The best restaurants in Santorini, Greece
The cliff-hugging villages, black sand beaches and buzzing beach bars make it easy to see why Santorini is among one of the most celebrated Greek islands. As the cinematic sister of Mykonos, the cafés lining its cobblestone streets are the perfect pit stop before a day of exploring. But the new wave of fine dining restaurants in Santorini has made it a joyfully unexpected destination for globetrotting gastronomes.
So on islands as well-travelled as Santorini, you might expect to sacrifice substance for style in local restaurants. But between the traditional tavernas and smart supper spots, travellers can find Santorini restaurants for fresh seafood, family-run eateries and truly authentic Mediterranean menus. The cherry on top? Some of these tables are angled perfectly to watch the sunset over the caldera, making every evening meal all the more special. These are the nine best restaurants in Santorini – from Perivolos and Fira to Oia and Pygros.
Vezené Santorini
Like Cavo Tagoo, the cliffside hotel in which it is located, the Santorini outpost of chef Ari Vezene’s outstanding Athenian bistro is overtly sexy. Cooking with fire is a serious business here: besides the sensational raw seafood, almost everything is cooked on a custom-made, three-metre, multi-level grill fuelled with olive wood and vines, which lends lobster yiouvetsi, goat fricassee, and dry-aged steak a distinctive aroma. Vegans are surprisingly well catered for, too. The open kitchen provides theatre to rival the sunsets over the flooded volcano. By day, skewers, sandos and smash burgers are served poolside, with some of the best cocktails on Santorini. Expensive, but well worth the splurge.
Address: Vezené Santorini, Cavo Tagoo Hotel, Imerovigli 84700
Website: vezene.gr
Aroma Avlis
With its fertile volcanic soil and fiery climate, it’s hardly surprising that Santorini’s wines are world-renowned. From silky sweet Vinsanto to full-bodied fruity Mavrotragano you can sample the best at Aroma Avlis, Karamolegos winery’s cheery taverna in the tiny hamlet of Exo Gonia. Book in advance for a tour of the family-owned vineyard where vines are cultivated in traditional style: coiled like bird’s nests to protect them from the wind. Afterwards, bag a table in the tavern’s flower-filled avlis (courtyard) and work your way through pork, pepper and feta dish kavourmas, creamy yellow spilt pea puree fava and other meze snacks, paired with a succulent selection of Karamolegos’ volcanic wines. Heidi Fuller Love
Address: Aroma Avlis, Exo Gonia 84700
Website: artemiskaramolegos-winery.com
Selene
Founded in 1985 by the late, great Giorgos Hatzigiannakis, Selene was the first fine dining restaurant on Santorini to spotlight local culinary traditions and ingredients – fava, capers, white aubergines, and the tiny, intensely sweet cherry tomatoes. After several incarnations and relocations, Selene has now settled into a former Catholic monastery in Fira. The cloistered Atrium is a sublime setting for one of the degustation menus created by Michelin-star chef Ettore Botrini. The wine tastings and pairings, curated by Master of Wine Yiannis Karakasis, are as exciting and elegant as the beautifully plated food.
Address: Selene, Katikies Garden, Fira, 847 00, Greece
Website: selene.gr
Panigyri
While most restaurants in Santorini make a fuss about their wine list, Panigyri has an olive oil sommelier. Sixteen different extra-virgin olive oils are used to create brilliantly original dishes such as veal tongue carpaccio with green olive salsa and bergamot vinegar, rabbit croquettes with stifado sauce, or lamb with pickled vine tendrils and sheep’s yoghurt. Homemade sourdough, baked in the wood-fired oven, also makes an excellent foil for those oils. Ingredients are sourced from small producers all over Greece by chef Fanis Maikantis, who is passionate about provenance. The vegan menu is equally accomplished, and clever cocktails incorporate local flavours, such as thyme liqueur, chamomile, and caper salt. The softly lit courtyard, gentle Greek music (sometimes performed live), and warm atmosphere are worth braving the summer crowds in Fira.
Address: Panigyri, Agiou Athanasiou, Fira 84700
Website: panigyri-santorini.com
Lava Taverna
Don’t expect fancy service, molecular sauces or live piano, the website of this deliciously simple restaurant warns. “Instead, we will give you a lot of passion, grandpa’s favourite dishes and just the sound of the waves.” Marooned at the quiet end of Perivolos beach, with blue and white wooden tables set on a waterfront patio, it’s a quintessential Greek taverna set-up — a rarity on Santorini these days. You can wander into the kitchen to see what’s cooking (perhaps moussaka, stuffed tomatoes, or soutzoukakia – meatballs in tomato sauce) or choose from the day’s catch.
