Bites: Floor-level dining

Byzantium, 2 Portwall Lane, Bristol (0117-922 1883). Mon-Sat dinner. Conventional seating and eating is sandwiched between courses more consistent with the exotic surroundings. For starters - a lantern bearing morsels of Oriental food for £6.50 a head - sit downstairs on low divans. Repair to the first floor for main courses of chunky, Frenchish food - steak, chicken, red mullet. Then back to ground level for desserts (£5.50), and coffee among the cushions. Main courses are £10.50-£19.

Byzantium, 2 Portwall Lane, Bristol (0117-922 1883). Mon-Sat dinner. Conventional seating and eating is sandwiched between courses more consistent with the exotic surroundings. For starters - a lantern bearing morsels of Oriental food for £6.50 a head - sit downstairs on low divans. Repair to the first floor for main courses of chunky, Frenchish food - steak, chicken, red mullet. Then back to ground level for desserts (£5.50), and coffee among the cushions. Main courses are £10.50-£19.

Hi Sushi, 40 Frith Street, London W1 (020-7734 9688). Daily noon-11pm. Sushi shop at street level, with an underground dining room with coloured-glass tables shaped in retro 1950s style. You sit on the edge of the floor with legs under the tables in a dug-out space. Cheap, cheerful Japanese food covers all bases from sushi for around £10, to a selection of noodles, tempura, and bento boxes for £5-£8, or a greatest hits selection for £12.50.

Momo, 25 Heddon Street, London W1 (020-7434 4040). Daily lunch and dinner. Partly what makes the Moroccan restaurant so painfully fashionable is the low banquettes and seats. Nonetheless the experience of eating here has a heady allure, with intensely aromatic tagines mixing fruit, nuts, spices, meat and fish. All for a price - around £25 for a couple of courses and coffee - that's higher than the usual north African experience, even if the seating is authentically

Thai Pavilion, 42 Rupert Street, London W1 (020-7287 6333). Daily lunch and dinner. The third floor of this Thai restaurant in Soho is khantok-style - that's with cushions on the floor and a backrest. The room's often taken over for functions, but when it's not, twos and fours can hit the floor and eat pretty good Thai food for around £16 a head.

Chikako's, 10-11 Mill Lane, Cardiff (01222 665279). Tue-Sat dinner. Cardiff is a surprising place to find this basement Japanese restaurant with two tatami rooms - where you sit on the floor and eat off a low table. These are normally booked by Japanese visitors, grateful for any Japanese food outside London. Plenty of tempura, teriyaki and teppanyaki alternatives compensate, and a meal comes to less than £20 a head.