Where to Eat in Vilnius: Restaurants and Lithuanian Food We Tried

My sister Laurie and I were in Vilnius for two very full days, and we spent most of them on our feet trying to see everything we could. We did manage to sit down to eat, and we ate well. This post covers every place we ate, with what we ordered and whether we’d go back, followed by a short list of places we found while planning and didn’t have time to try.

What surprised us most about where to eat in Vilnius was the range of choices. We expected beet soup and potato dumplings, and they’re everywhere. We didn’t expect the vast variety of international options.  We didn’t even know what Georgian food was until we sat down for dinner.  We even found an amazing food hall that had every option you can think of all in one place. 

Table of Contents

• Where We Actually Ate
• Worth Stopping For: Ponių Laimė
• Found While Researching
• Lithuanian Foods to Try in Vilnius
• Map: Where to Eat in Vilnius
• Practical Tips for Eating in Vilnius

Our Tip: Order the pink soup once, even if cold soup on a cold day sounds wrong. Then order something hot to go with it. I had a glass of hot wine, and it balanced out perfectly.

Where We Actually Ate

Etno Dvaras

Pilies g. 16, Vilnius · etnodvaras.lt

Our first real meal in Vilnius, right on Pilies, the main street through Old Town. It’s a traditional Lithuanian restaurant, and they seated us downstairs in an old cellar. I’d call it a cave in the best way. Either way, it was cozy, atmospheric and warm, which matters when the wind outside is going straight through your coat.

I ordered šaltibarščiai, the cold beet soup made with kefir that everyone calls pink soup. It really is that pink. It came with a plate of roasted potatoes sprinkled with parsley and a piece of the dark Lithuanian rye, and it was €5.95. I’m not someone who orders cold soup, especially in October, but I felt like I had to try it. To even things out I got a glass of hot wine, which turned out to be exactly that, hot wine, with nothing mulled about it. The soup was good. The flavor was strong and it was filling.

Laurie had the thick wild mushroom soup with bacon bits (€8.95), served inside a hollowed-out loaf of that same dark rye with the top sliced off and set beside it like a lid. It looked like it came out of a much fancier kitchen, and she loved it. The room downstairs is worth going for on its own.

In addition to our soups, we shared cepelinai. They’re big potato dumplings, probably the country’s best-known dish, and ours were filled with meat. They came out as two pale, glossy dumplings with a little pot of sour cream and crispy bacon crackling on the side for spooning over the top. They’re filling and an interesting texture.

Kvevri

Pilies g. 10, Vilnius · kvevri.lt

There are a lot of Georgian restaurants in Vilnius, and neither of us knew much about Georgian food (the country, not the state), so we tried one on our first night. Kvevri is named after the big clay jars Georgians have used to make wine for thousands of years, and the menu pairs dishes with Georgian wines.

It felt a lot like Mediterranean food with its own spin, and there were pomegranate seeds on everything. My roast pork came with potatoes in a cast-iron skillet set on a wooden board, topped with red onion, herbs and pomegranate. Laurie ordered the chicken and got what was basically a spatchcocked Cornish game hen, roasted and laid over thin flatbread, with a cucumber and tomato salad and a little pot of creamy white sauce. It was delicious, and I’d happily go back and try the dishes Georgia is known for, like khachapuri, the cheese-filled bread.

Bernelių Užeiga

Pilies g. 10, Vilnius

Another traditional Lithuanian spot on Pilies Street. We had a candlelit booth against an old stone wall, with vintage Lithuanian photos printed on the place mats. The menu covers the classics, like cepelinai and pink soup, but we went a different direction this time.

We started with seared scallops on a bright green pea purée, with lemon and bread on the side. Laurie had the pikeperch fillet with caramelized onion sauce, served over mashed potatoes with a little salsa of marinated vegetables. I had the turkey fillet stuffed with three cheeses in a lingonberry sauce, with a wine-poached pear, roasted potatoes and buttery vegetables. The pear is the pink thing in my photo. Both mains were under €15. We toasted the trip with a glass of white wine by candlelight.

