The Best Places to Eat and Drink in Le Port & around

Bare tables and clean lines set the tone at this intimate fine dining room tucked into Nice's antiques quarter, where a Michelin-starred Italo-Argentine couple met at Mirazur and later opened their own place. The short tasting menus follow the season and the local catch closely, with the occasional unexpected pairing that makes you put your fork down for a second. The wine list is priced like they actually want you to order from it.

1. Michelin Guide 1 Star
2. 50 Top Italy #32 · The Best Italian Restaurants In The World

Sansho, Timut, black lime, green cardamom: the chef introduces each spice at the counter before it shows up in your plate, which is either charming or a spoiler, depending on your nature. This Michelin-starred modern dining room in Nice is small and warm-lit, with every seat angled toward the open kitchen. Local fish and vegetables carry the menu, seasoned with a precision that owes something to years under Marcel Ravin at Monaco's Blue Bay.

1. Michelin Guide 1 Star

Jan Hendrik van der Westhuizen cooked on private yachts in Monaco before opening this intimate, 20-seat fine dining room near the port in Nice. A single set menu channels South African flavors, playing sweet against sour, smoke against acid. When cheese arrives, you cross the street to a separate cheese bar stocked with around twenty varieties, preserves, and dried fruit. The detour alone earns its Michelin star.

1. Michelin Guide 1 Star
2. The 50 The 50 Discovery

A small, lively bistro on rue Bonaparte where the menu names alone are enough to make you curious, and the food backs up every bit of it. The chef, a Passage 53 alumnus, works entirely with local suppliers to produce creative, technically precise cooking that's more playful than precious. The room buzzes, the service is seamless, and the chef occasionally delivers dishes himself. It holds a Michelin star.

1. Michelin Guide 1 Star

1. Le Fooding Le Fooding Guide
2. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand

The open flame does most of the talking here, with a parrilla grill and plancha turning out Colombian-Italian fusion in a narrow, terracotta-warm room near the port. The terrace spills onto the street in orange seating, and the kitchen stays visible throughout. Chimichurri shows up alongside braised veal, ceviche alongside sardines. It's a casual, warm restaurant where two culinary traditions share a table without much fuss about it.

1. Le Fooding Le Fooding Guide
2. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

A former burger joint on a backstreet near the port, now a bright Mediterranean restaurant run by a southern Italian chef and a Lombard sommelier who named it by combining their surnames. The kitchen pulls from the Saleya Market daily, so the menu shifts with whatever looked good that morning, leaning on citrus and spice. The wine list roams all over Europe and moves around as much as the food does.

1. Le Fooding Le Fooding Guide
2. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

The room was a grocery shop in a former life, and the intimate scale stuck. This bistro on rue Bonaparte runs a short, seasonal menu where most plates are built for two to share, the music skews trendy, and the wine list leans into orange with something like conviction. The team behind Les Agitateurs in Nice does the cooking, which swings easily between classic French and something more restless. A Michelin Selected restaurant.

1. Le Fooding Le Fooding Guide
2. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

1. Le Fooding Le Fooding Guide

1. Le Fooding Le Fooding Guide

1. Le Fooding Le Fooding Guide

1. Le Fooding Le Fooding Guide

1. Le Fooding Le Fooding Guide

1. Le Fooding Le Fooding Guide

1. Le Fooding Le Fooding Guide

1. Le Fooding Le Fooding Guide

1. Le Fooding Le Fooding Guide

1. Le Fooding Le Fooding Guide

1. Le Fooding Le Fooding Guide

1. Le Fooding Le Fooding Guide

1. Le Fooding Le Fooding Guide

1. Le Fooding Le Fooding Guide

1. Le Fooding Le Fooding Guide

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

Near the port, this cozy Italian trattoria leans into traditional Roman cooking, the kind where house-made pasta and spicy tomato sauce do all the talking. The bohemian decor and jazz in the background give it a lived-in warmth that makes lingering easy. The team keeps things cordial without being fussy, and the desserts are lighter than you'd expect.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

Emerald walls, crystal chandeliers, and exposed stone pillars set the mood at this glamorous little bistro tucked next to its Michelin-starred sibling JAN. The menu runs classic French, sole meunière and tarte Tatin, but chef Jan Hendrik, who grew up in South Africa, quietly folds in lentil bobotie and malva pudding alongside vanilla ice cream, which gives the whole thing a cosmopolitan undercurrent that the room, for all its Niçois polish, wears surprisingly lightly.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

The baba ganoush here has a smokiness that makes you wonder if other versions were ever trying. This is a Lebanese restaurant tucked near the Palais des Expositions, the kind of place that rewards coming in a group so the table fills with mezze and the sharing menu makes sense. The tabbouleh is bright and herb-heavy, the pistachio and almond pastries arrive with mint tea, and the whole thing moves at a civilized pace.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

A small bistro just off Place Garibaldi, run by two people who clearly did their homework before opening it. The chef came up through serious kitchens, and the short menu leans on whatever fresh ingredients made the trip to market that day. The wine list covers every French region without making a fuss about it. Lunch is the move, when a set menu keeps things tidy and the room feels most like itself.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

The room is all dark stone tones and brooding shadows, which makes the food's bright, citrusy energy feel like a deliberate provocation. This small fusion restaurant from the team behind Les Agitateurs sends Mediterranean produce through an Asian lens, think pho-scented broths, grilled duck with spring onion jus, and Thai salads that actually wake you up. The wine list leans organic, with a soft spot for volcanic terroirs and a smart sake selection alongside.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

Blue and white tiles line a small bistro steps from the opera house, where fish and seafood arrive as tapas-style plates, the menu mixing Mediterranean and South American ideas: ceviche, tataki, cod fritters. The name means "fish" in Portuguese, which settles the question of what you're getting. No reservations, service runs noon to midnight, and the terrace fills fast enough to suggest you shouldn't arrive expecting a leisurely hunt for a table.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

A Neapolitan-style pizza spot near the Nice waterfront, where a local artist's work lines the walls and the indoor room pulls well ahead of the sidewalk tables. The dough is light and easy, the toppings chosen with actual conviction, and the appetizers hold their own before the main event. Named among 50 Top Pizza Europe's Excellent Pizzerias, it draws a neighborhood crowd that knows not to skip dessert.

1. 50 Top Pizza 50 Top Pizza Europe Excellent Pizzerias

1. Difford's Guide Difford's Guide