Settled by Greek refugees from Turkey after 1923, Nea Erythraia is a northern suburb of Athens that started off very low-key and has now evolved into a buzzing shopping and nightlife area, full of cafés, bars, restaurants and gelaterias. Despite the recent boom, many places that have been local favorites for over a decade now are still popular. One such venue, a small, unassuming restaurant with the welcoming name of “Kali Parea” (meaning “good company” in English), is hidden in a quiet street off the main road. Its faithful clientele come here to savor seasonal fish (mainly small fry) and seafood (calamari, octopus and shrimp), prepared either fried or grilled.

As the towers of Tokyo’s Nihonbashi financial district began to proliferate and grow taller, developers took special care to preserve and in many cases not displace the area’s mainstream department stores, art galleries and varied restaurants, and so traditional establishments were often incorporated into the new buildings. The Mitsui real estate group, which opened the two Coredo Towers in 2014, made sure to include time-honored restaurants in the new setting, including an amazingly good, classic Edo-mae sushi bar lured from an outdated setting, an outpost of a Kyoto home-cooking restaurant and a dazzling array of famous sweets shops. The developers were also clever enough to include a classic izakaya, or pub-style establishment, enticed away from the Tsukiji market. Every evening, office workers pour out of local mega-buildings and pack into Nihonbashi Suminoe to enjoy the collegial atmosphere and flavorful charcoal-cooked fish. Sakaya means a location in which to purchase sake, and “i” means to stay in a place and feel at ease. Thus, i-sakaya becomes “izakaya” when pronounced correctly, and it’s the perfect way to describe Nihonbashi Suminoe.

The rustic family favorite Can Pineda has been holding down this corner of Barcelona’s El Clot neighborhood since 1904. It was not a restaurant originally, but a typical wine shop and canteen, where plenty of life could be found amongst the wooden barrels that now slumber peacefully on their perch up above the dining room. At that time, the place was frequented by local factory workers, who would come for a glass of wine to go with a simple meal or to drink while warming up their lunch boxes. The then-owners would put a pine branch on the door to signal the arrival of the vi novell, or new wine of the year, and from the pine, pi in Catalan, came the name Can Pineda, which translates roughly to “The Pine House.” Today, El Clot is part of the new high-tech 22@ district, which is focused on innovation and research but maintains in its oldest streets the spirit of the village (Sant Martí de Provençals) that once flourished here, with its own market (dating back to 1889) and walls that remain from Barcelona’s first Industrial Age. Can Pineda sits right in the middle, a small but welcoming eatery with just 30 seats, decorated with the characteristic blue azulejos tiles, those wooden barrels and a few excellent hams hanging behind the bar.

When we picked up a cab from Meşhur Unkapanı İMÇ Pilavcısı recently, it turned out the driver had just been there for a refuel himself. Sensing a captive yet interested audience, he held forth all the way to Beyoğlu about where to eat well and cheaply – without stomachaches ensuing – in Istanbul. We’re always happy to discuss the finer points of kuru fasulye (stewed beans), but this driver seemed to have a particularly deep interest in the subject. After debating the merits of various canned brands (“Yurt” brand or nothing, in case you were interested), he dived into the subject of soup.

This small, charming <em>mezedopoleio</em> gets its name, which translates to “Captain Michael,” from Nikos Kazantzakis’s eponymous novel. The tribute to Kazantzakis makes sense: The eminent writer and philosopher was a native of Crete, as is the family that opened this eatery some 50 years ago. <!--more--> In the 1960s, Kapetan Mixalis was more café than mezedopoleio (the Greek equivalent of a tapas bar), offering coffee, backgammon (<em>tavli</em> in Greek), card games, live music by locals, philosophical discussions and a friendly atmosphere from morning till night. It became a meeting point for Athenian intellectuals, actors and musicians. Famous personalities sat for hours at the sidewalk tables, quaffing wine and a traditional Cretan drink called <em>tsikoudia</em> (a grape-based brandy) and eating cold cuts, spoon sweets and other simple preparations that didn’t require cooking.

Nicosia’s Old Town grabs your senses in many different ways. You still enter it through 16th-century Venetian walls. Wander its narrow streets and you’ll see architectural shadows of the Ottoman, French and British regimes that have ruled Cyprus over the past 500 years. Turn a random corner and you’ll hit a fierce-looking razor wire and oil drum barrier with an overgrown and abandoned buffer zone beyond, reminding you that this is Europe’s last divided capital, in stasis since 1974, when a short-lived coup aimed at uniting the island with Greece sparked a Turkish invasion of the northern third of the island.

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Editor’s note: To cap off the year, we’re taking a look back at all the best eating experiences we had in 2015, and in Shanghai, that means everything from fried pork buns to shakshuka made with local ingredients. Yang Yang’s Dumplings The chengguan were out in full force shutting down our favorite street food hot spots this year, including one of Shanghai’s most popular night markets on Fangbang Lu and the soon-to-be-closed Tangjiawan market. We’re reminded that it’s ever more important to support those vendors who take pride in their craft and hand-make everything from start to finish.

Editor's note: The chef and owners of Mekan have moved on to a new location, which they've named Mari. We're sorry to report that Mekan itself has since gone downhill. In the great multicultural Anatolian kitchen, questions about the ethnic or national origins of foods are often cause for forks and knives to fly. A porridge called keşkek is a hot-button diplomatic issue between Turkey and Armenia, and we won’t even get started on the ongoing baklava debate. So what to make of this cuisine that draws influences from every corner of the former Ottoman lands, a territory stretching from the Balkans to North Africa? The answer might be in a simple term that’s becoming popular among Turkey’s minorities. The word Türkiyeli means “of Turkey” and differs significantly (and quite intentionally) from the word Türk, which often adds ethno-religious shades to nationality.

National Route 246 is one of Japan’s main byways, stretching for over 76 miles and snaking through the center of Tokyo. The small part of Route 246 that runs between Shibuya and the Meijii Jingu Shrine was recently recreated for one of the best-selling video games of all time, Gran Turismo 3: A-Spec. It also happens to be the location for the food court heaven known as Commune 246.

Manolo, the protagonist of Juan Marsé’s 1965 novel, Last Evenings with Teresa, possibly the saddest Spanish love novel ever written, spends a great deal of his time drinking and playing cards with the local elders in Las Delicias. Well known to locals and Marsé’s devotees but unknown to many Barcelonans, this bar was founded in the Carmel neighborhood in the mid-1920s using a natural cave that was turned into a bomb shelter built just below the republican air defenses during the Spanish Civil War (1936-1939). El Carmel, a working-class neighborhood on Rovira hill with spectacular views over the city, was home to the Andalusian, Galician, Aragonese, Castilian and Extremaduran immigrants who moved to Barcelona looking for brighter futures during the postwar years, the 1960s and ’70s. Las Delicias soon became their favorite local eatery, as portions were larger than usual. Decades later, portions are still very generous, the bar is still a neighborhood institution and the menu still reflects the origins of those who once settled down here. There are Andalucian specialties such as calamares a la andaluza (deep-fried squid, €6.50), morcilla de Jaén (pork blood sausage, €1.60) and pincho moruno (marinated chicken on a skewer, €4.50); Galician specialties like pimientos de Padrón (€5.25), lacón con cachelos (boiled pork shank, €7) and pulpo a la gallega (boiled octopus, €13.95); Aragonese longaniza (pork sausage, €5.25) and Castilian callos (beef tripe stew, €5.25).