Best Places to Eat in Rhodes

Noble Gourmet Restaurant: This unpretentiously decorated restaurant has huge glass windows opening to unobstructed views of the Aegean Sea from the 7th floor of the Elysium Hotel. Chef Giorgos Troumouchis, who introduced Rhodes to the fine dining scene, creates together with chef Spyros Kougios an impressive gastronomic experience using the most contemporary techniques and drawing inspiration from traditional Rhodian recipes and local produce. You can choose between four different menus: the “Get to Know” with five courses, “Nostalgia” with seven courses, “Smell” with nine courses and the highly impressive “Taste”, with 18 courses.

The presentation of each dish and the art de la table is impressive, and the waiters explain what the names of the ingredients mean in Rhodian cuisine and how they were served in the old days, offering an added cultural experience to diners. Rhodes, Ammoudes, “Elysium Resort & Spa” Hotel.

Address: Kallithea, Phone: +30 2241045700

Five Senses: A super elegant restaurant with a view of the Aegean bay of Vlycha from the large terrace. Executive chef Dimitris Kontaratos (with chef de cuisine Andreas Dermatis), is inspired by his study of the gastronomic past of the place and has created a modern-day and unique Dodecanese gastronomic experience.

Dishes that stand out include the marinated sea bream that’s half salt-baked, with okra pickle, sea samphire sorbet and Greek salad water, as well as dates and pistachios from Aegina; the “kakkavia” fish soup; an onion dolma with fish, crab, cream of potato with garlic and a soup made from fish stock; and “koulouria”, a handmade pasta cooked in lobster stock American-style with tapioca. Special desserts include the orange pie with yoghurt textures by pastry chef Lazaros Hatzisavvas. Hotel “Lindos Blu”.

Address: Vlychada Phone: +30 2244032110

Sea Bao: It’s a food truck on the pier, run by the historic hotel Rodos Palace offering great street food. The popular bao buns are the main event, stuffed with seafood and inspired by the traditional cuisine of the Dodecanese, with the care of the hotel’s executive chefs, Mihalis Stalas and Lefteris Kampourakis.

With views of the sunset in the Aegean Sea, you can try bao buns with octopus balls, octopus glaze with thyme honey and smoked tarama cream and matsogalo bao bun: crispy bao bites, with melekouni (traditional sesame bar) cream, matsogalo (traditional Rhodian desert) foam and cinnamon. You’ll also taste other unique meze e.g., mermitzeli with salted bonito, rusk, roasted cherry tomatoes, capers and tomato cream, while they also serve signature cocktails using traditional Rhodian and Greek spirits like the “Aegean Tide” with koriantolino liquor.

Address: Rodos Palace Hotel, Rhodes, Phone: +30 2241097222

12 Nissia:  Rodos Palace’s gourmet restaurant is located in a beautiful garden overlooking a picturesque lagoon. Here you’ll find new Greek cuisine with a menu influenced by traditional Dodecanese recipes that are modernized and readapted using creative techniques by executive chefs Michalis Stala & Lefteris Kampourakis. Their ingredients are sourced directly from local producers, while the vegetables are provided by the hotel’s garden.

Their “nose to tail” philosophy, is expressed in various dishes with the vegetarian pumpkin steak being the most impressive example: the pumpkin flesh is cooked like meat and its remains (from the skin to the seeds) offer texture. Other distinctive dishes are the octopus stew –an octopus cylinder with fava cream. Onion dolma stuffed with octopus, onion consommé and rosemary olive oil, or try the mezze from Kalymnos salted cod, grooved sea squirt, pickled onions, lemon jelly, spices and oil with purslane. For dessert, Greek coffee with rose Greek delight ice cream, hazelnut sponge and Greek coffee ganache.

Address: Rodos Palace Hotel, Rhodes, Phone: +30 2241097222

Mavrikos: This is a famous, historic tavern that’s been around for a century, set in a white and blue cobbled yard, shaded by grapevines, mulberriestrees At the reception you’ll see the Michalis Mavrikos and on the cooking fires his brother Dimitris Mavrikos. Dishes that stand out are marinated “gourlomatis” (fish), stingray salad with sea samphire, carrot and cucumber pickle, fennel in sweet wine with feta mousse, tuna belly marinated in olive oil, garlic and coriander with potato salad, lamb with thyme and garlic paste, pork pancetta caramelized with molasses. Dinner is served in a white and blue pebbled courtyard under lush green vines, mulberry trees and whitewashed cross drapes.

