Tallinn, Estonia

A 300-seat medieval restaurant in three connected Hanseatic storerooms on Vana turg, behind the Tallinn town hall. Opened in 1997 in a building first put up in the 13th century and rebuilt after a 1654 collapse, the kitchen cooks strictly from recipes the city's merchants would have known before Columbus — meaning no potatoes, no tomatoes, no chocolate, no coffee. The dining rooms have no electric light; the food arrives by candlelight on wooden trenchers, and medieval musicians on hurdy-gurdy and bagpipes play in the corner Wednesday through Saturday. The Christmas menu carries verivorst with sauerkraut and lingonberry; the year-round menu runs to bear, elk, and wild boar sausages, forest mushroom soup, and saffron-braised lamb.