We’ve been taking Maks to restaurants almost since he was born. His first trip to get sushi was when he was one week old, his first breakfast out was when he was 10 days old and his first culinary trip across Poland was when he was 3 weeks old. When he was about three months old, he was with us while we were exploring Brittany’s restaurants, San Sebastian’s pintxos bars and Asturia’s and Galicia’s tapas bars.
In spite of appearances, taking a baby to restaurants was easier than when he got older. He would usually sleep in a baby carriage / car safety seat or he was resting on our laps. I always had my scarf or a big washable nappy, so I brestfed him on numerous times during our visits to restaurants – nobody’s EVER reacted negatively but I also never went to the bathroom or our car to feed him. Discretion is everything. The baby didn’t need much to be happy – he had his mom, dad, milk and a nappy and it was awesome. The older he was getting, the bigger were his needs – we still take him everywhere we go, but now, when he’s almost 5 years old, Maks has his own favorites, his favorite places to which he wants to take us and he can cry when he hears that there are no free tables in a particular restaurant at the moment 😉
I wrote about child-friendly restaurants in the fall of 2014 – that list can be found HERE. Almost 1,5 years later, many of those places are still a great choice for lunch with a child, especially when it comes to Kura Domowa or Videlec. But there are also some new places which have immediately become ours and Maks’s favorites 🙂 Listen what he has to say, because a 5 year old knows best what children need!!! 🙂
3 OF MAKS’S FAVORITE RESTAURANTS:
1) MIZU SUSHI – Duchnicka Street 3 – Żoliborz
Maks’s absolute favorite when it comes to sushi. I love that place too, also for their attitude towards children. When you’re there, you feel like your child is a regular client – customer service always listens to children’s requests, they never react with impatience and everybody’s always nice and smiley. Me and my friend go there so often that the waitresses welcome our children with: “Hi Maks! Hi Tosia!”.
Maks orders his favorite hosomaki with roasted salmon himself, he asks for teriayki sauce and sits with us “by the river”. As soon as the children have finished their meals, they go and play in a wooden house or draw things by a small table. We always leave that place with full stomachs and smiles on our faces, and whenever Maks hears we’re going to grab some sushi, he always says the same: “to that place with a little house? Yaaaaay!!!!”.
2) KUCHNIA OTWARTA – Klimczaka Street 1 – Miasteczko Wilanów
Kuchnia Otwarta was open at the end of January or at the beginning of February and we’ve come back there a few times already – at different times and no matter what circumstance it is. We go there for family lunches, for dinners with friends without children and for huge, lazy breakfasts with friends and their child. Whenever we’re in there, we don’t want to leave! The place itself is high-tech, it’s very nice and makes it pleasant to stay there. If you add a huuuuge playground with walls made of glass for children, you get a perfect place – kids have fun and they don’t run around the whole restaurant. They even have their own bathroom with a tiny tiolet and a sink suitable for their height in that corner! Wow! 🙂
What makes Kuchnia Otwarta so special is also a very broad menu for kids. Chicken nuggets and french fries as one of two-three options? Not in here! Here, kids have a menu almost as broad as the one for adults, and they can choose from both meals and extras – when you order chicken cakes for your kid, you can add french fries, or you can order average potatoes, buckwheat, millet or pearl barley. And that beautiful menu! You’ll want to eat forever! 😉 There is also a wide choice for adults and a very delicious cuisine. You can read more about it HERE.
3) BASIL & LIME – Puławska Street 27 – Mokotów
Basil & Lime was on our chart from the fall of 2014 because this restaurant has been functioning for quite some time now. We couldn’t miss it now, because Maks loves Basil. He loves pad thai with chicken, Thai cuisine’s representative dish, so he is the one asking us to go “for pad thai” or “to Basil & Lime”. This is the restaurant that he can cry when you can’t get a table in 😉
Outside of pad thai, Basil has had a huuuuge corner for children underground for a few months and that’s where Maks disappears whenever we get there. We often pick a table by the corner, although I must admit I prefer to sit upstairs because I don’t like places without daylight. But Maks doesn’t care and even though there is a table for kids with coloring books upstairs as well, he always runs downstairs. In winter we often sit there so that everybody is happy. On some weekends there are animators in Basil, but you should check it out when you get there 🙂 There is a menu for kids and a lot of kids love pad thai with chicken or chicken sataye, small chicken shishkebabs. For adults – well, this is one of the best places with Thai cuisine in Warsaw – check it out HERE.
Unfortunately, we don’t have a picture of the corner – we visit Basil so often that we’ve stopped taking pictures of it 🙂 In exchange you get Maks happy with pad thai and my favorite pad kee mao 🙂
All those places have great food, but they’re also very open and child-friendly. They have sizable corners for kids, children’s menu, customer service with a great attitude towards kids. Maks has his favorite places in terms of food as well, but they’re not necessarily child-friendly. He loves Uki Uki for their Japanese soups with thick nuddles, he loves pizza in Mąka i Woda or Al Capone. Most recently he liked Locale, because you can sit very close to the man making pizza 😉 Let’s just say he’s a foodie with his own preferences 🙂 And I think he’s the best advisor if you’re looking for a place where both children and adults will be happy! 🙂
PS. You can find more child-friendly restaurants HERE, but remember that not all of them have such huge corners for children and that this list was made in 2014. Sometimes it’s good to call and check if the corner is still there 🙂
PS2. What are your kids’ favorite restaurants?? 🙂
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