Restaurants in Vienna that you Should Avoid
I recently made a post about the best restaurants I visited during my time living in Vienna. Today I figured I’d make a list of ones that I think are best to avoid or that I felt were tourist traps. I’m not going to be including images since I don’t have any of my own and I’m sure the places I discuss would not like that. Even though no one reads this anyway, haha :/
1. Baumkuchen
There are many shops throughout the city selling baumkuchen. This is a cone of pastry with cinnamon sugar, which you might think should be pretty good. I got one filled with apple bits and vanilla ice cream for like Eur 7. Needless to say the ice cream was not good and started dribbling out of the bottom of the “cone”. The apple chunks had an artificial apple flavor somehow, and the baumkuchen was tough and tasted like cardboard. It was kind of like a bad frozen pizza crust with some sugar on it. If you are really interested in getting a good baumkuchen, do thorough research on the place you are visiting, or go to the Christmas market where they are more likely to be made fresh.
2. Cafe Diglas
Even though it has solid google reviews, the food I got at Cafe Diglas was not enjoyable. I got the salad with goat cheese. The salad was not fresh and the dressing tasted off, honestly as if it was expired or something. The bread we got with our meal was just ok. I was expecting some kind of yummy baked pear and the menu says caramelized nuts. What I had on my plate were obviously canned pears and some walnut bits out of a bag. Who knows, maybe their other dishes are better, but definitely avoid the baked goat cheese salad.
3. Eissalon Tuchlauben
This is an old ice cream place that has been in business in Vienna for a long time. I went to the main parlor which is a pretty cool location with vintage looking chairs and stuff. Unfortunately the ice cream was overpriced and the seats and table were grubby. One of my biggest peeves with ice cream was also checked off during my visit to Tuchlauben, which are those little ice chunks in the ice cream, meaning that there were issues in the production process. It was also very gummy/stretchy which means too much guar gum was used.
4. Zum Weissen Rauchfangkehrer
This place is very much a tourist trap and exhibits an amusement park-esque loyalty to everything Austrian. This includes the waiters who are dressed in traditional Austrian clothing (is it offensive to say costumes?). The wood interior is uninviting and the restaurant happens to be located on a street full of homeless people, which is of course no fault of the restaurant. I had some kind of goulash that was very small and had the acidity of balsamic vinegar that I did not enjoy. My tiny portion was like Eur 30. Luckily I was not the one whose wallet was punished, and I am glad I did not eat anything else that would have further increased the bill. I mentioned the homeless before because leaving this joint with the unhoused looking on forces you to bask in the guilt of emptying your wallet for something so subpar. Instead, the same money could’ve gone to 7 meals worth of delicious doener for the needy at the same price (see previous post “Best Restaurants at Different Price Points in 2025”).
Hope I was able to give you some ideas about what eateries in Vienna to avoid that are easy to fall for.
