9 Best Restaurants in Manuel Antonio and the Central Pacific Coast, Costa Rica

Follow your nose to this simple second-floor room offering breathtaking views by day and a deliciously inventive selection of seafood by night. The lunch menu is strong on salads, burgers, and sandwiches, but the dinner options include some of the best entrées in town, like seared tuna over a tequila-and-lime cucumber salad and calamari sautéed with capers and olives. To sweeten the deal, try the coconut bread pudding.

It’s the setting that will lure you, but the food that will keep you on repeat at this seafood restaurant just steps from the sand. Bamboo, wood, and rattan decor will make you want to throw on a Tommy Bahama shirt and order a mai tai. Stars of the menu include grilled lobster, seafood curry, and jumbo shrimp in a creamy garlic sauce. The sound of crashing waves blends with chill-out music, setting the scene as one of the more upscale, and oldest, restaurants in Jacó.

This cozy café is the only place in town that serves its own fresh-roasted coffee, with an eclectic menu serving inventive dishes like chilled avocado soup, mango chayote salad, roasted pork with sautéed papaya, and dorado with Caribbean salsa. Top sellers include jerk chicken, fish tacos, and the fish of the day with passion fruit sauce. The breakfast burritos, baked goods, and variety of sandwiches make this a top breakfast and lunch spot. Tables in the front dining room overlook the road, but there's also seating in the back garden. They have craft beers on tap, and there's live music Monday through Saturday from 7 pm to 9 pm. The attached store and their small coffee roaster in Quepos sell bags of their award-winning coffee to take home.

The outdoor tables are pretty much always full, owing to a location on Manuel Antonio's busiest corner, across the street from the beach near the national park entrance. This is a convenient place to grab breakfast after an early-morning hike—maybe banana pancakes or a típico, with eggs and gallo pinto (black beans and rice). The lunch and dinner menu ranges from the ubiquitous arroz con pollo (rice with chicken) to tenderloin with french fries, and jumbo shrimp in garlic and lemon butter. The fresh mahimahi and tuna are always a good bet. Daily happy hour is 4:30–6:30, featuring two-for-one cocktails.

It may not look like much at first glance, but this open-air restaurant across the street from the beach serves some dishes you'd be hard-pressed to find in other casual beach-town places. Request one of the outdoor tables under the bamboo dome and dine on dishes like fish croquettes in a lemon sauce, grilled tuna in mango sauce, and clams au gratin. Sea bass in a heart-of-palm sauce, lobster, and tenderloin are a few of the main dishes. The interior is limited to pebble floors, thin wooden columns, turquoise tablecloths, and soft candlelight.

Just behind the original location is a new and improved venue where a spectacular sunset view comes with friendly, attentive service and a tempting menu that includes such typical tico dishes as sopa negra (black-bean soup), ceviche, shrimp and fish on a skewer, and filet mignon wrapped with bacon and topped with a mushroom sauce. Up a long dirt road, this is the best place in town to soak in the ocean views—especially when accompanied by a glass of their famous white-wine-and-vodka sangria.

This favorite with sportfishermen ("You hook 'em, we cook 'em") is the town's best place for seafood, serving everything from shrimp scampi to fresh tuna with mushrooms to fried snapper and orange chicken. Their location, overlooking the marina, offers the best view in town. You won't find any billfish (like marlin or swordfish) on the menu, owing to the restaurant's conservation policy, but the back wall is covered with pictures of them—and their proud reelers. Weathered fishing caps hang from the bar's ceiling.

The chefs at this popular corner restaurant have mastered Thai cuisine with a Costa Rican twist, starting with the ginger fish, cashew chicken, lobster pad Thai, and green curry that will have you planning your next vacation to Thailand. Daily specials are the way to go, based on the freshest catch of the day and creative sides like mango salad or fried rice served in a pineapple bowl. Request your own level of heat and cool down with a refreshing cocktail. The patio seating with basket lamps is the ideal platform for sunset views while macaws fly across the horizon.

This Italian eatery is the perfect place to stop for brick oven pizza or homemade pastas. Thin and crispy top picks include New York style with pepperoni, sausage, and ham, or pesto-chicken pizza with toasted walnuts and caramelized onions. Staying true to Italian cuisine are the homemade meatballs, and fettuccine Alfredo. The tuna chipotle and filet mignon are hearty dishes and come with a side of roasted potatoes and vegetables. There’s a children’s menu, and a touch of Southern hospitality, especially when owner Mark Dalton makes his way from table to table (he's originally from South Carolina). If the lights dim, it just means someone ordered the banana flambé, a dessert and show worth saving room for. Live music is performed Saturday from 7 to close.