The 2004 Bridgestone 100 Best Guides

the perfect Xmas stocking filler for food-loving friends and family!

After years of being asked to publish our annual Bridgestone 100 Best Guides ­ the 100 Best Restaurants in Ireland and the 100 Best Places to Stay in Ireland ­ in time for Xmas so that people could give them as presents, we have finally gotten our act together: the 2004 editions are in the shops now, packed with loads of hot new entries.

Great Italian cooking in East Galway; Belfast's peerless dim sum; West Cork's inimitable café; brilliant new discoveries to stay in the unexplored Borderlands; hot new addresses from Mayo to Dublin city centre to Dingle. Here they all are, smack up to date, ready to be discovered. The months spent on research and writing the new books also explains why Megabytes has been off your computers for a while.

So, what has been going on out there in the world of creative cooking and hospitality? Well, contrary to all the "Rip-Off Ireland"stories that blamed restaurateurs for high prices, we have found that value for money when eating out is unquestionably better now that it has been for at least 5-7 years. Restaurateurs have reacted to a tough year by keeping prices shaved as close as they possibly can, by offering value and early-bird menus, and by absorbing price hikes in the areas of insurance and staff costs themselves. The result is simple: eating out in Ireland offers superb value for money, and culinary standards keep on rising.

Of course there are still places where you do get ripped off: fast food joints, sandwich bars, petrol stations and pubs. But Irish restaurateurs need to say it loud and proud: value for money in creative restaurants is at a new height.

What else? Well, we reckon one area where costs are remaining too high is in country house accommodation: there are too many places where you are charged restaurant prices for wine and food even though the man of the house opens the wine and the woman of the house cooks your dinner. Some of these country houses will not survive another tough year unless they catch themselves on. So, if you want value ­ and we all want value ­ and you want to give the gift of good food value, you will find the best-value addresses in the new Bridgestones.

Order the 2004 Bridgestone 100 Best Guides online: