Tapas make a cheap and tasty meal. Photo by Ville.fi.

By Nicolas J. Clément in Madrid—

For affordable eating in Madrid, you can choose between tapas or more expensive entrees in regular restaurants. Tapas, the famous side plates served in bars throughout Spain, are usually served with a caña (small beer) or a “caña doble,” if you’re really thirsty (it’s a better deal).

If you opt for tapas, you should consider hopping from one tapas bar to another. Each place will offer a different selection of plates, from the big and generous to the almost nonexistent (next!). Many of the best tapas bars in Madrid are located in “Zona Centro,” the liveliest neighborhood for nightlife. After downing some tapas, you can explore the nightlife on the hopping Calle Huertas.

Here is a quick list of my favorite restaurants that will provide an evening of excellent tapas tasting:

Malaspina
Calle Cádiz, 9 (Metro Sol), open daily from 10.30 PM to 2 AM

It’s best to visit the informal Malaspina at night, when Calle Cadiz and Calle Barcelona are bustling with life, people and, well, “madrileños and madrileñas de toda la vida” (regulars). In addition to tapas, Malaspina serves a great sangria and good raciones (oversized tapas to share with friends). If your group is less than six people, you can order a “media-racion.” All Spanish classics are covered from the “tortilla” (omelet with potatoes) to “pulpo” (octopus). Expect to pay around €15 per person for an entree. A beer and a couple of tapas is cheaper.

La Tia Cebolla
Calle de la Cruz, 27 (Metro Sol), open daily from 12 PM to 2 AM (kitchen from 1 PM to 2 AM)

Although the tables at La Tia Cebolla host a fair number of tourists, you’ll still get real Madrid-style cuisine with prices made for locals. The “croquetas” are a a house specialty made of olive oil, flour, egg, milk and tuna or jamón (not to be confused with ham, which is worlds apart from the Spanish jamon). Croquetas go for around €5 for six pieces, and a small beer on the overcrowded terrace is about €2. Go before 10 PM to beat the crowd.

Il Picolino De Farfalla
Calle de las Huertas, 6 (Metro Sol or Anton Martin), open daily from 1:30 PM to 4:30 PM (lunch) and 8:30 PM to 2:30 AM

Il Picolino De Farfalla offers international cuisine at amazingly cheap prices. “Asado,” a traditional Argentinian dish made of various types of meat, goes for a little over €10. Portions are more than enough to fill you up. A chorizo, with appetizer and a glass of wine included, makes a satisfying  €10 dinner.  As with all bars and restaurants in this area, go at 8 or 9 PM before the crowd gets in to avoid a wait.

Post tapas: Bar-hopping and free drinks

Did you really think you’d call it a night after tapas, beers, and dinner? But you haven’t hit the bars yet!

Bar-hopping is best done on Calle Huertas, the main thoroughfare of the Huertas neighborhood. Just walk the street and let the bars’ staff convince you to sample a free “chupito,” usually a hard local liquor made of fruits. You can go from bar to bar this way without spending a single euro. No worries about leaving without buying another drink– it’s not mandatory.

After reaching the end of the street, you should be quite ready to go to bed happy. If you still have energy, go dancing at the famous five-floor nightclub Kapital (Calle Atocha 125). Other club options are Ananda (also near the Atocha train station) or Pacha (Calle de Barceló 11, metro Tribunal).

Popularity: 7% [?]

Free live jazz on Tuesday at Jazz Cafe Alto. Photo by Silent Buddha.

By Audrey Sykes in Amsterdam—

Looking to groove to some live music in Amsterdam on a weekday? The city’s got you covered with bands performing nightly across town. And there’s no need to dish out funds from your “miscellaneous” pile: Here are some hot music venues that are free (or nearly)!

Sunday: Mulligan’s Irish Bar
Amstel 100
Website: www.mulligans.nl
Cost: Free

This authentic Irish bar draws in locals and tourists alike for pints in a social atmosphere. Traditional Irish tunes mixed with foot-tapping bluegrass makes for a friendly vibe all night long. Stop by after 7 PM any night of the week for free entertainment. On Sundays, however, Mulligan’s hosts open jam sessions.

