The 23 Best Places to Eat and Do in Costa Rica

The fastest way in is a charter prop plane from San José, eight seats, thirty minutes, and suddenly you're in the Talamanca Mountains. The spa here is part of a wider wellness program on a 180-acre hacienda, ranging from aura cleansing to the Estée Lauder Skin Longevity Institute, which is a sentence that could only exist in 2024. Vogue named it among the 100 best spas in the world. Couples who e-bike before noon and book the therapeutic sauna for after lunch seem to find their people here.

San José's Conservatorium runs a proper R&D lab where ideas get tested before they reach the table, which tells you something about the mood of the kitchen. It's a creative fine-dining restaurant with dry-aged steaks and a pastry chef who leans into his Asian heritage for the sweet courses. The team has a spot on Latin America's 50 Best Restaurants list, and the ambition in the cooking makes that easy to believe.

The garden terrace sets the mood at this Italian restaurant in Santa Ana, where the menu reads like a Roman trattoria but the seafood section quietly belongs to Costa Rica. Ossobuco and pizza al taglio share space with local sea bream, corvina, and jumbo shrimp pulled from nearby waters. It's the kind of place that earns its crowd through the gap between what's expected and what actually arrives.

Chicharrones here are meatier and more substantial than most you'll find elsewhere in Latin America, and that alone tells you what kind of place this is: a beloved chicharronera in the hills of Aserrí where locals gather the way Ticos gather at any good party, with limes, tortillas, black bean puree, and Salsa Lizano close at hand. Come with a group, order big, and expect cold Imperials alongside the kind of afternoon that runs longer than planned.

A rustic wood cabin near Poás Volcano that draws hikers and locals alike for daytime Costa Rican cooking. Coffee comes first, naturally, then the casado, a loaded plate of rice, beans, eggs, cheese, salad, and stewed meat that functions as both breakfast and reason enough to detour off the volcano road. Gallo pinto, stuffed tortillas, and arepas round out a menu built entirely around what people in this country have always eaten.

Cuts of chateaubriand and Brazilian picanha share the menu with octopus over cassava "charcoal" and jumbo shrimp with garden poppies, which gives you a sense of how Furca operates. It's a steakhouse, but one that takes Costa Rican ingredients seriously alongside the global red-meat playbook. Sides run from blackened yucca to grilled asparagus, and the wine list stays in the Americas. Dressy-casual, and not a place you rush through.

Picaritas bags split open and loaded with ceviche, mayonnaise, and hot sauce, then dusted with Tajín: that's a caldosa, and it's the thing to order at this compact ceviche spot in Escazú. The room runs entirely blue, walls to cold bar, and the menu leans into Costa Rican style, long-marinated in lime, sweet peppers, purple onion, and cilantro, with fish, shrimp, squid, and blood clam all in the mix.

The corn-flour empanadas here have been coming out of the fryer since before most regulars' grandparents were born, served alongside the Plaza de las Garantías Sociales. This is a casual Tico snack counter where you order by filling, beans to chicharrón, and the house move is getting your empanada split and dressed with lettuce, tomato, sour cream, and chilera. Morning coffee or afternoon horchata both work. Show up hungry and without a reservation.

Every shot of rum comes with a free snack, which is the kind of bar policy that deserves to be exported globally. La Vasconia is a dive bar and karaoke spot where ordering a bucket of beers unlocks a round of bocas, think ceviche, chorizo, or fried yuca. The local call is Centenario rum or a chiliguaro, Costa Rica's spicy guaro-and-tomato-juice answer to a Bloody Mary. Stay late and there's a full menu of Tico classics to keep you upright.

The rondon arrives in a deep bowl, coconut-milk broth holding fish or mixed seafood together with cassava, taro, yams, and plantains, and it's the reason most people drive out to Santa Ana. Ricky Barthley's casual, shady neighborhood restaurant doubles as a sports-watching spot, with an afro-Costa Rican and Caribbean seafood menu that also runs through chunky ceviche, shrimp fried rice with patacones, and a mariscada stew served over gallo pinto.

The smiling pig in a chef's hat on the logo sets the tone: this is a casual, family-friendly skewer spot built around wood-fired pinchos, the meat-on-a-stick tradition Ticos reach for when carnita cravings hit. Pork with chorizo, pork with vegetables, chicken, all charred over wood and served with barbecue, hot, or pineapple sauce. Massive steel hoods handle the smoke. A cheerful, unpretentious place to eat with your hands.

A takeout spot run by a chef who trained at Michelin-starred restaurants in Spain and came home to make raw food instead. The menu leans on Costa Rican produce, cold-pressed juices spiked with turmeric and ginger, plant-based sushi and poke bowls, and vivid dragon fruit bowls that look almost too colorful to be lunch. The chef also teaches raw-food preparation classes when she isn't behind the counter.

Strawberry picking comes before you even sit down, which tells you exactly what kind of place this is: a rustic roadside stop on the slopes of Poás where the menu reads like a Costa Rican grandmother's weekly rotation. Chorreadas, gallo pinto, olla de carne, and a tortilla aliñada the size of a Frisbee stuffed with masa, cheese, and cream. Wash it down with a cup of local coffee or fresh strawberry juice still cold from the garden.

The setting is an old remodeled house in Barrio Amón, which fits: this is the kind of neighborhood restaurant where the menu reads like a love letter to Costa Rican regional cooking. The chef leans on local ingredients and sustainable catch, working through dishes like caldosa and arroz guacho from Guanacaste in a way that feels rooted rather than nostalgic. A casual dinner spot with serious intentions behind it.

A soda is Costa Rica's answer to the diner, and this stall inside San José's Central Market is the old-school institution among them. The family now running it carries on the tradition of antojitos, gallo pinto combo plates, and casados piled with rice, beans, meat, and spaghetti, all finished with plenty of chilera. Go expecting to share a narrow counter with locals who have been ordering the same thing for years.