3 Best Restaurants in Haifa and the Northern Coast, Israel

Climb the stairs beside the Doña Rosa restaurant and keep an eye out for this local favorite in an old, two-level, stone building—complete with a cat sunning itself on a stool, a jumble of odd tables and mismatched chairs, and a selection of handmade clothes and handbags for sale. You can sit outside to sip coffee and fruit smoothies alongside homemade bourekas (filled pastry triangles), shakshuka (eggs in tomato sauce), carrot cake, grilled-cheese sandwiches, and apple pie. Beer and wine are available, too. Indian cuisine is served every Thursday night. From Thursday night through Sunday you can get vegetarian meals; the rest of the week, pastries and coffee are offered.

In the souk, duck into this café and enjoy a coffee, some hummus, or a kebab in the courtyard of the 16th-century Khan al-Faranj, or Franks' Inn. Note the 18th-century Franciscan monastery and tower to your left.

Stop into this legendary institution, opened in 1940, for coffee and cake, or a meal of spinach blintzes with melted cheese, hamburgers, or Chinese dishes. Three generations of the Oppenheimer family work here, and the walls carry enlarged photographs of how the place looked when just a hut. The management swears that the schnitzel gets accolades from Viennese visitors.