A new restaurant inspired by classic American diners has opened in Prague’s Karlín district.

Route 54, located on the ground floor of the Pulse8 hotel on Sokolovská Street, offers dishes ranging from Texas barbecue and ribs to Chicago-style deep-dish pizza and Italian beef sandwiches.

The project is led by Israeli chef Gal Ben Moshe, known for the Michelin-starred Prism restaurant in Berlin and the Prague fine-dining restaurant Parzival, which opened last year.

While Parzival focuses on a small number of guests and refined cuisine, Route 54 takes a different direction, built around a lively diner atmosphere and a menu based on American comfort food.

The restaurant’s name refers to a highway that runs between Illinois and New Mexico. In Karlín, that idea is translated into a menu that moves across several regions of the United States, combining barbecue, sandwiches and diner classics.

The restaurant was created in cooperation with the Jan Hotels group, which operates hotels in Prague and Český Krumlov. Both of Ben Moshe’s Prague projects are located inside hotels run by the company.

The chef, who built his career in Tel Aviv, Europe and the United States, moved to Prague last year after closing his Berlin restaurant. While preparing the opening of Parzival, he was already developing the Route 54 concept.

During his research of the local market, he concluded that Prague lacked a full American diner offering more than just burgers. Route 54 was designed to fill that gap.

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