Manuel Antonio is known for its beaches and its national park, but the eating here is better than a small coastal town has any right to offer. There is everything from a plastic-chairs soda serving the best value lunch you will have all week to proper fine dining with a view over the canopy. Here is how the scene actually breaks down, so you can find the right table for the night you are having.
Start with the local food
Costa Rican cooking is not showy. It is fresh, generous and built on a few things done well, and it is worth eating properly at least a couple of times before you go looking for anything international.
The dishes to try
Gallo pinto, rice and beans cooked together and usually served with eggs, is breakfast. Casado is the lunch plate that feeds the country: rice, beans, plantain, a salad and a protein, for a price that will surprise you. And ceviche, white fish cured in citrus with onion and coriander, which is exactly what you want at two in the afternoon in this heat. The fish comes in at the marina a few minutes away, so it is about as fresh as ceviche gets.
Fine dining
There is a genuine high end here, and it tends to come with a view. Think open-sided dining rooms built into the hillside, a kitchen doing something careful with local fish, and a wine list. Book ahead in high season, because the good tables are the ones with the sunset and everyone wants them.
Rooms with a view and a kitchen to match
For a special occasion, the restaurant at Hotel Mariposa is the one we point people to. Closer to us, Coconuts by The Falls is our own restaurant, open to non-guests as well as to people staying here, and it sits in the garden with the jungle on three sides. Ask for a table near the waterfall; the sound of it is the whole point.
Casual places that are genuinely good
Emilio's Cafe, up on the hillside along the main Manuel Antonio road, looks out over the ocean and the forest and is best known for breakfast, coffee and Mediterranean-leaning plates rather than seafood. Restaurante La Finca is the other one we send people to. Both are the sort of place you end up at twice.
Local favourites off the main strip
Club Banana sits up in the Zona Americana above Quepos rather than in Manuel Antonio itself, in one of the old United Fruit company buildings. It is a dinner rather than a lunch, and it is worth the short drive up the hill for the setting alone. Check its hours before you go, because it is not open all day.
Seafood
You are on the Pacific, a few minutes from a working marina, so this is the thing to eat. Marisqueria Sabromar, near the entrance to town, is the unpretentious choice for very fresh fish at a fair price. The restaurants down at Marina Pez Vela put you right on the water, which is worth doing once at sunset even if you pay a little for the position.
Vegetarian and vegan
Easier here than you might expect. The Manuel Antonio Falafel Bar is a small Mediterranean place with a proper vegetarian and vegan menu and a loyal local following. Beyond that, most kitchens in the area keep real vegetarian options rather than a token pasta, and our own kitchen handles vegetarian, vegan and gluten free without any fuss.
Eating with children
Most places here are casual, open-sided and outdoors, with room to move and nobody minding much, so a restless four-year-old is nobody's crisis. Ask us for the current pick before you set out; the one we would name changes with who is cooking.
Dinner for two
For an evening on your own, the two to look at are the restaurant at Hotel Mariposa, for the occasion, and Coconuts by The Falls, for something quieter with the sound of water and no drive home afterwards if you are staying with us.
Breakfast
Emilio's Cafe is the standing recommendation for coffee and a proper breakfast with a view. And if you are staying here, breakfast at Coconuts is included with the room, which saves you the drive entirely.
A note on all of this
Restaurants in a beach town open, close and change hands, and this list will drift. Treat it as a starting point rather than a guarantee, check current hours before you set out, and ask at reception if you want to know what is actually good this week. We eat here too.
