Dublin on Fifty Quid – A Whole Day Out

Breakfast

The first stop on every full day out is coffee. You can stick to the spots in our Dublin on a Score piece if you drink back coffee. But if you, like most coffee drinkers, are a milk-based coffee consumer, then you want to hit up Simon’s Place on George’s Street. Milky coffee’s cap out at two fifty – including cappuccinos and mochas. There’s no mention of alt milks on their menu. But they are usually extra, so factor that in if that’s your poison.

It’s also a great spot to stop if you’re into people-watching and outfit-spotting. You can also grab what could be Dublin’s most affordable eggs on toast for a fiver each here. Meaning breakfast and coffee come in at seven fifty each or fifteen total. Leaving you with thirty-five quid for the rest of the day. 

Alternatively, you could head to The Cheeky Piglet and get two hashbrowns and a coffee for a fiver. This works more like a snack than breakfast, though. And it’s up in Fumbally Court, so it is a little further outside the centre than I’d usually recommend. 

Lunch

Lunch wise? You have a load of options. If you want to keep the extra for a blow-out-adjacent dinner, you must lean into the fiver soup lunch. Oxmantown, Soup Dragon and a wealth of others titter around the fiver mark for their soup. 

Then there are also quesadillas in MASA starting at a fiver. But the average spend is a tenner per person. So you’d need the willpower to keep it to the minimum. 

That said, if you’re down to hit the tenner each and leave only fifteen to twenty for dinner, then you have the sharing platter in UMI for eighteen quid. Or grab a burrito from literally any burrito place, specifically Mama’s Revenge, if you’re looking for quality. If you want, you could also hit up Reyna for a whopper kebab for eleven euros. Along that vein, you have the Chicken Gyros from Yeeros coming in around eight yoyos. 

Felling pasta? grab Spaghetti Al Limone, in Fasta for nine euros. Asian-wise, there are as many options as there is diversity in Asian food. I’ve mentioned most places on capel street, but also Lanzhou Hand-Pulled Noodles at Lee’s Charming Noodles come in under a tenner. Of course, we all know DiFontaine’s and Bambino for a slice, but also Southpaw has a Pecorino Pizza Portofoglia comfortably under a tenner. 

As I always recommend, if you want a pint with your lunch, it’s Grogan’s for a pint and a toastie. It comes in a little over a tenner each if you add ham. 

Dinner

After lunch, you could hit up another museum, head to a park, walk down the Liffey to Grand Canal and have a god gander at The Poolbeg Towers. You could also do some walk-by alternatives site seeing- Saint Audoen’s Gate or hitting up Stoneybatter where the Spice Girls filmed the STEP music video.

When dinner time rolls around, you have to take stock of what you did during the day. If you went for the fiver breakfast and the fiver lunch, then you’re probably gonna want a decent feed for your leftover forty blips. 

If you’re looking for two courses, then capel street is the spot. Throw a stone; most places will feed you a starter and a main for fifteen to twenty each. There’s also a massive sushi platter in Kimchi Hophouse that’s only thirty quid, so you could add drinks to your budget. 

If you have an even thirty left, hit up Nomo for their OG ramen. It will fill you and delight you equally for €14.95 each. There’s also Sprezzatura as an option. Most of their pasta comes in around twelve to thirteen. Equally, you have Bonobo or Kodiak for pizza. If you stick to the classic marg and get a half pint, you can booze a bit too.

Let’s say you did the cheap lunch and expensive breakfast, and you only have twenty-five thirty quid left, Ireland’s biggest chimichanga for two in The Hungry Mexican at twenty-five euros. Kokoro Ramen Bar has Ramen for two for twenty-five too. Along with the classic pick of a Dash Burger and split chips.

If you want dinner for two with a drink but only have a tenner each left in this fifty quid budget and think it’s impossible, do I have a deal for you? In Ranelagh, at Er Buchetto, you can get a cheese and charcuterie board with two Aperol Spritzes for only twenty euros. The perfect date night spot if you’re saving all your spare euros for the inevitably large electricity bill that’s headed for us all. 

If you went a bit over bored and got the expensive breakfast and the expensive lunch without realising and you’re genuinely down to a tenner between you and dunno how you’re gonna cope but you’re famished … take a deep breath. You can always grab a dinner box and split it. You’ll have to skip the garlic dip, though. 

You could split a three in one from Xian Street Food too. Or you can get a seven-inch pizza from Boco for seven squid, which isn’t really enough to feed you till you’re full. But it’ll keep ya going. That way, you have three quid left to blow.  

The Extra Oomph

Here is where you head to one of those free drink events if you’re trying to stretch it out. But you could top your day off in a completely different way. 

Hear me out: the best way to end a day out on the cheap is to play the Lotto. It adds a little excitement to your day with your leftover two quid. Each picks three numbers and do one line only. Then, leave it up to the man-made deities and dream about which overpriced gaff you’d buy if you won. Then if you actually win, it’ll keep you humble because you’ll never forget how broke you were when you bought it. So it’s a win-win even if you lose.