955 Best Restaurants in Mexico

This grandly turreted brick building was once the summer home of the Braniff family, former owners of the defunct airline. The house specialty is chamorro, pork shank wrapped in banana leaves. A patio overlooks the boardwalk and is inviting in the evening.

Perched on the rim of the 300-foot-deep cenote, this palapa restaurant charges a MX$50 entrance fee to access the site. Busloads of tourists come to dine on chicken, pork, and fish dishes, as well as house specialties like the seafood platter and shrimp kebab. Although the setting surpasses food, it's still worth lingering over a meal to gaze out over the deep blue waters. After your food digests, enjoy a swim off the dock. There's also a souvenir shop.

People rave about the dishes—especially the steaks—at this chalet-style restaurant in the Hotel El Paraíso. The interior has eight candlelit tables and a cozy fireplace. Swiss delights include classic raclette and several different types of fondue. The service is doting but not distracting. The intimate bar is known for its creative, strong cocktails.

Open to the ocean air, the wood-and-palm exterior of this restaurant looks right at home on Conchas Chinas Beach. The menu is a mixed bag of Mexican specialties such as chile relleno, international cuisine add-ons like chicken masala, and seafood dishes like the delicious crab enchiladas with chipotle sauce. There are wonderful views of waves crashing on or lapping at the shore at its bar El Set. If you're driving, look for the sign for Hotel Lindo Mar on the coast highway.

The coffee is good at this sunny corner café, but it's also a great place to stop in for a meal. (Just be prepared for leisurely service.) The menu includes a wide variety of Mexican dishes, including the delicious sopa de ajo (garlic soup). The pechuga de pollo en chipotle al gratin (chicken breast with chipotle and topped with cheese) is also tasty, but if you're looking for a simpler dish, you can also order more American fare—including burgers and fries.

Though it may be a bit hard to locate, you may well find yourself returning, drawn by the clean, unpretentious environment and congenial service—not to mention margaritas as big as fishbowls. Superb seafood dishes include sopa de siete mares (soup of the seven seas) and jaiba a la diabla (a spicy hot crab dish).

Set right on Boca de Iguanas Beach, this restaurant serves the typical seafood dishes of the region. Breakfast and burgers are also available. The restaurant is part of a camping compound with cabins and swimming pool included, so many come for the food and stay for the pool.

This outdoor restaurant is one of a handful of eateries along the lakeside in Teuchitlán. While not fancy, it offers a variety of Mexican dishes, including fish, molcajetes dishes of mixed meats, cheese, and vegetables in a stone bowl), and fajitas, and provides a grand view of the lake teeming with fish and birds including herons and pelicans. There's also a fish pond where kids can borrow a homemade rod for some catch and release. As you turn into the street, don't feel pressured by the parking attendants at the other restaurants who will make attempts to get you into their locales.

This popular steak house is a great place to enjoy a meal on a sunny day. There's a nice outdoor dining area with plants as well as toucans and other birds in cages. The menu has large tasty salads, including the so-called Kenya salad, with lettuce, nuts, pear, grapes, spinach, and Brie. Try the puntas de filete a la Mexicana (tenderloin tips with a red Mexican sauce served with rice and beans).

This quaint restaurant is small but cozy, and serves traditional homemade dishes and wood-oven pizzas. Sit at the outside tables and get a good view of the quiet life in the main square.

From the balcony of this cheerful second-story restaurant you'll have a great view of the goings-on in the zócalo. Brightly colored cloths adorn the tables, where house specialties—including cecina con enchiladas (salted beef with spicy enchiladas) and rellenos al gusto (green chilies stuffed with chicken, cheese, or beef)—are served by the friendly staff. There's free Wi-Fi for diners, so you if you bring your laptop you can check your e-mail while you eat.

Many people stop here for a breakfast of enchiladas and refried beans before heading to El Tajín.

It's worth making your way south to Cuidad Universitaria to dine at this distinctive and generally untouristy venue inside the UNAM faculty club, with a terrace that overlooks beautiful gardens and volcanic rocks. Open to the public and especially enjoyable for a late afternoon lunch, the restaurant serves a diverse, affordable menu of globally inspired dishes, such as penne pasta with a puttanesca sauce, panela cheese enchiladas with mole verde, and roasted rosemary chicken with a Chardonnay reduction. A buffet is offered on weekends.

Bullfighting posters and mirrors in elaborate frames are some of the things that make stepping into this restaurant a little like stepping back in time. Main dishes include róbalo a la cazuela (sea bass in a tomato-based sauce with shrimp). The daily prix-fixe menu consists of a soup, a plate of pasta or rice, and an entrée. Sunday sees a tasty paella.

