5 Best Restaurants in Veracruz City, Veracruz

A leisurely stint here in the sun, watching ships unloading their cargo, is what Veracruz is all about. This family restaurant was so popular it split off into side-by-side establishments run by two brothers. The menus are nearly identical, both serving renowned traditional lechero. The milk is flamboyantly poured from silver jugs at a great height by a server. Visit the Gran Café closest to Hotel Emporio for classic picadas y gordas (puffy, deep-fried tortillas with beans, onion, mole, and cheese).

Try for a sidewalk table under the arches, if you can withstand the competing marimbas and the appeals of women selling crafts.

Sit in a shady arcade, near the live music, or in a dining room with copper columns and beamed ceilings at this famous café, which was opened as a candy shop in 1824. The menu has lots of dishes from Veracruz, including a delicious huachinango a la veracruzana (red snapper simmered in tomatoes, onions, garlic, green olives, and capers). The $8 weekday lunch special includes a soup or salad and a meat dish. The Gran Café del Portal has an ongoing rivalry with the Gran Café de la Parroquia as to which place serves the real lechero—here white-jacketed waiters bring you one kettle of strong coffee and another of hot milk, and let you do the mixing.

This two-story family restaurant has a large indoor fish tank, a play area for children, and shaded tables on a white patio. The menu includes salads, pastas, meat dishes, and thin-crust pizzas. The cuatro formaggi pizza with mozarrella, blue cheese, Gruyère, and provolone cheeses is heavenly, especially with chimichurri sauce. The insalata golosa, a large salad served with a zesty house dressing, Gruyère cheese, bacon, and crushed nuts, is especially tasty.

Playa de Hornos, a popular stretch of sand south of the Acuario de Veracruz, is lined with thatch-roof seafood shacks. They all serve basically the same thing: fish cooked any way you like it. This place, with a giant neon sailfish positioned on the roof, is among the closest to the aquarium and one of the best. Grab a table in the open-air dining room or one under an umbrella along the surf.

The Guinness Book of World Records honored the founder of this friendly seafood restaurant for dreaming up the world's longest seafood-stuffed fillet of fish, which was once prepared in the street along the waterfront. You can find smaller, but equally scrumptious concoctions and live midday music at this open-air dining room. Especially popular are the camarones Pardiños (juicy shrimp stuffed with manchego cheese and wrapped in bacon) and ostiones a la diabla gratinados (spicy oysters topped with grated cheese). Dishes like cheese-stuffed plantains satisfy vegetarians.