Atlanta Good Food category interest

Have you ever woken up and thought, “Gosh, I’d love to eat at a second-best restaurant today?” Of course not. Whether you’ve lived here your entire life or are visiting for the first time, it’s human nature to want to experience the best of the best. And that’s exactly why we wrote this guide.

These are the highest-rated restaurants in Atlanta—the ones we’d sit in an hour of traffic for on I-75/85 and wouldn't complain about. Food and experience are both taken into consideration, and any type of dining establishment is fair game. On this list, you’ll find sushi restaurants, an iconic soul food joint, and BBQ. Every city has its classics and its hot new places, but these are restaurants where greatness is guaranteed.

THE SPOTS

New American restaurant Lazy Betty didn't just kick off the tasting menu boom in the city, it set the standard for what lavish multi-course experiences could be. The menu shifts frequently to incorporate a range of seasonal ingredients—and to keep repeat diners on their toes. Courses sway from straightforward (tender filets of cod or wagyu beef in a buttery wine sauce) to unexpected (a beef wellington play with a giant scallop coated in a herby truffle custard). Decorated with statement lighting and tons of live plants, their Midtown location is the perfect middleground, where you'll be welcomed whether you strut in with a floor-length fur before catching a show at the Fox or straight from denim day at the office.

Use this place to stump pessimistic in-laws and discerning friends who try to find fault in everything. The Deer And The Dove’s menu is packed with gamey proteins that you’re more likely to find in a North Georgia restaurant than in ATL. But no one does these meats as well as this Decatur spot. Juicy venison is served rare with a light, coffee-dusted char. Dry-aged duck topped with duck bone jus and foie gras is so rich we've almost lost our train of thought mid-chew. And the unfussy dining room works nicely with the artistry of each dish.

Marcel is like that dependable, first-option friend who is always 10 toes down when needed. That’s why this moody French steakhouse serves a mix of clientele—well-dressed couples, suits wooing out-of-town clients, and anyone in need of a morale boost via a steak splurge. The buttery steaks are their showpiece, but everything here, from the tableside sole to the cacio e pepe, is faultless. This is the type of place that will turn you from a newbie into a regular, with a favorite corner table and a penchant for flambéed desserts.

The Westside is clustered with great sushi options, but the star that shines brightest is Omakase Table. At $235 per person, securing a spot at this 12-seat counter isn’t cheap, but the extravagant meal has more than 20 courses, including silky cuts of toro, kanpachi, and other pieces of nigiri chosen for their most optimal in-season taste. But dinner isn’t just a string of sushi—the meal starts with a few plates that play around with a range of flavors, like savory charred scabbard topped with sweet and sour pickled plum. And as a treat between courses, ask about the chef’s vintage knife collection and carefully curated glassware.

Even if this Buckhead restaurant didn’t serve food, we’d pay to just sit inside and take in the view. Five multi-tiered chandeliers light up the giant space and large ornate pillars line the main dining room—this place is absolutely over the top, but we like that here in the A. And once the family-style Lebanese dishes hit the table, Zakia really starts flexing. Use the labneh sprinkled with za’atar as a palate cleanser in between bites of crispy batata harra and creamy lamb ragu hummus. Entrees like red wine braised lamb shanks (so tender the lamb falls away from the bone with one poke of a fork) are harder to share—we want every bite for ourselves.

This Summerhill spot does some really interesting things on its always-changing menu. So while you’ll fall in love with dishes like the Tajin-heavy strawberry sambal chicken and karnatzlach sausage doused with a red pea mapo sauce, you’ll likely never see them again. But that’s more reason to return. They don’t take things too seriously here—the menu often lists ingredients like “pretentious flowers” and “unnecessary garnishes” in between a mix of other ingredients that you’d never imagine would play together nicely. Plus, we love that we can trust-fall into an abundance of pillows at every table after polishing off our whiskey milk and chocolate-sesame cookie dessert.

If you love sushi and small talk and have a couple hundred dollars to spend, book a reservation at Hayakawa. The elegantly minimalist omakase counter in West Midtown’s Star Metals building only has eight seats, but that doesn’t stop the owner/head chef from going full performance mode and donning a mic headset so his jokes, life tales, and dish descriptions will reach your ears while you’re mid-chew. It’s endearing, we swear. Hayakawa specializes in Hokkaido-style nigiri—thick, meatier cuts of fish. And even though it’s a mouthful, the buttery, delicate fish nearly melts on your tongue.

