La Cocotte Café

I work on Pearse Street which may as well be in the suburbs for the lack of decent places to have lunch. I’ve only become acquainted with the café here in the past couple of months, and its just under a ten minute walk from Pearse Street, so at lunch time I can meet friends who work nearer the city centre. This place is always buzzing at lunch, as it offers great value on hot and cold dishes. The café is spacious, with the lovely large windows illuminating the large room. The décor is simple, with sweet gingham vinyl tablecloths on the tables, with the sugar cubes served in small kilner jars.
To order you queue at the food counter, but they bring the food to your table. Their lunch options are all helpfully marked to show if they are gluten free or suitable for vegetarians. Their soups are usually both. I always get fries when I come here, and have noted their popularity amongst the other diners too! They serve a range of sandwiches, salads, hot dishes and deserts. The food is wonderfully presented on large wooden platters, and their fries come in those small tin buckets that seem to be so popular at the moment.
My favourite treat when eating here is their hot chocolate, which comes in a BOWL, no half measures here!
Alliance Francaise offers courses in French, as well as examinations, but also they have film screenings and cultural evenings. It has a warm and welcoming atmosphere and I wish I’d discovered their café sooner!

We were looking for somewhere to have a relaxed and chatty lunch, despite all the Christmas madness going on around town. La Cocotte seemed like a great option. It’s on the corner of Kildare Street and Nassau St in the Alliance Francaise, so it’s central but a little off the beaten track.
The place is canteen style, where you order at the counter but get served at your table, and when I walked in I was struck by how appetising the smell was. The menu is a couple of french classics and various sandwiches. I went for the Beef Borguinon with chips. The beef comes in a little pot and it’s the real deal — a properly tasty winey stew, and I got a mountain of chips with it. I ordered it with a coke and it came to less than 12 euros. I really felt I had my dinner that day!
Its not for every lunch, but its nice for the odd treat where you don’t want to break the bank.

I like this place. The food is very nice (try the vegetable quiche) and it’s good to sit by one of the big windows and watch people bustling around the outside of Trinity. For half the week It’s open a bit later than many other cafes, so it’s great for a quick early evening meal.

I have walked passed this building nearly a million times and it wasn’t until the suggestion of a friend that I actually stopped in. This unassuming café, inside of the Alliance Francaise building, overlooks the beautiful Trinity College. It is very reminiscent of a French café. Very simple inside, metal chairs, red and white table cloths… it’s a café.
They had a pretty decent selection of salads, paninis, sandwiches, not to mention two delicious options for quiches. They had a selection of desserts that looks like they were to die for, but I’m also a dessert junkie!
Between my friend and I, we had the veggie quiche and quiche Lorraine, a goats cheese salad and a bowl of soup. If I would have known how large the salad was I would have skipped the soup and shared the quiche! For the price, you can’t beat it. It’s a great little spot, out of the eyes of the tourists, to get a quick yet tasty meal.

This café is attached to the Alliance Francaise in a beautiful older building. The café is modern inside, however, with mostly white walls and very simple (mostly IKEA) furniture. I passed by the place one morning and made a point to stop in later the same day for a coffee and some kind of snack.
I stopped in mid-​afternoon for a cappuccino and croissant, and both were good. The croissant seemed fresh and was very nice.
Beautiful black and white photographs hung all around the room as part of an exhibit, which apparently changes periodically.
This isn’t a super stellar café, and it may not have a ton of atmosphere, but it was a pretty good, comfortable stop during a busy day of wandering around in Dublin. It provided a hint of France, too, which was a welcome thing.

Came here with a RateMyArea deal which made it okay, but I dont think I would go back for a pastry… Id give the rest of the food a shot.
I got an apple and almond tart which had nice texture but the pear pieces were massive in it so if you did not have a knife you would just keep pulling chunks out leaving a hallow shell of pastry left. Oh wait, they did give me a knife! But it was plastic and could not cut the hard topping or crust. The topping did not really go with the pears, although it did go with the flaked almond on top.
The tea and coffees looked pretty standard for a café.
The staff were nice and pleasant to me, but the person before me got the wrong sandwich and they seemed to not know what to do and started yelling in French and English at one another.

The Café des Amis is run by the Alliance Francaise– the French Institute. As you might expect, you will be required to order your food and coffee in French, but if you’re really struggling the staff are more than happy to help you out.
The croissants do compare favorably to the ones I’ve tried in Paris and the coffee isn’t bad either. But the ambience reminds me a lot of the canteen at College. It’s usually buzzing but not too busy. A good place if you want to practice your French but if you just want to have a coffee there are nicer places just around the corner.

The Café des Amis is a strictly french language café based within the Alliance Francaise. The Staff, menu and chat is all «au francaise»… come here to practice your french and get a little bit of French coffee or tea into your system… maybe a bit of French bread?
It still feels like you are in a school while you are here, and you wont feel like you are sitting in a quiet Paris café listening to jazz and reading Baudelaire. You will however have the chance to sit down and practice the language while also eating and drinking some nice treats. The Alliance is very inviting and the staff are always happy to help you along if you haven’t quite got the hang of ordering your food au francaise!