3 Best Restaurants in Puerto Maldonado, The Amazon Basin

This funky, thatched-roof restaurant with river views in the back has one of Puerto Maldonado's best kitchens, offering up a wide variety of local favorites such as pollo con salsa de castañas (chicken in a Brazil-nut sauce), pescado en hoja (fish fillet cooked in a leaf), or lomo (grilled tenderloin) with tacacho (fried plantain balls) and ensalada de palmito (heart-of-palm salad). The environment is appropriately Amazonian, with Indigenous art on the walls.

Conveniently located on the Plaza de Armas, this popular restaurant is a good spot for a light meal, dessert, or fresh fruit drink. The menu includes a selection of sandwiches and salads, tamales, and entrées like chicken cordon bleu, but most people come for the homemade pastries and ice cream flavored with castañas (Brazil nuts) and local rainforest fruits such as aguaje and camu camu. Wooden tables fill the front room next to the display cases, and there is a large patio in back. A Swiss priest known as Padre Xavier opened it, and the profits go to a home for at-risk children in Puerto Maldonado.