23 Best Restaurants in Coromandel and the Bay of Plenty, New Zealand

It might be way out in the bush, but this restaurant could stand proud in any big city. Dine inside or out, beneath the trees, and watch the chefs in the open kitchen adding wood to the pizza oven or creating contemporary cuisine with organic-farmed beef and lamb and vegetables straight from the garden. For flavor and innovation, try the chef’s choice of three seasonal tasters. This is a great option for family dining---there’s so much space and a little playground---and it’s actually only about 10 minutes away from either town, Waihi or Paeroa. Accommodation is available too, from $180 per night.

In addition to great food, this restaurant has a community-hub feel thanks to live music sessions, poetry readings, film nights, and a summer sculpture symposium. The dinner menu reaches beyond standard café fare, and there's also a great range of classic breakfasts and fresh baked goods. Be sure to check the on-site shop Eggstras for quality deli items to take on your journey. The café is about 1 km (0.6 mile) from the Whitianga ferry landing.

This contemporary steak house in Mount Maunganui has an industrial chic interior with a black, white, and wood design, and a menu that showcases some of beef. Choose from Scotch fillet, Wagyu fillet, or ribeye on the bone; you also get to select your own elaborate steak knife. The fire and embers of the closed Mibrasa oven gives the dishes a charcoal flavor. Meat aside, the menu also features excellent fish and vegetable options, as well as an extensive wine list featuring top New Zealand wineries.

Like many places to eat on the peninsula, this casual café does a roaring trade with mussels and seafood. But lots of Kiwi café foods are also here, like full breakfasts, salads, and pizza, while the dinner menu serves all the classics. Quiches, cakes, and sandwiches are handmade every day, and the coffee is fair-trade. You can enjoy your food and drinks indoors or alfresco. Nothing is deep-fried.

This restaurant bills itself as a "modern day hearth," inviting diners to take a seat at the bar and watch the chefs at work next to an open fire. Located inside the lobby of a former cinema, Camina serves Spanish-inspired dishes that are designed to be shared. The menu features all things grilled, from cabbages and market fish to hefty slabs of steak with smoked tomato butter. 

Mediterranean food and ambience are the focus at this quiet restaurant tucked away on the edge of town. The finest local produce, organic where possible, is matched with quality international and local craft beers and wines.

The tropical-inspired courtyard of this restaurant adds a welcome splash of color to Thames, and the menu has a lot of good options. Choose from small sharing plates or tacos with creative fillings like lamb tzatziki or crispy cauliflower.

Located right on the beachfront, the views at this coastal chic café are hard to beat. Floor-to-ceiling windows take full advantage of the café's beachside position, so you can watch the waves roll in whether seated inside or out. The menu covers all the New Zealand favorites, from eggs Benedict for breakfast to fish and chips, pizzas, and burgers for lunch. In the evening, you can order the likes of squid linguine or sous vide lamb.

Within one of the few hotels remaining from the gold rush days, you'll find classy pub grub in a convivial atmosphere. The Grahamstown Bar & Diner (GBD) is the main restaurant bar, serving everything from lunch to bar snacks and pizzas to evening main courses. On weekends, it gets pretty packed late night thanks to music gigs. Down the back is a more casual bar with pool tables; upstairs, there are some basic but clean and excellent-value accommodations.

The food and the view will vie for your attention here, as you dine on contemporary New Zealand cuisine. The menu is created largely from local artisan produce, and you can admire Tauranga Harbour from the stunning waterfront location. The quite pricey à la carte menu encompasses starters or starters to share as well as light meals that can be appetizers depending on the size of your appetite, mains, and desserts. From the grill, meats come with a choice of butters and sauces. Reservations are recommended, particularly if you want a spot on the over-water balcony.