This intimate spot has excellent food and hanging lamps and masks. You'll find a fairly typical selection of meat, poultry, and seafood dishes, including salmon with grilled onions and spicy chile de árbol sauce and steak with a savory mustard sauce, but the favorites are garlic-and-shrimp soup and the queso al cilantro, fried cheese on a bed of potato skins, covered with salsa verde.

El Coral serves generous portions of seafood in a relaxed environment facing the beach. It's a favorite among those heading out on a tour of the Marietas Islands and for surfers who come to ride the waves at El Anclote.

Situated a 10-minute drive southwest of the city center, this elegant spot specializing in sophisticated contemporary Mexican and international cuisine is a lovely destination for an unhurried dinner. The house specialties change regularly, but typical fare includes steak Rossini with foie gras and a red wine glaze or rare-seared tuna with risotto and a balsamic–black olive reduction.

At the town’s most comfortable eatery, tables draped in white linen sit under a wide palapa that's surrounded by plants and with a burbling fountain. In a small hut in the back, the cooks make tortillas by hand, and menu highlights include locally made longaniza (a tasty grilled pork sausage) and excellent sopa de lima. A small shop sells carefully selected and cleverly displayed local folk art.

The German chef at this little restaurant with tiled floors and beamed ceilings does exceptionally well with Mediterranean cuisine. The pastas are made fresh, and the pizzas are tasty—especially the cuatro queso pie made with Gouda, mozzarella, Parmesan, and goat cheese. A complete selection of Italian, Chilean, Mexican, and German wines rounds out the offerings.

This oceanfront restaurant has seen better times, but it still has a reputation as one of the best spots to eat in South of PV. Part of the Girasoles Condominium Complex, it's right on the beach, offering customers extraordinary views of the Pacific Ocean and the legendary sunsets of the region. The seafood is good but lacks originality.

Residents of Izamal have strong opinions on which restaurants make the best panuchos, salbutes, papadzules, and other local specialities, but Restaurante Muul is on many short lists. The atmosphere is no-frills, though the location is convenient, right on the main plaza just steps from the ex-convent.

This cavelike restaurant might only be open on Friday and Saturday, but it has unforgettable regional cuisine and a fun atmosphere with live music. Even simple items like the salsas and frijoles (black beans) are intensely flavored. There's an exquisite sopa de setas (soup of oyster mushrooms), or you could try the signature dish, enchiladas de picadillo con mole de olla (ground beef and raisin enchiladas with a savory local mole).

Patrons come to Restaurante Pineda for the generous portions of delicious seafood, though the beautiful ocean view is also a draw. Locals rave about the grilled octopus, oysters, and scallops, but the coconut-breaded shrimp aren't too shabby either. You'll leave the place with a full stomach and a somewhat emptier than expected wallet, but it's well worth the experience.

Grab a seat in this palapa restaurant directly across from the water and watch the day's catch come straight from the docks. The menu features local specialties like ceviche, seafood soup, fish fillet stuffed with shrimp, and breaded seafood rolled into a ball and deep-fried. In season (July–December) you can order lobster and octopus cooked several different ways. With a seashell-strewn floor and plastic tables, it's far from fancy, but you're sure to leave satisfied. Owner Diego Núñez and his family also operate Río Lagartos Adventures and can arrange a variety of tours.

Dark mahogany furniture, crisp white table linens, exquisite blue-and-white Talavera place settings, and refined service strike a note of restrained opulence at this 18th-century estate whose dining rooms surround a central courtyard with fragrant gardens and a circular fountain. Although you'll find European-influenced classic fare like chateaubriand for two and crispy calves' brains in brown butter, the Mexican delicacies are the stars—consider the crepes of huitlacoche, or a jewel-like dish of escamoles panfried in butter and herbs. The dessert cart, which displays everything from rich chocolate cake to Bavarian cream with strawberries and cajeta (goats-milk caramel), is a must. Even if you don't come for a full meal, try to drop by for cocktails and appetizers in the beautiful courtyard.

Just above the market, with a view of the main plaza, this plant-filled restaurant makes delicious regional cuisine served by a friendly staff. The envueltos de mole (chicken-filled tortillas covered in a thick, smoky mole sauce) are an excellent choice if you want to take a break from walking around the market and enjoy a snack. There is often live traditional music at lunchtime.

Rico Suave boasts an impressive selection of 100% natural juices and smoothies, freshly squeezing and blending almost every fruit (and vegetable) that you can imagine. You can order breakfast or lunch here, as well; tortas (street food--style sandwiches made on bolillo bread, a baguette-style roll) are popular.

You'll recognize this bustling corner stall near the Mercado San Juan by the tangling garlands of chorizo hanging over its flat top. And while the taqueros here serve perfectly good tacos of many varieties, the reason you're here is the fragrant, herbal chorizo verde, or green chorizo, from the nearby city of Toluca, stained emerald with herbs and green chiles.