6 Best Restaurants in Bellavista, Santiago

Originally inspired by Laura Esquivel's romantic 1989 novel Like Water for Chocolate, this Bellavista standout focuses on Chilean dishes made with "life, love, vigor, and passion" as per the book. Reserve the "bed table" if you want to be showy (it has a headboard but is not actually a bed).

Evoking another time and place, El Mesón Nerudiano centers around traditional recipes, poetry, music, and live theater, all in homage to Chile's greatest poet, Pablo Neruda. A stone's throw from La Chascona, Neruda's house-turned-museum, this restaurant has a menu with Chilean favorites, including caldillo de congrio, a fish soup cooked from the recipe given in one of Neruda's poems.

Starting life as a canteen for local workmen, Galindo today draws artists and the young Bellavista crowd, who come for traditional Chilean fare in an old adobe house. Although it gets crowded, it's a great place to try traditional dishes like pastel de choclo or a hearty cazuela, a typical meat and vegetable soup.

Stop by this authentic Spanish restaurant after visiting Cerro San Cristóbal for tasty tapas like chorizo riojano (a piquant sausage), pulpo a la gallega (octopus with peppers and potatoes), and queso manchego (a mild white cheese) or for the house specialty—cabrito al horno (oven-roasted kid goat). Wine aficionados will appreciate the extensive list of vino chileno.

Taking inspiration from ancestral dishes made in all the regions of Chile, there's a historical theme at Peumayén, where every meal starts with a colorful "bread basket," a slate plate with examples from the north to the south of Chile. Entrées designed for sharing include guanaco meat; horse meat, lamb, fish, and the much-celebrated potato continue the ancestral theme. The restaurant interior is part romantic, part rustic, and there's an agreeable plant-filled courtyard for outside dining in warmer months.

Hereford beef burgers, onion rings, and three kinds of veggie burgers all share space at this American-style restaurant owned by a French expatriate. These are some of the best burgers in the city, with patties made from meat, mushroom, chickpea, quinoa, or shrimp.