December 3, 2003 -- Holed up for the spectacular New Year's Eve celebrations in Reykjavik, I looked at the city's overpriced, underspiced restaurants with dismay. More than a year later, wandering through the Mercat de la Boqueria in Barcelona, I found cuts of ham and pieces of fruit that I'd never be able to taste in the States -- or that I'd be able to order within my budget at a restaurant.
The answer to both dilemmas? A room with a flame -- or a kitchenette, to be precise. If you're in a city where restaurants are just too expensive, where buying food is a brilliant part of the culture, or you're toting along some continually-noshing kids, you'll find huge advantages if you request a hotel room where you're able to whip a little something up on demand.
Advantages of a Euro-Kitchen
Popping into a supermarket almost anywhere in Europe can be an amazing tourist experience. In Iceland, for example, you can get a wide variety of the bizarre specialty skyr , which tastes like a sour, fruit-flavored yogurt. In France and Spain, citizens' daily lives often revolve around what they can pick up at the local open-air food market, where displays of toothy fish fight for space against gloriously colorful pyramids of fruit and huge, saggy nets filled with snails.
Reykjavik is one city where cooking your own meals really pays off. The local cheap cuisine is uninspired, and "discount" can still mean $15 or more per person. Instead, stay at the Hotel Fron (www.hotelfron.is), right off Laugavegur, the main shopping street. Not only do you get a kitchen, rooms are relatively cheap for this costly town, with cozy little studio apartments coming in around $80 during low season and $120 during high season.
On a recent trip to Barcelona, we were very impressed with the Hotel Silver (www.hotelsilver.com), a family-run hotel in the hip Gracia neighborhood just north of the center of town. They'll give you a room with a tidy little electric stove for €71.50 ($85.80), or you can pay €30 ($36) more for a renovated room with a sparkling-new range and a microwave/convection oven. Led by a married couple and their sister-in-law, the staff are aggressively friendly. For a room with this level of comfort and amenities, the price is hard to beat.
To visit Paris without going to the market is to miss the heart of French life. In France, the word for "apartment hotel" might as well be "Citadines" (www.citadines.com), a massive chain with smartly-appointed little buildings in 14 French cities, plus Berlin, Brussels, London and Barcelona. In Paris, the use of a spotless studio apartment for a week can cost as little as €91 ($109.20)/night; prices are even lower in the rest of France.
For many travelers to London, Harrod's food halls are a cruel tease: you can look, but you can't cook at this temple of gastronomic excellence. If you're staying at the Kensington Guest House, though, you can have it both ways: pick up your choice of fresh ingredients and take them home to the friendly B&B to cook. Rooms start at only $82.50, making the hotel worth the trek to its West London residential neighborhood. An added bonus: Holland Park is very near Portobello Road market, probably London's grandest and tastiest open-air shopping emporium.
Kitchenettes Closer to Home
In the US, plenty of independent hotels and motels offer kitchenettes, but their quality varies wildly: some of our readers had a nightmarish time at the Signature Suites West Village in New York this month, in a "suite" covered with grime they reported. Three mainstream chains are reliably clean, efficient and nationwide: Towneplace Suites and Residence Inn (both by Marriott, www.marriott.com) and Summerfield Suites by Wyndham (www.wyndham.com). Check their sites for a suite near your destination, and remember that they usually offer discounted rates through consolidators such as Expedia (www.expedia.com) and Orbitz (www.orbitz.com).
The grime at the Signature Suites was a pity, because New York has a huge farmer's market at Union Square on Saturdays -- it's a tourist attraction in itself. If you can afford it, Frommer's recommends the suites at the Kimberly in Midtown for their fully-equipped kitchens. New York farms are famed for their apples and cheese, and combined with a bottle of wine, you can build a tasty local hors d'oeuvre plate before you set out on the town.
In LA, getting hungry means getting in the car -- again. Staying at the Summerfield Suites in West Hollywood not only puts you in one of the hippest parts of town, within a quick drive of both Hollywood and Santa Monica, it gives you a spacious, reasonably-priced room that you can fill with your own late-night goodies gathered from the local Albertson's.
There's nothing to lose -- and noshing to gain -- when you stay at a hotel that offers kitchenettes. At the very least, you'll always be able to heat up a can of soup in a pinch.
Are you a fan of cooking on the road? Have you stayed at any of these properties or do you have a recommendation of your own? Share your tips on our Lodging Message Boards today.