Address: Lindos, Lindos square, Phone: +30 2244031232

Hellas: The tables are laid out in the pebbled-mosaic courtyard and the stone-built interior hall with its characteristic Lindian ceiling. Young chef Kyriakos Iakovidis, together with top chef Irini Georgoudiou, creates a menu based on local tastes from his past made with typical products of the island. Topical dishes such as dolmades with a cyclamen leaf wrap and shrimp filling and grouper in an egg and lemon sauce with Lindian prawns and dill oil, or swordfish eggs cured in beeswax (like bottarga) and the “moplevra” (asparagus) with a sauce of swordfish caviar and swordfish egg tarama (cream).

Another stand-out on the menu is the cured smoked beef with spices (like the farmers used to make and take out to the fields for lunch) served with tomato salad, sinoro cheese, capers and tomato sponge. Also make sure to order the refreshing, playful cocktail Tiny-Tiny which is made from a local distillate, wine, flower essence and cucumber. Desserts include an amazing baklava and a resinous spoon sweet made from pine blossom.

Address: Rhodes, Pefki, Phone: +30 2244 048316

Akres: An imposing mansion built in 1906, remains elegant yet simple after it was remodelled from house into this restaurant. They have an elevated porch at the entrance, with modern décor and a lovely roof terrace overlooking the landmark Acropolis of Lindos. Chef Giorgos Laoudikos bases his cooking on local culinary tradition and creates what he calls “fine local cuisine” with modern techniques and finesse.

Signature dishes include the sumptious Rhodian pitaroudi with a pumpkin base and tarama cream from grooved sea squirt and Lindos shrimp, the marinato (salted mackerel and legume salad with sea urchin, seaweed and buttermilk sauce scented with paisley oil), the giaprakia with minced beef cooked in a beef marrow broth, the manites (a type of fermented mushroom, pickles and bulgur wheat) and the octopus with three types of fava, pickled onions and aged vinegar glaze.

The kiatapi (lamb cooked in lemon and tomato sauce, with cumin, and broth of onion with xinomizithra cheese), a dish typical in the village Siana, served with potato and chard – the sauce thickens with sitaka cheese from Kassos. To close the meal, melekouni dessert: sesame, almond cream, orange, hibiscus, and pollen ice cream.

Address: Lindos, Phone: +30 244031927

Cesar Meze Bar: Familiar vibes in the romantic terrace beneath the Acropolis of Lindos, overlooking the entire village. Chef Stavros Koustenis and well-traveled, food and wine connoisseur Kosmas Kosmidis serve modern, well-prepared Greek cuisine with local and fusion influences: bold but tasteful, balanced and accessible for both Greek and international paletes.

Recommended are the tuna gyros with crunchy tacos, anchovies cream, tomato coulis and onion, the smoked red porgy fillet with vegetable stew, potato espuma, crunchy courgette blossoms and a drizzle of paisley oil, and the lamb with an aubergine mayonnaise, black garlic yogurt sauce and tomato. Another to try is the grilled, dry aged Atlantic bonito served with a la spetsiota lopia bean broth and yogurt dip with rosemary, as well as the grilled aged beef with potatoes and homemade tomato paste.

Address: Lindos, Phone: +30 2244 031410

Fresh: Right behind the beach of Elysium Resort & Spa, with a lovely sea view, painted in summery shades – lime and white, Fresh’s menu treats Greek cuisine with a fusion attitude and influences from the Rhodian culinary tradition, brought to you by executive chef Giorgos Troumouhis.

Among the dishes that stand out, the Symian shrimp with quinoa and avocado, pickled turnip and liquid green apple jelly, the Rhodian bostani with bulgur, watermelon, cherry tomatoes, homemade vegetable pickles, dried figs, feta and capers, the lentil and rice with chanterelle mushrooms, San Mihali cheese and orange, as well as the poached turbot with saffron and the fennel with citrus fruit, soutzouki and sea urchin.

Address: Elysium Resort & Spa Hotel, Kallithea, Phone: +30 22410 45700

Paranga: Paranga taverna is housed in the place where the Officer’s Club used to be during the Italian occupation, in a greenery-immersed space. The menu, created by chef Yannis Efthymiou, includes classic Rhodian and traditional Greek dishes as well as meats “cooked to order” served in a celebratory fashion in colourful ceramic pots made by local artists. Stand-out dishes include the lamb “kapamas” cooked in the wood-fired oven and the goat “stifado” stew baked in a traditional casserole oven.

The garlicky chickpeas pureed with fresh tomato, feta and mint, chickpea patties with mushroom sauce and salt-baked seafood with tarama are all part of the array of dishes. Accompany them with an impressive selection of homemade breads and local wine to wash it all down. Reservations required.

Address: Apollonas Phone: +30 2246091247

Ilias‘: Ilias’ taverna in mountainous Emponas serves the best of traditional Greek and Rhodian cuisine. As you sit in a large room with a fireplace and a stone terrace surrounded by greenery,
Ms. Roula (Zafira) Piperi prepares partridge with handmade tomato-stewed trahana, “koulousafa” (intestines stuffed with minced meat and rice), labrioti “htisto” – slow-cooked stuffed goat – chickpeas with goat shank roasted in a wood oven and spaghetti with rooster.

