vegetable couscous that comes with ‘caldo’ (a thin stock type sauce) to drizzle over it, and a ‘picante’ chili-based dressing to jazz it up a bit.

You also get some lovely Morroccan bread and garlic dip to start, and the homemade lemonade is delicious!

I can’t claim to be telling you Almería’s best kept secrets with this particular blog, as the restaurant has already garnered favour with reviewers from the Guardian, Telegraph and Trip Advisor among others since it opened in 2003, but if you haven’t yet been it’s well worth the walk to the top of the city.

The larger sister restaurant opposite the castle – Restaurante Almedina Baraka – also offers live music events, often with well known flamenco artists, and when I get the chance to go to one of those I’ll let you know how it is!

For more information check out their Facebook page Restaurante-Tetería Almedina.