In 1922, reporting for the Toronto Daily Star from the borderlands of the Thrace region, Ernest Hemingway wrote of a “Silent, Ghastly Procession” of Christian refugees fleeing the advance of “the Turk.” The literature and art of the Christian Anatolians exiled in this period – from the films of Angelopoulos to the genre of Rembetiko music itself – is considerable and no doubt strengthens the identity of this diaspora today.

Walking into La Corte is like stepping into the 1950s. At this no-frills fonda, located in downtown Mexico City by the Supreme Court (hence the name), customers perch on red vinyl seats at laminate tabletops or along the counter and read their newspapers, the tableware and lighting are utilitarian, and the décor is minimal: just a few televisions with fútbol on and the sound off. The color flat screens might be the only indication that this is, indeed, the 21st century.

Perhaps nothing epitomizes Rio de Janeiro’s hedonistic approach to cuisine more than a popular deep-fried finger food: the pastel. A bite into one of these fresh, crispy stuffed dough pockets – which range from a palm-sized crescent moon to a rectangle as big as a dinner plate – releases a blow of hot steam that envelops the diner’s face in an aromatic cloud carrying the fragrance of the decadent fillings inside.

When Julián Fernández and Carmen Erdocia moved to Barcelona in 1996, they bought an old fútbol salon in the Eixample that was named Táctica, or “tactics,” in a reference to Spanish football. Julián and Carmen began serving pintxos such as tortilla de bacalao (Spanish omelet with codfish) to hungry futboleros. Eventually, the venue became so popular that they decided to convert Táctica into a Basque restaurant specializing in pintxos. The name was easy: Taktika Berri means “new tactics” in Basque.

Piraeus holds the distinction of being Greece’s biggest port, as well as the largest passenger port in Europe. Although it is a mere 20-minute train ride from downtown Athens, most Athenians think of Piraeus with a reverence reserved for a foreign country. There is just something almost mythic about this ancient port, which has been in existence since the 5th century B.C. – the famous opening line of Plato’s Republic is, after all, “I went down to the Piraeus yesterday.” In the modern period, the greater Piraeus area – home to a population of about half a million in Piraeus proper, along with a number of suburbs – has witnessed dizzying highs and lows, especially over the past century. The area has been a major destination for immigrants from elsewhere in Greece, including the islands and the Peloponnese. One of the biggest population expansions came after 1922, when vast numbers of Greek refugees fleeing Asia Minor (modern-day Turkey) migrated to the area and established new working-class neighborhoods, including Nikaia, Keratsini, Drapetsona and Korydallos.

Most people who visit Barcelona are sure to spend at least some time at one of the city’s beaches. Yet few are aware that when seeking respite from the bustling urban streets, heading up into the forested hills above the city can be just as pleasant. Vallvidrera, a village at the entrance to Collserola National Park that offers gorgeous views of the surrounding forests and the city below, is just the place for such an excursion. Starting in the early 19th century and up until the 1980s, Vallvidrera served as a vacation destination for wealthy Barcelonans who wanted to escape the summertime heat of the city. The abundance of mansions here, many built in the Modernist style, is a testament to this bygone era. Nowadays, although Vallvidrera is a year-round community that is technically part of Barcelona proper, it’s still a destination for local urbanites and their families wanting to get out of the city and relax, particularly on weekends.

Editor’s note: This feature, by guest contributor Gizelle Lau – a Chinese-Canadian food and travel writer based in Toronto – is the first in an occasional series on “diaspora dining,” covering the best places to find our favorite cuisines outside of their places of origin. The history of Chinese in Canada – pioneers who left their native land in pursuit of a better life and future – is a familiar immigrant story.While the first record of Chinese in Canada dates back to the late 1700s, it wasn’t until the late 1800s and early 1900s that they began to arrive in greater numbers, establishing Chinatowns in cities such as Toronto and Vancouver and opening their own restaurants, grocery stores and laundromats. Despite exclusionary government policies that existed for many years, today Canada is home to one of the largest Asian populations outside of Asia, including over half a million Chinese in the Greater Toronto Area alone.

It’s two in the morning at Wangji Chaozhou, a rice porridge (粥, zhōu) restaurant in Changning that stays open till 5 a.m. – late even by the standards of restless Dingxi Lu, a bustling, neon-lit thoroughfare close to several college campuses. The waitress on duty is either suspicious by nature, or made more so by her late-night schedule. She regards us impassively, unwilling to let the slightest flicker of amusement disturb her bored demeanor.

Nothing beats an alfresco summer meal in Shanghai, yet it’s not easy to find a Chinese restaurant that offers outdoor seating. While Chinese people prefer to shelter under umbrellas during the hottest months, Shanghai’s sun-worshipping expats flock to patios and terraces – most of them located in Western-style establishments. So the opening last summer of Cantonese restaurant Xin Dau Ji, with its expansive deck outside, complete with fans for open-air breezes, was a very pleasant surprise. The venue’s outdoor tables sprawl into the former French Concession’s Xiangyang Park, one of Shanghai’s smallest parks, built in the 1930s for French children. Alongside the bubbling fountains, miniature roller coasters and stone tables, more than a hundred varieties of flowers bloom, making it one of most serene spots in the city to enjoy a meal.

Editor’s note: This is the second piece in our series featuring the hidden gems in some of Athens’ most touristy neighborhoods. We previously explored Psyri; it is now time to take on the holy grail of Athenian tourism: Plaka. There’s a reason why this area of old Athens, just below the Acropolis, is the city’s most touristy neighborhood: it has a history of more than 6,000 years.

For a Chinese city as fast-paced and increasingly cosmopolitan as Shanghai, there are surprisingly few late-night dining options that don’t involve ordering from the roving, streetside pushcarts that hawk grilled skewers or fried rice and noodles. Unfortunately, these midnight vendors are not always where you want them to be when you need them most, after 10 beers. Enter Ding Te Le.

It’s not every day that you find a former national volleyball champ in the kitchen, but that’s just the case with Lu Dajie (aka “Big Sister” Lu) and her eponymous restaurants. After a successful career with the Chinese military’s volleyball team, followed by years working in restaurants for others, she left her hometown of Jianyang in Sichuan province with her brother, bringing her region’s famous cuisine with her. Now, in Shanghai, she is slowly building an empire.

There wouldn’t be much of a revived culinary scene in Mexico City without chef Ricardo Muñoz Zurita. A kind of recipe detective and writer of several well-regarded Mexican cookbooks, including the superb Diccionario Enciclopédico de Gastronomía Mexicana, he has been even more successful in his restaurant ventures. After his humble Café Azul y Oro at the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM) received rave reviews, he expanded on its concept – a menu of traditional regional Mexican cuisine based on sometimes forgotten recipes he had gathered through his field research – by opening a larger restaurant in the hip Condesa neighborhood in 2010. Two years later, he opened a third location in a beautifully restored building in the Centro Histórico, which has proven to be his most successful venture yet.

Dear Culinary Backstreets, Where can I go in Barcelona when I'm tired of sightseeing and I just want to sit down and relax with a cup of coffee? Visiting museums and landmarks can be a lot of fun when you're a tourist but sometimes you can learn more about the life of a city by sitting in a chair in a café than you can by reading any guidebook. In Barcelona, there's no shortage of cafés but like anywhere else, it can sometimes be a bit tricky to find one that has just the right ambiance.

You could walk past the shoddy exterior of Henan Lamian every day without giving it a second glance, but the noodle shop hidden within is worth a double take. In our six years of eating there whenever the craving strikes (and it inevitably does, several times a week), this hole in the wall has become our local mainstay, providing cheap and consistently good noodles around the clock.