If you're easily bored but surrounded by creatures of habit, Talat Market in Summerhill is going to be the all-in-one solution for you and your counterparts. With a focus on fresh produce (including in-house pressed coconut cream that's in everything from cocktails to soups), this colorful Thai restaurant constantly changes their street food section of the menu—and if the spicy garlicky de-shelled crab claws make a return, get them. But they also keep the popular mainstays. Know that you won’t find green curry soup as vibrant, spicy, and creamy anywhere else in Atlanta, nor a crispy rice salad as fresh. People start gathering in front of the restaurant before it opens, but once you’re in, kick back with friends or enjoy a relaxed date night highlighted by a spacious patio outdoors, and mini martinis.

An Inman Park neighborhood hangout and a frontrunner for best pasta and cocktails in the city, at BoccaLupo you can bob your head to De La Soul B-sides while eating squid ink spaghetti with shrimp and sipping a rum drink from a broken baby figurine head. BoccaLupo’s menu changes constantly, but the $125 tasting menu is our go-to, combining Southern roots with creative touches like tortellini in umami broth or fried chicken parm with collards.

Georgia Boy’s 13-course tasting menu is a meal you’ll vividly remember without any help from your camera roll. Their locally inspired dishes (a Varsity-esque hot dog here, a Georgia pollen salad there) change often, but tasty signatures, like the housemade cereal and poached lobster served with a warm banana milk, remain. In case this sounds like a gimmick, those signature dishes and others like the juicy venison tartare garnished with pickled dried cherries prove otherwise. And all the best speakeasy tricks are employed here: there’s no signage (it’s tucked away inside Southern Belle in Poncey-Highland) and there’s a hidden back door, which reveals a front row seat to tweezer-wielding chefs who occasionally disappear in a haze of dry ice.

The simple thing would be to write off Inman Park’s Delbar as another pretty, sceney restaurant lush with plants and a roomy sunroom. But you’d be wrong. When the smooth, creamy hummus hits the table, and when the flaky sea bass arrives, any doubts will be put to rest. The char-grilled, citrusy wings? They’re quietly some of the most flavorful in a city relentlessly obsessed with wings. And the zesty-sweet spring pea salad is a contender for Best Salad On Any Menu Anywhere. So yes, Delbar is buzzy and perfect for big groups, but it’s the food that always steals the show.

Yes, Busy Bee has been around for decades, and yes, it’s still the best place for straightforward soul food. Even though the West End diner is takeout-only now—with the same fascinating mix of people waiting semi-patiently in line—the juicy fried chicken remains an Atlanta legend, fried in a light batter that’s more seasoning than bread. The perfectly crisp catfish and pork chops are still the standard in the city, and so are the candied yams with just the right amount of sweet and the crispy fried okra that isn’t too chewy.

Sure, parking is tight and “dining in” means standing outside over a highboy, but we’ll suffer these minor inconveniences for this BBQ. Owned by a former Korean pop star-turned chef and her Texas-raised husband, Cumberland’s Heirloom melds smoky grill flavors with hefty doses of Korean influences. And while K-fusion is nothing new, Heirloom just does it best. Smoked ribs get slathered in a gochujang rub and spicy pork sandwiches come with a healthy dollop of tangy kimchi on top. Even their side game is strong—we'd be happy to eat their sweet and spicy tofu cubes as a main and their mac and cheese with chili flakes adds a pop of fun to a Southern staple.

Miller Union in West Midtown continues to set the bar in Atlanta for what top-to-bottom excellence looks like. They focus on local ingredients, and you can get a high-end meal here without a high-end price (lunches come in under $20). Enjoy slow-roasted chicken that comes out just crispy enough, a phenomenal wine list and thyme-infused gin cocktails that turned us into herb lovers, and creamy vanilla caramel ice cream that comes packed between two crispy churros. Nothing ever disappoints here. And the industrial-loft-meets-coastal-home aesthetic makes for a fresh date night backdrop.

Southern National offers incredible takes on old-school soul food classics with just a touch of youthful invention. Chicken arrives crispy and juicy with a hint of berbere spice, and the acidity of the cucumber slaw cuts through the sticky-sweetness of the Asian BBQ baby back ribs. But it all starts with the bread—deliciously savory jalapeño johnny cakes and the crispy outside, soft inside sheet pan biscuits with a bit of sweet. The spacious Summerhill restaurant is never too crowded, so it feels like you're in on a secret—it’s the spot for a laid-back date night or for just hanging out with friends.

When we visit Gigi’s Italian Kitchen, we feel like we’ve been whisked away to another time, one that’s light on stress and heavy on delicious creamy pasta primavera with housemade cavatelli, carrots, and leafy greens. If you snag a seat at the bar, you’ll see chefs in crisp white T-shirts preparing pastas, salads, and beef carpaccio in the open kitchen, where fancy dramatics take a backseat to plain old fantastic cooking. The red-checkered tablecloths, family photos, and always-burning candle could have fallen out of a romance novel. And since the place is tiny, reservations fill up fast, though spots are always reserved for walk-ins.