Her husband Ilias Kostantakis is a master at barbequing. Everything is made using their home-grown produce. Also look out for the many kinds of spoon sweets and try their own wine. Rhodes, Embonas, 2246041415

Address: Emponas, Phone: +30 2246041415

Petalas: At this seafront tavern, with blue and white table seating and an impressive view the sea, chef Panagiotis Petalas and his team prepare a variety of creative dishes combining fish with legumes and vegetables. Bean soup with lobster, spinach and anchovy foam, lopia beans from Katavia with calamari, shrimp and garlic, chickpeas with scorpionfish and fresh fish either grilled or fried. Also ewe with risotto (made from smoked orzo), rooster with Florina pepper cream, yogurt and vine grass. For dessert, try the galatopita (milk pie) and the spoon sweets.

Address: Kiotari, Phone: +30 22440 47265

Kozas

Dimitris Kozas known as the “barefoot cook” is a third-generation fish chef. He cooks and oversees always on the move, and always barefoot. Why? “I have no idea myself,” he writes in the menu. The taverna first opened in 1932, the walls are covered in sea shells and the view of the sea is unobstructed.

Always buzzing and with speedy service. An amazing cuttlefish risotto with three grains (rice, Vialone Nano rice and wheat) is their signature dish. Additionally, order the skioufihta pasta with crab and San Mihali cheese (from Syros), the garlic shrimp with black garlic mayonnaise and boiled potato, the octopus carpaccio with caper sauce. A mainstay is the fresh fish grilled or fried, as well as shellfish.

Address: Stegna Phone: +30 2244022632

Santa Marina

On the small bay, at the glamourous and exotic all-day beach bar complete with rows of comfy day beds. Excellent executive chef Manolis Platellas (from the famous “Ronda”) and head chef Nikos Martakis, have created a menu focused on modern Greek cuisine. They use local, Greek products and combine modern cooking techniques, fresh vegetables and herbs creating a delicate, imaginative and skilled menu.

Try the grilled octopus with BBQ fennel, pickled vegetables and watercress, the courgette blossoms with soft white anthotiro cheese, espuma, goat’s milk and ladotiri cheese from Milos. Cuttlefish cooked in its ink with pumpkin seed pesto and juniper cream, the red porgy osso buco with green olive pesto, lemon jelly and Greek herbs. In addition, there are vegan choices, as well as an extensive sushi selection. The lamb in the wood-burning oven with retsina wine, pine honey and spice powder is another of their signature dishes. From the deserts, we recommend the melekouni crème bruelle.

Address: 2^nd km on the Rhodes – Kalithea road, Phone: +30 693 291 7427

Thea

An elegant wooden deck with chill vibes and an open view of the sea and the kaleidoscopic sunset make for an ideal summer dining experience. Chef Nikos Zervos has created a Greek cuisine menu, light and flavourful with familiar, classic recipes that he executes with a modern style. Try the pork kontosouvli with tzatziki cream and fries, and the shrimp saganaki orzo with yogurt mousse and coriander.

Address: Sheraton Rhodes Resort Hotel, Ialisos, Phone: +30 2241057537, 0030 2241075000

Mylos

The beautiful restaurant in the garden of Atlantica Imperial hotel exudes romance. Enjoy dining with unobstructed views of the Aegean and Tsampika mountain through the French windows. The menu is an expression of the new Greek cuisine and offers creative dishes prepared using modern techniques –Ilias Kakouris is the executive chef.

The Greek salad with feta cream, dried olives and bread crust is a refreshing take on this old classic, as is the red porgy with white tarama tartare and kakavia soup dressing, as well as the chicken pastitsada with truffle oil and Naxos graviera cream. Reservations required.

Address: Atlantica Imperial Resort & Spa Hotel, Kolimpia, Phone: +30 2241057000

Marco Polo Cafe

A romantic space with a cool yard and a magical garden, with cosmopolitan vibes and a very charming owner who serves great food made with creativity and finesse. The flavours are Greek and Mediterranean.

Try the fresh white grouper ceviche, the seafood yuvarlakia soup, the pork with manouri cheese and fig marmalade, the shrimp with hazelnuts, and the shi drum with boiled wild greens and fava gnocchi. Just make sure to book a table well in advance.

Address: 37 Agiou Fanouriou str, Palia Poli, Rhodes, Phone: +30 2241 025562

Read also:

Koskinou, Rhodes: An oasis of tradition in vibrant colours and soft pastels

Dimitris & Michalis Mavrikos: the guardians of Rhodes’ gastronomy

Rhodes: Charismatic island with an authentic history of cosmopolitanism