Monday: Belgique
Gravenstraat 2
Website: www.cafe-belgique.nl
Cost: Free

A small Belgian bar offering a mix of trendy swing and rock, Belgique lures an alternative crowd of all ages. A large selection of Trappist beers and an easygoing atmosphere add to the appeal. It might be tricky fitting bands in this tiny tavern, but once the night gets started, no one seems to mind grooving shoulder-to-shoulder.

Tuesday: Jazz Cafe Alto
Korte Leidsedwarsstraat 115
Website: www.jazz-cafe-alto.nl
Cost: Free

The historic Jazz Cafe Alto dates back to the 1950s and stirs up smooth Latin vibes on Tuesday nights (though this cozy, swingin’ bar offers live music every night). Wednesdays, Fridays and Saturdays are especially popular nights, and thus have a €5 entry fee (although it includes a fresh Amstel at the bar). If you crave a scene full of jazz cats and sax solos, this is your place.

Wednesday: Maloe Melo
Lijnbaansgracht 163
Website: www.maloemelo.nl

Never too packed and always relaxed, Malo Melo offers a nightly session of blues and soulful rock that’s impossible to find elsewhere. The crowd ranges from students to seniors, but shares a common passion for acoustic slides and electric tears. It’s a groovy scene for all, offering a true taste of Amsterdam’s chilled-out style.

Thursday: The Last Waterhole
Korte Leidsedwarsstraat 49
Website: www.waterhole.nl
Cost: €1

The Last Waterhole is known for smoking rock covers by local music regulars and a great, rockin’ vibe. The lively and sociable setting makes it irresistible for patrons, who sing along and boogie down. The central location makes the Waterhole a perfect place to start or end an evening out on Leidseplein. Music performed nightly.

About the author: Audrey Sykes hopped across the pond from the US three years ago for a Masters degree in global journalism. Since then, she’s lived all over Europe, reporting and editing for music sites, snowboard mags, and travel media.

Popularity: 10% [?]

When it comes to Berlin, we love the nightlife. Not only are the clubs and bars wildly fun, with great music and dancing pumping ’til dawn, but admission is cheapo-friendly, especially compared to the hot spots of other capital cities.

For cheap souvenirs, we recommend bringing home free club promotional materials, handouts, and even listings magazines. You’ll have proof that you partied like a rock star (even if you can’t fully remember the club…).

Your nightlife “Tip”-sheet

Choose your own nightly adventure with a copy of either Zitty or Tip, Berlin’s listings magazines, available at any magazine kiosk for less than €3. Not only will the guides help you navigate Berlin after dark, but they’ll inform you of low-cost classical and rock concerts, operas, movies, museum exhibits, and gallery openings. We recommend picking up either magazine as soon as you arrive in Berlin.

If you decide to make a night of Berlin’s hot bars and clubs, we’d suggest picking up all the flyers that catch your eye. You can usually find club promos near the door or coat check, as well as (frame-able) postcard advertisements near the toilets and cigarette vending machines. Who knows, you might even be able to score a poster. 

Although they are essentially advertisements, free nightlife flyers from Berlin will be a hit back home–and might help you remember your adventure, especially if the nights blur into days. While you’re at it, hold on to your used copy of Zitty or Tip. It will be fun to see where to go next time!

Also see: Our recommended budget hotels in Berlin.

Popularity: 11% [?]

Get more bang for your forint with our Cheapo-tested tips for a night out in Budapest. Kari Hoerchler, who recently prowled the city’s streets hunting down hotels for us, also found out how to have fun…

Start the night with a free drink.

A cheapo could get a jump start on the evening with a free drink at the Matyas’ wine fountain in the Labyrinth of Castle Hill. However, we found it more efficient and enjoyable to fork out the HUF 8000 (roughly €31) to sample over 50 wines at the House of Hungarian Wines above ground.

Get your restaurant row on.

Ramble on over to the Liszt ter, the veritable restaurant row of Budapest. People watching is free of charge, not to mention fun. And, frugal dining spots abound. A fresh variety of cocktails, sandwiches and salads are available at Café Vian. ‘Pest favorites, including goulash and fruit soup, are served at Menza (which also serves international fare, like pasta and salads). Both restaurants run a tab of about HUF 3,200 (almost €13) per person.

Hit up a club.

