21 Best Restaurants in Antigua, Guatemala

You'll feel like a guest in a private home when you arrive at this restaurant. Take your pick of tables, which are on a patio with cascading orchid plants, by a small pool, festooned with candles and flower petals, in the rear garden, or in one of the elegantly appointed dining rooms. The menu includes homemade pasta dishes, such as anolini served with a creamy pepper-and-cognac sauce, as well as fish and meat dishes served with a variety of sauces. All the vegetables are organic, and the bread is baked right on the premises.

Guatemalan colonial meets French country bistro at this eatery two blocks east of Parque Central. Trout amandine, pied de cochon, and steak frites with béarnaise sauce make up some of the French-themed highlights on the menu, along with an ample wine list that features mostly Chilean and Argentine vintages. You'll find a whimsical hog theme throughout, with pewter, ceramic, and wood pigs used to decorate the room with its dark wood and worn, exposed stucco walls. Lighting is low and romantic, with small spotlights and chandeliers made from frosted-white glass bottles. Jazz and blues provide the background music.

This hot spot on the northwest corner of Parque Central hustles and bustles with all the commotion of a big-city café. Coffees, teas, chai, and hot chocolate are on tap, along with a good variety of panini and salads. It can be difficult to find a table during the day, especially on weekends. If you're here with someone else, have one person in your party grab a table the minute one opens up, while another orders at the counter. Things thin out a bit after 8 pm.

Breakfast starts at 7 am, and specials such as toast topped with strawberries, papaya, or mango, and omelets made with fresh vegetables will give you plenty of sightseeing fuel. (Breakfast is served all day if you like.) After such a big breakfast, don't count on eating much for the rest of the day. For lunch, try the quiche or the Brie plate; the homemade pies and pastries are also notable. You can eat in the café's airy dining room or grab a cappuccino and a sweet roll at Café Condesa Express next door. Either way, the location right on the Parque Central can't be beat.

The friendly proprietors serve a menu that includes Thai curries, Chinese noodles, and Indian vegetable dishes. Be careful—some of the dishes, especially the curries, are quite spicy. Asian food aficionados will find the food not at all like the real thing, but Antigua is, after all, about as far from the source as you can get. There's live piano music nightly. The restaurant is popular with the many students studying Spanish in Antigua.

For Italian food in the city, this tiny restaurant can't be beat. Northern Italian specialties, delicious antipasti, and delicate homemade pastas are among the favorites. Wash it all down with a selection from the affordable wine list. The atmosphere and decor are low-key. Instead of giving out individual menus, waiters lug the menu board to your table to explain what's available. Hours can be a bit capricious; evening dining may begin at 6 or 7 pm, or whenever the restaurant opens, but the service is first-rate. Reservations are recommended.

You half expect Enrico Caruso to emerge from the shadows when you walk into this trattoria a couple of blocks from La Merced church. It's generally a bit cluttered and crowded, and it fills up quickly. You'll find overflow seating on the back patio, but sitting out there isn't nearly as atmospheric. For an Italian restaurant, the selection of pastas is small, but the café's signature plates are its various tenderloin dishes—we like the beef prepared with Gorgonzola cheese, nuts, and rosemary. There's also a wide selection of paninis and gelato.

Wander over to this seven- table café and pastry shop to try the 25 kinds of homemade cookies filled with nuts, chocolate, coconut, oatmeal, and spices. There's a good selection of gourmet coffee on the menu, too.

This restaurant—named after the mistress of Spanish conquistador Pedro de Alvarado—is something of a local institution; tables are scattered throughout a dozen rooms, but it's still not easy to get a seat. Early-morning specialties include fruit salad, pancakes, and very fresh bread (the bakery is right downstairs). Sandwiches and other light fare make for ample lunch and dinner options. The service can be slow, but the eclectic decor makes the wait pleasant. The bulletin board downstairs is an excellent source of information for travelers. Calling it “Doña Luisa” works too.

This fun place behind the cathedral has gained cachet with Antigua's foreign population, expat and tourist alike, who have made it one of the city's liveliest restaurants. You'll find a good selection of pizzas and pastas on the menu, along with less traditional dishes such as panfried salmon and grilled beef fillet with sautéed spinach. Italian music—it might be Sinatra, it might be Pavarotti—wafts through the three dark-wood rooms (one upstairs), along with convivial chatter from the spirited bar, making it an especially good place to eat if you're here with a group.

One of Antigua's original elegant restaurants is in a 16th-century house near La Merced church a few blocks north of the Parque Central. The place is huge and does a brisk event business, but offers plenty of secluded tables for intimate, candlelight dinners. Lunch is served in the downstairs courtyard; dinner expands to the upstairs terrace with stupendous mountain and city views and gorgeous end-of-day sunsets. The menu changes every few months, but always consists of a mix of Guatemalan and international fare—perhaps a three-meat pepián, or a tarragon leg of lamb with a mango shrimp salad on the side.

Looking for a place where you and your friends can knock back a few margaritas? At this festive cantina, a branch of a larger establishment in Guatemala City, the whole group can fill up on Mexican fare, including taquitos, enchiladas, and burros, the diminutive siblings of the American-style burrito. Things really get going when the mariachi band shows up. Stop by for live music Saturday evenings. Fans of Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera will find a great selection of prints from these masters—the menu even bears Frida's signature portrait.

An old Antigua favorite, this place has three locations serving the same Guatemalan and Mexican fare. The newest branch is housed in a colonial home, spacious enough to offer indoor and outdoor seating. Musicians stroll about on weekends. The menu includes queso fundido and the restaurant's famous caldo real (a hearty chicken soup). Other locations are the original on 5 Avenida near Parque Central, and a newer branch just across the street from that one.

One of Antigua's best small Italian restaurants serves up homemade pastas and pizzas from a wood-burning oven, and a variety of home-baked breads. Choose from an impressive selection of cheeses and wines sold by the bottle or glass. This is mostly a place to stop for a light bite, rather than a full meal. Most of the seating is outside, but you'll find plenty of covering to duck under on a rainy day.

We could picture Che Guevara plotting the revolution in a corner of this café, a hangout of young expats in the heart of Antigua's language-school district. You'll find some meat on the menu, but vegetarian fare dominates. (We love the falafel and hummus dishes.) The place is immensely popular. Don't be afraid to ask if you can squeeze in if you see no available tables indoors or in the courtyard. There are lectures, in English, on some topic of political interest, each Tuesday evening, and live music many other nights.

The name is apt. Anything and everything in the bagel realm makes up the bulk of the menu in this place just around the corner from the Parque Central. You'll find an equally wide variety of smoothie flavors here as well as decaf coffee (a real rarity in this country). Stop by at 5:30 pm for the nightly screenings of late-run Hollywood films on DVD; there's a huge selection of those, too. Movie time occasionally varies but will always be announced that day on a board in the doorway.