Some trips are about the sights. This one was about dinner. Five nights in Athens at the end of February: one night in a grand hotel on Syntagma Square, four nights in a small suite hotel at the Thiseio end of Ermou, and four tables that each held a Michelin star when I went.
I had been here four months earlier, at the start and end of my Greek road trip. This time Athens was the whole point.
Where I stayed
King George, Syntagma · 4.5/5
The King George is the grand hotel I would design if someone handed me a 1930s building on Syntagma Square and no budget ceiling. The public rooms have patterned marble, Ionic columns and Murano chandeliers. My room had its own Venetian glass chandelier, herringbone floors and the kind of silk-shaded lamp I would happily steal for my own flat. Cocktails in the chandeliered lounge before dinner were the right way to begin, and the rooftop restaurant, Tudor Hall, is reason enough to stay.
It isn't flawless. Recent reviews mention worn furniture and tired bathrooms in some rooms, some rooms face the inner atrium with no daylight, and there's no pool of its own (guests use the Grande Bretagne's next door). Ask for a square-facing or Acropolis-view room and you'll forgive the rest.
The Athens Version Luxury Suites, Thiseio · 3.5/5
A small suite hotel at the Thiseio end of Ermou, with Cava Nektar's wine shop on the ground floor and, the real reason to book it, a roof terrace that looks across the rooftops to the Acropolis and the Agora. I watched the sun go down from it on my second evening. Thiseio and Monastiraki are on the doorstep, Makris is around the corner on Astingos, and guests rate the staff, the cleanliness and the location.
The rooms don't live up to the roof. Reviewers mention hard beds, worn furniture, a tiny lift and a small lobby; hot water and street noise come up too, and few rooms share the terrace's Acropolis view. Breakfast is extra (about €9 to €15, usually brought to the room), and the desk isn't staffed around the clock. Book it for the terrace and the address.
Four stars, five nights
Four starred dinners in five nights sounds excessive. In practice, each of the four was a completely different kind of evening.
Tudor Hall · 4.5/5
Tudor Hall sits on the King George's seventh floor, and the first thing you see is the Acropolis, floodlit and close enough to feel staged for you. Chef Asterios Koustoudis cooks classical Greek ingredients with French technique across seasonal tasting menus. The parade of snacks is witty, from tiny savoury tartlets on wooden blocks to a lollipop dressed as an orange, and the langoustine with a golden sauce and carrots is the plate I keep going back to in my photos. Service is polished in the grand-hotel way, and the martini arrives properly cold in cut crystal.
It's expensive even by starred standards, with à la carte mains at €41 to €65, and the pace is formal and long. It's open Tuesday to Saturday only, and a jacket is advised.
Book a table by the windows: the view is half of what you're paying for.
CTC, Kerameikos · 4.5/5
CTC takes its name from "si-ti-si", the Greek word for nourishment, and chef Alexandros Tsiotinis treats the menu as a journey through Greek food history, printed on a linen napkin when you sit down. The cooking is precise with a Greek core, and the courses arrive on sculpted ceramics, glass and wood: a tartlet crowned with a rolled spiral and cucumber on a wooden pedestal, a quenelle of ice cream with caviar over paper-thin slices, lobster in a bisque. The room, by Stavros Kontodimos, is calm and minimalist, so the plates do the talking.
The critiques are small. The much-hyped Kalarryti lamb doesn't wow everyone, and the desserts have only recently caught up with the savoury courses. Even so, food critics regularly call it the best-value starred table in Athens.
Hervé, Petralona · 4.5/5
Hervé is the most fun of the four, and the least like a temple. Eighteen seats face an open kitchen in a residential corner of Petralona, the walls carry big, loud street-art portraits, and chef Hervé Pronzato and his team cook and explain 14 or 15 small courses in front of you, with Indian, Middle Eastern and Malaysian accents. It's a chef's-counter evening, so the theatre is the cooking itself.
With that many courses there's the odd weaker bite, and it's a serious spend; you need a card to book, and it opens Tuesday to Saturday only. Go hungry and sit at the counter for the full show.
Makris, Thiseio · 4.5/5
Makris is the most romantic of the four, and the most personal. The building is a neoclassical house said to have been Greece's first inn, with a glass floor over ancient remains, pottery fragments suspended from the ceiling and a roof terrace facing the Acropolis. Chef Petros Dimas sends courses out with short printed poems. One, "The Forest in Epirus", remembered walking the woods with his grandfather and arrived as mushrooms, red fruits, nuts and roots with quail, venison and burnt milk. Much of the produce comes from his farm at Ancient Corinth, where I had stayed four months earlier.
The flaws are the ones reviewers repeat. A full menu runs four to five hours, the wine upsell can be persistent and the pours small, and the desserts don't quite match the savoury courses. Choose the shorter Genesis menu if you want to be in bed before one.
Between dinners
I went back to the Ancient Agora one afternoon, and it's still the calmer, shadier half of ancient Athens.
Cava Nektar, Monastiraki · 4/5
A family wine and spirits shop on Ermou, trading since 1982, with more than 30,000 labels and a deli counter of Greek cheeses and cured meats. It's the place for Greek wine to take home, and the staff know the bottles and will steer you towards small producers. The building also has a rooftop restaurant, Chelona. The flip side of that range is that it can be a lot to take in, so go with a budget or a style in mind, and ask about packing if the bottles are going in your suitcase.
Before you book
Two of the four starred restaurants, Tudor Hall and Hervé, open Tuesday to Saturday only, and Hervé takes a card to hold a table, so plan the week around the dinners rather than the other way round. From Barcelona, Vueling flies direct to Athens.