Getting a reservation, even at the hottest places, isn’t usually a challenge in these parts. But Mujo remains the city’s hardest-to-book enigma, so scoring a place at the stellar 15-seat omakase table in West Midtown is the ultimate special occasion flex. The space is equally enigmatic—a hidden door leads to a dark room that looks like the only way to enter is with a secret greeting and million-dollar wire transfer to an offshore account. Servers, dressed in black, nearly disappear into walls until one steps forward to fill your glass. But the biggest mystery to unravel will be which of the 12 courses will be your favorite, especially when every bite of high-grade nigiri is worthy of the title.

Antico keeps its menu tight and sticks to quality, imported Italian ingredients, so every pizza tastes as incredible as it did when this spot first established itself as a city favorite nearly a decade ago. And it nails the perfectly charred, chewy doneness of the Neapolitan pie. There are a few locations around the city, but we’re partial to the sometimes chill, sometimes chaotic energy of The Battery outpost, which has a big bar and plenty of space to accommodate your crew of two or 12. And no matter how packed the place seems, expect to see your steaming hot pie delivered to you within minutes of ordering.

In the land of a thousand brunches, this all-day Grant Park brunch staple rises above them all. And that’s why this place stays busy, so get here early or during the weekday lunch hour when it’s easy to slide into one of the upcycled church pew benches without a wait. We’ve been here numerous times, smothering crispy country-fried tempeh in creamy white pepper gravy while trying to establish a connecting theme in the trippy art and colorful mosaics. We’ve got nothing. But we do think they should add a golden griddle sculpture to honor their always consistent, fabulously fluffy buttermilk pancakes.

Snap Thai’s tasteful nautical theme is reason enough to to host a big celebratory dinner or a meet-the-parents date. But it’s also the kind of place where you have to choose your companions wisely. By that, we mean take folks who won’t condemn you for licking the last drop of green curry sauce off the plate. If you’re a seafood lover, the Buckhead restaurant has all the favorites—from a fragrant crab fried rice and tom yum lobster bisque to flaky cod in a ginger mushroom sauce. It’s the dishes, with layered flavors of lemongrass, coconut cream, and spices that really elevate this spot.

So So Fed doesn’t have its own home—they take over Ok Yaki’s kitchen in EAV on Sunday and Monday nights, where they continually upstage their host. They’re one of the few places in the city serving Lao food, made as tribute to the chef’s heritage. And menu descriptions mention when it’s “grandma’s favorite” (we share grandma’s tastes, it seems). But So So Fed didn’t earn a spot here just because it offers a hard-to-find-in-Atlanta cuisine. The food is just really f*cking good. The menu rotates, but the crying tiger, which should be eaten by fully submerging the thin slices of medium rare steak into the spicy tamarind dipping sauce, is one of the consistent standouts.

If dining at the High Museum would be your idea of a good time, this Buckhead spot is a cool backup plan. As soon as you’re seated, you’ll get an iPad to browse the restaurant’s rotating artworks (yup, that Matisse). Really kick up the ritz and opt for Atlas’ Euro-American tasting menu, in which damn near half the courses are sauced tableside. And although waitstaff will present a box of ornately carved knives (along with an oral history of each), know that these knives are pointless since the filets are so tender they could be cut with a spoon. While the fantasy of eating like a Bridgerton character is fun, we’re more impressed with the food—like a salty caviar and herby butter sauce that brings a rich flavor to blanched asparagus.

While Tio Lucho’s makes incredibly good Peruvian staples, they also offer enough excellent seafood selections to let us pretend we’re in a coastal city. Floor-to-ceiling windows let the sun shine down on tables full of dishes that don’t appear on many ATL menus, like the salty and rich lomo saltado and more standard snapper ceviche. You’ll almost (almost) feel a salty breeze when you sip Pisco sours topped with egg white foam in the colors of the Peruvian flag and tear into spicy tiradito and tender pulpo anticuchero. The colorful, casual space makes it easy to contemplate taking a nap at the table after finishing off a bowl of hearty chaufa de mariscos. We're pretty sure no one would disturb you.

At Oreatha’s, owned by the chef behind Twisted Soul Cookhouse andamp; Pours, Southern comfort food gets sprinkled with international flavors. Pork ribs come with sweet and sour sauce and Korean fried chicken comes garlicky sweet. The crispy Thai-Seasoned Catfish is the star choice, with hints of lemongrass and ginger, and a touch of chili heat. Swing by on a laidback date night or for patio meetups with friends to catch local musicians at Wednesday night jazz.