Speyer sits in the Palatinate, the largest wine-growing region in Germany by area, and the food reflects it: robust, hearty, and built around local pig and local wine. The regional specialty is Saumagen — literally "pig's stomach", stuffed with a mixture of pork, potatoes, and spices and then boiled or pan-fried. It sounds challenging and tastes better than it sounds. Saumagen is associated in the popular imagination with Helmut Kohl, who grew up in the Palatinate and was famous for serving it to visiting foreign dignitaries, including Margaret Thatcher. Whether this was diplomacy or stubbornness is a matter of debate.
The wine is the other reason to eat well here. Palatinate whites — Riesling, Grauburgunder, Weissburgunder — tend to be richer and riper than those from the Mosel or Rheingau, and the local restaurant wine lists reflect this. Many restaurants in Speyer are straightforwardly traditional, oriented towards local families and the cathedral visitor trade. The streets around the Domplatz have the highest concentration of options; the Maximilianstrasse and the lanes off it have a few more individual places worth seeking out.