Paupys Market

Aukštaičių g. 7, Vilnius · Paupys Market on Go Vilnius

This was our favorite meal for the money. Paupys Market sits in Paupys, a brand new neighborhood along the river next to Užupis, and the main hall is a big glass-roofed atrium with plants trailing down from every balcony. You pick from different counters, so it’s easy when two people want completely different things.

I went to Mamma Rosa, the Italian counter, for the focaccia con mortadella: a big, soft focaccia layered with mortadella, stracciatella, pistachios, basil pesto and arugula, served in red-checkered paper. It was €12.50. Laurie went Asian at Wok Out and had the mango ebi salad, with prawns and soy vermicelli tossed with cucumber, carrot, wakame and a sweet and sour mango sauce, finished with chili, sesame and herbs. It was €12, and she said it was delicious. A glass of red for me, white for her. It wasn’t expensive, and it was a nice change from the cellars.

Eskedar Coffee Bar

Pilies g. 26, Vilnius · eskedarcoffee.com

This is where we’d grab our coffee. It’s right on Pilies Street, a couple of minutes from where we were staying, so it became our go-to whenever we needed a break. It’s dog-friendly too, which we always notice.

Rūta Chocolate

Didžioji g., Vilnius · ruta.lt

Not a meal, but it belongs here. Rūta has been making chocolate in Lithuania since 1913, and its Old Town shop looks like a giant box of chocolates, with oversized truffles and white chocolate drips around the window and a chocolate-bar pattern underneath. Laurie picked up some chocolate to bring home. If you want an edible souvenir from Vilnius, this is the one.

The Tasting at the End of Our Walking Tour

Our Old Town walking tour ended at a small shop off Pilies Street, where we sat in a back room with Lithuanian rye bread, a pork and beef sausage, honey, a mild local cheese, apple cheese and šakotis, the tree cake. It isn’t a restaurant, but it was the best introduction to Lithuanian food we could have had. I wrote it all up in our review of the Vilnius walking tour with snacks.

Worth Stopping For: Ponių Laimė

Stiklių g. 14, Vilnius

We didn’t go in, but we stopped in front of it like everyone else does. Ponių Laimė is the café in the old Glass Quarter with the window displays people line up to photograph. When we were there in October, the front was covered in giant pink and gray macarons, with red autumn leaves and lanterns hanging from the roof above the mint green door. The display changes a few times a year. Inside, it’s a self-service café known for macarons and pastries, and it serves Lithuanian dishes too. It’s on our list for next time.

Found While Researching (Not Been Yet, but Here’s Why They’re on the List)

We haven’t eaten at any of these. They came up again and again while we were planning, and they’re where we’d go next time.

Ertlio Namas

Šv. Jono g. 7, Vilnius · ertlionamas.lt

This is the one we really wanted to try and didn’t get to, so it’s at the top of the list for next time. Ertlio Namas is in the Michelin Guide for Lithuania, and it’s set over three floors of a 17th-century townhouse in Old Town. The chef works with a historian to recreate dishes that were once served at noble courts, monasteries and manor houses, going back through the Medieval, Renaissance and Baroque periods, and each course comes with the story behind it. You choose a seven-course or nine-course tasting menu.

It’s dinner only, Monday to Saturday, so book ahead. We made it as far as the front door.

Lokys

Stiklių g. 8, Vilnius · lokys.lt

Lokys has been open since 1972 in a 15th-century merchant’s cellar in the old Jewish Quarter, which makes it the oldest restaurant in Old Town, and it’s still run by the family that started it. It’s known for game: wild boar with lingonberries, venison and, yes, beaver stew. If you want a cellar dinner with a menu you won’t find at home, this is the name that comes up most.