Address: Lava Taverna, Agios Georgios Perivolos
Website: tavernalava.com
Meze Meze
Like Spanish tapas, meze bites are the mainstay of most Greek outings with parea (friends) which is why you’ll rub shoulders with a local crowd at the Pagonis brothers’ cave-like taverna along a cobbled alley in the hilltop village of Finikia. When it’s sizzling hot outside the best seats are in the cool, vine-shaded courtyard. Tucking into a raft of traditional sharing plates – red pepper-laden feta cheese dish tyrokafteri; chunks of vinegar-marinated Cretan loukanika (sausage); feather-tender veal slices slow cooked with rosemary, or peppery chunks of graviera cheese – it’s easy to forget that you’re in Santorini, one of the world’s tourist hotspots. Heidi Fuller Love
Address: Meze Meze, Foinikia 84702
Website: mezemezerestaurant.gr
Roza’s
You’d never expect such exciting food at this out-of-the-way roadside eaterie in Vourvoulos. Husband-and-wife Kyriakos Petropoulos and Katerina Tsotsokolauri run it, and the menu riffs on regional, seasonal Greek produce with a hint of Anatolia. ‘Small boats on the Aegean Sea’ (smoked eel wrapped in vine leaves with a blob of lime foam), wild fennel fritters with tzatziki ice cream, wild asparagus with slivers of bottarga and Medjool dates, sweet and sour quail with salsify puree are just some of the playful, unpretentious dishes you might find in season. The Greek cheese and charcuterie selection alone makes Roza’s an essential detour before or after a visit to the superb Vassaltis Vineyards winery nearby.
Address: Roza’s, Vourvoulos
Website: rozasantorini.gr
To Psaraki
It’s not new or fancy, but this jaunty tavern overlooking Vlichada’s fishing port serves some of the best (and most honestly priced) seafood on the entire island. Alongside whole grilled fish, order sardines stuffed with fresh herbs smoked eel on grilled aubergine, and pears poached in local Assyrtiko wine for pudding. Be sure to call ahead to book a table overlooking the harbour. While you’re there, check out Santorini Arts Factory, an old tomato-canning plant converted into a museum, gallery and café, with a funky shop selling Greek designers' ceramics, totes and sarongs.
Address: To Psaraki, Vlichada Marina, Vlichada 847 00, Greece
Website: topsaraki.gr
Ftelos brewery
A few steps back from the hustle and bustle of capital Fira, this state-of-the-art organic brewery run by a trio of visionary local businessmen is a magnet for beer lovers, who flock here to sample Blue Monkey lager and other signature sips, or to join one of Ftelos’ home brewing master classes to learn how to make their own. MALT the brewery’s chic glass-walled restaurant next door is the perfect spot to soak up some of that booze, along with Naxos graviera cheese-stuffed anchovies, white tarama mousse spiked with wakame seaweed, herb-grilled lamb served on a bed of ratatouille and rosemary jus, and other dazzling dishes served up by award-winning chef Nikos Patsioras. Heidi Fuller Love
Address: Ftelos Brewery, Karterados 84700
Website: ftelosbrewery.com
Qhera
Thirassia islet – a splinter that broke away from Santorini after a volcanic eruption ripped the heart out of the island thousands of years ago – has long been overlooked by all but a few day trippers on volcano tours. That is starting to change since the advent of the smart Santa Irini hotel, the award-winning Mikra Thira winery, and now Qhera on the waterfront of Korfos Bay. A five-minute speedboat or 15-minute ferry ride from the port of Ammoudi, below Oia, transports diners to a simple seaside deck with fishbowl caldera views. The menu, designed by executive chef Fotis Maikantis (of Panigyri, above), spotlights just-caught fish and seafood: surf and turf tartar with pickled kumquat and aioli, tarama with citrus and sea fennel, and ‘free style’ catch of the day, prepared in multiple ways. Only accessible by boat, Qhera is open 12-9pm.
Address: Qhera, Korfos Bay, Thirassia
Website: qherasantorini.com
Aktaion
This 100-year-old taverna has earned its title as one of the best restaurants in Santorini. It's a quaint spot to try traditional, reasonably priced dishes such as fava with fried capers and spring onions, tomato fritters and braised veal with smoky aubergine puree. Most of the handful of tables outside have magical caldera views. The third-generation owner, Vangelis Roussos, is an artist; his wood carvings and paintings decorate the snug, whitewashed interior.
Address: Aktaion, Firostefani, Santorini 847 00, Greece
Website: aktaionsantorini.com
Oia Vineyart
Andreas Markozanes, part Ethiopian and part Greek, grew up in Finikia near Oia, thinking of Santorini as “a rock that made money”. But through travel, he increasingly came to value the traditions of hospitality stitched through the island’s history, the rootedness that village life had given him growing up, and the wonder of its wine and agriculture. He wanted to bring all these things together in a restaurant, Oia Vineyart, which he started with his brother and a few friends. A food shop, gallery and restaurant are spread over an old captain’s house and wine cellar on one of Oia’s quieter lanes. Upstairs is a furnished room where artists can stay and be fed while they work – as long as they leave one painting behind. They live what they preach about connectedness here. Timothy O’Grady
Address: Oia Vineyart, Oia 847 02, Greece
Website: oiavineyart.gr
Metaxi Mas
Ask any local where they eat on Santorini, and chances are they’ll rave about this Cretan tavern in Exo Gonia. This pretty hillside village has somehow escaped the attention of most tourists. The colourful terrace lined with basil plants is part of the appeal (ask for a table outside). Portions are hefty, cheesy, and saucy (pork chops in orange and honey sauce, kataifi cheese rolls, shrimp saganaki sauteed with feta and tomato). This is authentic Greek comfort food on an island where value for money is increasingly scarce. The restaurant’s name means “between us”, but this local secret is definitely out.
Address: Metaxy Mas, Exo Gonia 84700
Website: santorini-metaximas.gr