For a walk on the wild side, head over to Erzsebet ter to catch live acts and art at the underground Godor Club. Even if the place gets overcrowded with revelers, it’s still fun to check out the stage from the park above via a glass bottom fountain. When we were last in Budapest, we made a visit. Pints of beer were HUF 480 (just under €2) and entry was free.

The late night and early morning crowd pumps at Szóda. Not only is the design of this club chic, but the crowd is notoriously hip, making Szoda the perfect place to find out where the latest and greatest kerts (makeshift bars in the courtyards of abandoned buildings) can be found. The team behind Szoda are also behind several of the city’s speakeasies.

Sit back and relax.

For a more mellow mood, catch local and European art films at one of Budapest’s opulent, old movie houses. Urania National Movie Theatre was built in the 1890s. Plush velvet seats and gold vaulted ceilings trick the eyes into thinking one is spending the evening at the much more expensive opera house across town. Stop by the box office to find out which films have subtitles. Tickets run between HUF 890 and 990 (€3.50-4).

Kari Hoerchler is a budget traveler and science fiction novelist stationed on Planet Earth. Not only has Kari been a star contributor to EuroCheapo’s guide to Budapest, she has also recently been spotted under spotlights on small stages in New York coffeehouses telling tall tales of a tropical island—and future vacation hot spot—in the Bermuda Triangle. Book ahead.

Popularity: 12% [?]

Hitting the town in Madrid doesn’t have to rip into your bank balance faster than a speeding bull. As in all good cities, nighttime budget-friendly options abound!

Here’s our cheapo guide to living it up for a night in Spain’s vibrant capital.

Get in the mood

Start out near central Plaza de Chueca, an area where there’s no shortage of trendy clubs and restaurants, many of which are cheapo-friendly. Considered to be the premiere gay area of  Madrid, Chueca and its main square are full of people hangin’ out in cafes and bars almost every night. In fact, if you hang out in the square long enough, chances are decent that you’ll make some new friends and find yourself involved in some last-minute plans.

Dinner

While daytime lunch specials certainly abound around Chueca (a good midday meal can be had for between €5-8), it can be a bit challenging to keep dinner prices low. We’d recommend checking out the trendy and delish Bazaar Restaurant, located just south of Plaza de Chueca on C/Libertad, 21. The menu runs the gammut from goat cheese salad to Thai-style noodles with grilled meats, and can be digested with ease for under €25.

And a movie…

Next stop: Filmoteca’s Cine D’Oré (Santa Isabel, 3, next to Metro Anton Martin) where the Spanish film archives are housed and any number of old greats from Ingmar Bergman to Luis Buñuel are showcased in one of three “session” rooms. Tickets are €2 for students, €2.50 for non-students.

And then drinks to discuss…

When the movie lets out, try Café Central, located about three blocks away, at Plaza del Angel, 10. The jazz bar has a bubbly atmosphere with reasonably-priced drinks, delicious snacks (pinchos y tostas €1.20), and even fixed-price meals (€10 for two courses). 

And if you decide to spring for tickets to the evening’s jazz performance, they’ll throw in a free drink ticket. We don’t know about you, but we always love getting an added bibbidy for our buck.

Popularity: 11% [?]

Photo by theGirlonthestreet

The weekly free newspaper A Nous Paris recently published a list of the ten trendiest nightclubs in Paris. This paper bills itself as “the diffuser of urban news and trends,” and the article, written by Edouard Ronstand, is an attempt to boil down Paris nightlife to the ten must-do addresses with the best ambiance.

The list ranges from the classic La Flèche d’Or (102 rue de Bagnolet, metro Porte de Bagnolet line 3), to an upscale Cabaret named Bobin’o (20 rue de la Gaîté, metro Gaîté line 13). The cutting-edge electro and multimedia club La Géode is also listed (parc de la Villette, metro porte de la Villette line 7). La Géode and La Flèche d’Or are some of the few venues mentioned in Ronstand’s article that can be visited on a Cheapo budget.