Beigelių Krautuvėlė

Pylimo g. 4, Vilnius · Facebook page

A small bagel shop inside the building of the Lithuanian Jewish Community, with fillings like egg salad, hummus and salmon. After learning how large Jewish Vilnius was before the war, and how little of it survived, I’d like to stop here for lunch. It’s closed Saturdays and closes early on Fridays.

Sweet Root

Užupio g. 22, Vilnius · sweetroot.lt

The special-occasion pick in Užupis. The kitchen builds its menu around Lithuanian vegetables, especially root vegetables, served as several small courses. It’s dinner only and open just a few nights a week, so book ahead.

Gaspar’s

Pylimo g. 23-3, Vilnius · gaspars.lt

Gaspar’s has a Michelin Bib Gourmand, the guide’s mark for good food at a fair price, and it serves something you wouldn’t expect in Lithuania: Goan-Portuguese food from a short menu. If you’ve had your fill of potatoes and beets, this is where I’d go.

Lithuanian Foods to Try in Vilnius

Šaltibarščiai (pink soup). Cold beet soup with kefir, served with hot potatoes on the side. Vilnius even has a pink soup festival in late spring.

Juoda duona (black rye bread). Dark and dense, with a slight sweetness that surprised us both. It shows up with almost every meal, and sometimes as the bowl.

Cepelinai. Potato dumplings stuffed with meat, served with sour cream and bacon crackling. We had them at Etno Dvaras. Filling. Very filling.

Šakotis (tree cake). Baked on a rotating spit so the batter drips into branches. If a cake and a cookie had a baby on a rotisserie, it would be this.

Apple cheese. No cheese involved. It’s apples cooked down and dried slowly in cheesecloth until it’s firm enough to slice.

I’m recreating Laurie’s wild mushroom soup in a rye bread bowl on Plates and Parties. [LINK: add once the recipe is live]

Map: Where to Eat in Vilnius

[GOOGLE MY MAPS EMBED: one pin per restaurant above, then swap this paragraph for a Custom HTML block with the iframe]

Practical Tips for Eating in Vilnius

How many days do you need to eat well in Vilnius? Two or three. We fit in a cellar lunch, a Georgian dinner and a food hall in about two and a half days, but a third day would have gotten us to Ertlio Namas.

Is eating out in Vilnius expensive? Not compared with Western Europe. Even on Pilies Street, our meals didn’t feel like tourist pricing, and the food hall was a good deal. Ertlio Namas and the other Michelin-listed places cost more, as you’d expect.

Do you need reservations? For the casual places on Pilies, we didn’t. For Ertlio Namas, Sweet Root or anything Michelin-listed, book ahead. People in Vilnius seem to eat earlier than we’re used to, so don’t leave a weekend dinner too late.

Will the staff speak English? Menus in Old Town usually have English, but servers’ English varies a lot. Pointing works. Asking “what do you recommend?” sometimes doesn’t, so it helps to know a few dish names before you go.

Can you buy wine for your apartment? Only until 8 p.m. (earlier on Sundays). Shops can’t sell alcohol after that, though restaurants and bars keep serving.

Where should you stay to be close to the food? Old Town. Three of the places we ate are on Pilies Street, and the food hall is a short walk away. Our Where to Stay in Vilnius guide covers the best areas and hotels.

Read More About Vilnius

• Vilnius Travel Guide: Is Lithuania’s Capital Worth Visiting?
• Our Vilnius Old Town Walking Tour Review
• Where to Stay in Vilnius
• One Day in Vilnius

Listen to Our Vilnius Episodes

Want to hear more about what we ate? In Part 2 of our Vilnius episode on The getAwayZ podcast, Laurie and I tell Erin about the snacks at the end of our walking tour, from rye bread with a surprising bit of sweetness to the apple cheese nobody could identify. We also talk about ordering cold pink soup on a freezing day (and balancing it with hot wine), Laurie’s mushroom soup in a bread bowl and our first Georgian dinner. Part 1 covers the rest of the trip, from the walking tour to Užupis.

Listen to Vilnius Part 2 (coming Nov 2) · Listen to Vilnius Part 1