Places to eat in Vanuatu

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Nambawan Cafe is the hot spot to meet people in Port Vila. Go there for Breakfast, buy your copy of the 'Vanuatu Post' and just sit there watching the movement goin' on.
Pop there again for a Tusker beer or a fresh fruit juice, or a cocktail, at 5 pm and enjoy the sunset.
This is the time for yacht people to get off for a beer.
Wi-fi available

Favorite Dish: Fresh fruit mix.

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Tara Beach is about a half hour drive from Port Vila and is located on Devils Point Rd. The laid back resort and outdoor restaurant is right on the beach which adds to its dining experience. The local owners Sala and Lei Vatoko are both wonderfully hospitable and have a wealth of knowledge about thier island home. Carl will greet you with a beaming smile and attend to your every need. The food as you can see from photos is a mix of local and western fare and is very well presented. All local produce is organically grown and very tasty. Local beef from Santo Island is truely the best you will find anywhere in the world you cant leave without having a steak at a local restaurant. Seafood is fresh and well presented. Tara beach is situated on Mele Bay so swimming and snorkling is safe from the sand beach or have a paddle on the kayaks while waiting for your meal. Guests are welcome for day trips or meal and make sure to ask if Sala is around you wont be disappointed and if you are truely lucky get him to sing a few tunes he is Vanuatu's own "elvis"

Favorite Dish: Lobster Mornay .........delicious flavour not overdone with sauce flavours to take away from the experience. Magnificent!!

Chill Restaurant was another place I would have liked to have tried again. We went there after the Kava tour and we were pretty tired and about ready to hit the sack. We hadn't had dinner though, and wanted something light after the snacks we'd had on the cruise.

We decided to share a pizza and salad and have a dessert each. The pizza was great! Can't remember what type it was, but it was very nice.

I had waffles with coconut icecream. The waffles were I think a little overcooked, but the coconut icecream was delicious. My partner had the Nangai nut icecream slice, which was quite frozen and a bit of a chore to eat, but it was yummy nevertheless.

Favorite Dish: Pizza!

The Cafe Au Peche Mignon regularly receives rave reviews, and it's well-deserved. The place is always packed and popular with locals and tourists. The display cabinets show off the chef's gorgeous-looking pastries and desserts. Unfortunately, we never got around to trying any of them, but we did pop in for lunch one day and had pizza and beer. The pizza was quite tasty and nicely cooked, and the prices were reasonable.

The atmosphere of the cafe was a little bit strange. All the seating was alfresco, and in Port Vila that means hot. Luckily, it's also completely enclosed so it's out of the sun. Unfortunately this also makes it seem somewhat claustrophobic. It was generally nice once seated though.

One time we decided to just get some ice-cream from the sidewalk bit. Paying for the food this time was a bit of a drama. One person served us the icecream and then we had to queue up at a separate till to pay for it. The staff were rushed off their feet and yet refused to be harried, so we found ourselves queued up for quite a while.

Favorite Dish: Well, I only had the pizza, but it really was quite nice!

The best food in town by far was to be had at Tropik Bistrot.

It's a very unassuming place, a little bit on the cheaply decorated side. The place was empty that night, we were the only customers, so we took a seat outside where it was a bit cooler. (Even though the sign claimed it was fully airconditioned, it was cooler outside).

The menu was full of interesting temptations. For entree, I settled on the Heart of Palm Salad. Oh my! Sooooo delicious! And my partner had the Mangrove Crab Salad, which he said was very nice too.

For mains, I decided on the Coconut Crab (after prodding from my partner and after checking with the waitress that the stocks weren't being unnecessarily depleted - in fact, this was the first time in a long time that they'd had it on the menu, apparently). The crab was served with a delicious spicy sauce, and the whole combination was divine, I loved every minute of it!

My partner decided on the Rib Eye Fillet with Vanuatu Pepper Sauce. He hesitated here, because most of the other meat he'd tried so far had been rather disappointing. However, he was very pleased with the steak here, cooked to perfection. I had a taste as well, and normally I don't like steak but this was indeed very nice.

Happiness all round!

For dessert we had crepes - crepes suzette and banana crepes. They were OK, but not as good as the two previous courses.

All in all, this was a wonderful place. The food was fantastic, and the staff were friendly and attentive but not overly so. The best service we had during our stay.

The bad new is, on the plane on the way home, we saw an ad in the paper saying the place was for sale. Hopefully the restaurant will stay open!

Favorite Dish: It's a toss up, the heart of palm salad was delicious and unexpected, but the coconut crab was to die for!

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We didn't eat from Michener's a la carte menu, but as part of our package, we received a complimentary candlelight dinner on our balcony. (Seems practically all guests get this inclusion.)

This was arranged through Michener's Resaurant - we had a set menu to choose from, so we arranged the date and time and pre-ordered our 3-course dinner. They were quite punctual and the service was good but unfortunately, we were a bit disappointed with the food itself.

Let's get the bad part out of the way first. The entree and dessert were OK, but the main was, well, terrible. My partner had the beef, which was not just rare, it was quite raw inside, and in addition to this it was just a bad cut of meat, gristley and chewy. I'd ordered the Wahoo fish wrapped in banana leaf, and I was fairly disappointed with this too, it was quite dry and inedible.

However, the entree was reasonably filling. I had a smoked marlin and salmon salad which was actually rather delicious, and my partner had the coconut prawns, which was nice but we'd had better at Shooters. We both had the chocolate tart for dessert which was also delicious and a generous serving to boot. It was just a shame the meat was so inedible, it spoiled the evening a little bit.

The service was good - the waiter went away after delivering each course and we just dialed the restaurant to get the next one, which was delivered within 5-10 minutes.

We also received a complimentary bottle of Hardy's sparkling wine with the meal. It wasn't that nice, the complimentary Grandin we'd received on arrival at the resort was better.

Favorite Dish: The chocolate tart!

We'd read a lot of good reviews about the Flaming Bull Steakhouse, but it didn't really make our list of "must do's". Nevertheless, we found ourselves there after our trip to Hideaway Island. I especially wanted to go because of the rumoured cocktail in a coconut shell, I really wanted one! Alas, they'd run out of shells :(

Very disappointed.

However, we decided to eat there anyway, and the cocktail was nice even served in a normal glass. We had calamari (which were cooked to marvellous perfection) and a burger and chips, which was purportedly very nice as well.

Favorite Dish: The Calamari was fantastic!

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Tilly's is one of the top places in Port Vila. We decided to have a tapas lunch there one day before our tour, so the experience was brief. But oh was it good! The service was fantastic - attentive, but not pesteringly so. The feshly squeezed lime juice was light and sweet. We ordered 3 tapas dishes (calamari, koftu, and pork dumplings), each of which was quite delicious.

And best of all, the view over the water was to die for.

It would have been nice to have had another meal here, we defintely would have gone back if we'd had more time.