3 Best Restaurants in Coral Coast, Viti Levu

Formerly third-in-command at the renowned Jean-Michel Cousteau Resort, chef Sushil Chandra has brought his talents to the Bedarra Beach Inn on the "Sunset Strip." Take a seat on the balcony overlooking the pool and ocean and enjoy masterful seafood dishes at reasonable prices. Try the mahimahi in coconut milk, lemon, caper, and garlic butter or the Fijian specialty Ika Vakalolo—cooked fish in coconut milk with tomato and onion. The curries, too, are outstanding. The space is intimate, the service casual, and the cuisine well worth diving into. Reservations are essential for dinner, but for breakfast and lunch just walk in.

At the end of a jetty extending into a lagoon, a sand floor and thick wooden tables furnish the setting for outstanding seafood. Among the restaurant's six types of fish, all but Coral Trout can be steamed, grilled, baked, panfried, crumbed, or battered and served with a trio of tartar sauce, soy sauce, and garlic butter. The pièce de résistance is a seafood platter for two that includes oysters, mussels, scallops, shots of lobster bisque, baby octopus, calamari, prawn cocktails, parrot fish, mahimahi, tuna, and a whole lobster, all beautifully presented on a wooden board. You can dine under the hand-carved, traditional high ceiling or alfresco and take in the views some couples choose to accompany their wedding vows.

Hamburgers, pizzas, steaks, and the occasional seafood item prepared by local chefs are the order of the day at this cool garden café located along the famed "Sunset Strip." Swiss owner Jean Pierre Gerber, a certified chef, ran the ranges until he retired from the kitchen and began catering to Aussies visiting from the Outrigger on the Lagoon megaresort just down the beach. When Gerber isn't sailing, you might find him seated at the full bar, enjoying a pepper-steak sandwich. Stereo music and views of the ocean 60 feet (18 meters) away make this a pleasant place to vacation from the Outrigger's menu prices. There's also a Sigatoka location.