The Bayfair Shopping Centre may seem an unlikely place to find one of the area's most innovative restaurants, but this is well worth seeking out. Izakai combines Māori ingredients and cooking styles with Japanese cuisine, so you'll find hāngi-style pork belly and watercress with ramen; squid with horopito (a peppery native herb); and creamed paua (local shellfish) and prawn gyoza (dumplings). The centerpiece of the restaurant is a long curved bar, but you can also sit at high tables near the window or in a more intimate booth-like setting.

This café’s small shared plates feature an eclectic fusion of Asian and classic European flavors with a strong Kiwi touch. Try the ostrich tataki (seared) or tuna fillets with beetroot, orange, and horopito (a pepper-flavored native plant). Sit inside in candlelight or under the trees in the buzzy garden with the locals.

Found in the tiny village of Kūaotunu, this rustic seaside restaurant started out as a caravan and is now a lively spot where you can enjoy wood-fired pizzas, seafood, and local organic coffee. Over the summer months, there's often live music and regular barbecue nights, adding to the community feel. There's also a café and art gallery adjacent to the restaurant. 

This spacious, centrally located café-restaurant can get busy with both visitors and locals. Breakfast kicks off at 10 am with all the standard Kiwi options. Salads, burgers, and fish-and-chips come on the menu for lunch; dinner is still casual but with slightly more upmarket fare with a good range of lamb, steak, salmon, pork, and vegetable dishes on offer. If you arrive during the day, pop into the adjacent Manaia Gallery, which sells jewelry, art, and crafts.

The high prices set this restaurant apart from other local options, but then again so does the food: in the open-plan kitchen, nationally renowned chef Stephen Barry fuses quality indigenous meats, seafood, and produce with Pacific Rim flavors. À la carte menu choices range from small tapas to share and appetizers (which can also be requested in a slightly larger portion size) to full main courses. For those who inevitably want a taste of all the desserts, there's a tasting platter. The street-side restaurant looks out onto Mauao (Mt. Maunganui).

The standout restaurant in town showcases local produce, shellfish, fish, lamb, and beef. Lunch easily segues into dinner in the sheltered courtyard or in front of the fire, depending on the season. Service is swish and prices are up there, but you get what you pay for. All-day brunches and light lunches are also served.

The spacious, airy dining area at this restaurant, with its large windows and wicker and wood decor, has been carefully designed to evoke a country picnic—while still feeling as stylish as you would expect from a central Tauranga establishment. Picnicka's menu is designed to be shared, with a range of plates that use local produce cooked over a wood fire, or served fresh; choose from dishes like barbecued cos lettuce, fresh market fish, and spiced lamb skewers.

Put a slightly upscale yet still casual restaurant in a popular local hotel, with a waterside location in a vacation town, and you've got this can't-miss dining spot. There is casual pub dining in the bars, but Salt, with its alfresco dining by the palm-edged marina, is the star. The menu changes with the seasons, sometimes offering free-range pork belly with marinated prawns, seafood bouillabaisse, or grass-fed eye fillet. Bar snacks include lots of fresh seafood such as Coromandel mussels. Reservations are recommended in summer.

A classic New Zealand take-out experience, this is the spot to get a quintessential Kiwi-style beachside lunch or dinner of fish, shellfish, chips (fries), and burgers. When the fish (battered or crumbed) and chips are done well, they’re not too greasy or fatty. You could even wash them down with a bottle of the very sweet Lemon & Paeroa (the iconic Kiwiana soda made not too far from the Coromandel).

The garden bar and restaurant within the 1876-built Talisman Hotel offers quality pub fare, with a focus on using local produce where possible. You’ll meet the locals here, be it over brunch, lunch, or dinner, where your meal could be anything from crammed-full burgers to summer seafood ceviche. Suggested wine matches for the evening mains suggest more care than your standard pub grub.

This restaurant is "nautically themed" and really means it; the bar and kitchen are both housed in shipping containers. The atmosphere is casual to the extreme, so come in your swimwear if you feel comfortable doing so, and order some locally inspired pizzas. Burgers and salads are also available. Although there's seating inside, on a sunny day you are more likely to be seated outside under a shaded umbrella.