Another suggestion is Le ShowCase, a massive venue literally under the bridge Alexandre III (metro Champs Elysées Clemenceau, lines 1 and 13). Also included: a sushi bar in an aquarium (Ozu & Aqualounge, 2 Avenue des Nations Unies, metro Trocadéro lines 6 and 9); a modern club in an old boulangerie (Le Nyx, 30 rue du Roi de Sicilie, metro Saint Paul line 1); a hub of counterculture with lasting happy hour prices (Le Motel, 8 passage Josset, metro Lerdu Rollin line 8); a neon mini-restaurant with changing themes each night (Club Superbar, 3 rue André Antoine, metro Pigalle lines 2 and 12); a brothel turned into a rock and hip-hop scene (Tania Club, 43 rue de Ponthieu, metro Franklin D. Roosevelt lines 1 and 9); and a members-only casino that serves dinner all night (Cercle Gaillon, 11 rue de Berri, metro George V line 1).

Popularity: 17% [?]

Photo from www.djqbert.com

Calling all fans of technically-skilled DJs and of the Invisibl Scratch Picklz! If you’re in Athens this week, here’s some good news: DJ Qbert is in town! If you’re unfamiliar with Qbert, check out the documentary DJ Qbert For Intellectual Dummies or pretend to be him by playing his character in Tony Hawk’s Underground video game.

Tuesday and Wednesday nights he’ll be performing at One Happy Cloud (Aristofanous 12, Psiri, +30-210-322-2256) beginning at midnight. Tickets are only €15 per person—not bad for a legend—and if you want to make sure you get in, go early, as only 100 people will be admitted to the club each night.

Popularity: 6% [?]

Photo by chris_wass

White Trash Fast Food, the notoriously attitude-heavy restaurant/bar/club in Berlin’s Mitte, gets itself all gussied up on Sunday nights for Coconut Grove, a nostalgic nod to the heyday of swing.

While you can still order White Trash favorites such as the Killer Elvis Burger, and the joint’s schizophrenic décor is as much rock n’ roll Chinatown brothel as ever, starched white cloths adorn the tables and the wait staff dress up in period garb to match the mood.

Add candlelight and live swing by Andrej Hermlin & The Swing Dance Orchestra and you’ve got a memorable Sunday night out, all for a mere €3. The band usually starts sometime after 9 p.m. It’s recommended to make reservations or show up earlier to get a good spot. White Trash Fast Food is located at Schönhauser Allee 6/7. Telephone: +49 30 5034 8668.

Popularity: 9% [?]

Photo by Bruno

Turned off by the amount of American pop music in Paris? Don’t worry, it’s not everywhere. Introducing Favela Chic: a Brazilian club with a great mix of non-pop music that’ll get you dancin’.

Located in the trendy 11^th arrondissement near République, the club is a well-established Paris nightspot. (We’re not breaking any news here, folks, but it certainly merits a mention!) The DJs mix up samba, rock ‘n roll, and hip hop, creating an atmosphere that’s completely chill, if smoke-filled and hazy.

Come as you are—dress to dance, not to impress. Tuesday through Thursday is free entry and the club closes at 2 a.m. Friday and Saturday there’s a €10 cover, which includes a drink, and you can party till 4 a.m. Drinks cost between €7 and €10.

Favela Chic: 18, rue du Faubourg du Temple, 75011 Paris. Metro République (lines 3, 5, 8, 9, 11).

Popularity: 10% [?]

Last Saturday night the French anti-discrimination group SOS Racisme tested admission policies at nightclubs in five cities across France. Similarly dressed couples of North African, African, and European ethnic backgrounds approached bouncers at different clubs in Paris, Lyon, Angers, Toulouse, and Bordeaux.

The outcome: Paris’s best-known club earned itself some bad publicity.

In the other four cities neither racial profiling nor discrimination was reported, but non-white couples were systematically turned away from the famous Queen on the Champs-Elysées. It’s not the first time Queen has failed an SOS Racisme pop-quiz, and the organization is collecting evidence for a lawsuit.

In addition to its unfortunate entrance policies, Queen is way over-hyped. Two equally chic clubs in the area passed the test with no problems, so if you’re hungering for a splurgy evening with the jet-set scene on the Champs, check out Les Planches (40 rue du Colisée, 8th arrondissement) or the Mandala Ray (32 rue Marbeuf, also in the 8th.)

The Mandala Ray happens to be co-owned by Johnny Depp, Sean Penn, and John Malkovich.

Popularity: 8% [?]