12 Best Restaurants in Wales

Close to Harlech's mighty castle, this friendly "restaurant with rooms" is a wonderful find. Chef Glyn Roberts uses locally sourced ingredients from salmon to lamb to create imaginative, beautifully presented contemporary dishes with a Thai accent. The main house has three spacious, modern rooms and four more are in the annex, a 16th-century coaching inn. The aviation-themed bar (the inn's owner was previously a pilot) is well-stocked and has views over Yr Wyddfa (Mount Snowdon).

Well, this is unusual: a trendy restaurant in which all the food is prepared by prisoners; the idea behind The Clink (British slang for jail) is that those serving time for minor crimes are given the chance to turn their lives around by gaining experience as gourmet chefs. The restaurant (just outside the prison grounds) is a bright, modern space, and the Modern British food, made with local, seasonal produce, is genuinely delicious. Note that they don't serve alcohol.

This excellent "restaurant with rooms" is renowned for its creative use of local products and the rustic-chic vibe. Fruit and vegetables come from the Griffin's own organic kitchen garden, while meat is sourced from surrounding estates such as the Welsh Venison Centre. If you'd like, stay over in one of eight cozy, vintage-style bedrooms, complete with Welsh blankets and fresh flowers; dinner packages are also available. The inn is in Felin Fach, 5 miles northeast of Brecon.

Housed in a redbrick building near the Principality Stadium, this rustic-chic restaurant specializes in Spanish grills and wine. Try a sirloin from a Spanish dairy cow and then round it off with a Catalan tart accompanied, of course, by some sherry. Sunday lunch follows the Spanish tradition of shared rice-based dishes. The group also owns a stylish boutique hotel, Parador 44, located above the restaurant as well as a tapas bar, Bar 44, around the corner on Westgate Street.

With its gorgeous view over Cardiff Bay, this undeniably romantic restaurant is a popular choice. The classic French bistro menu is jazzed up with international influences like tempura tiger prawns and classic mac-and-cheese, but it's the steaks, especially the Chateaubriand, that diners come here for. The extensive wine list has a decent selection of vino from around the globe.

On the top floor of Cardiff and Vale College's City Centre Campus, this smart restaurant with panoramic views from the floor-to-ceiling windows is run by catering and hospitality students. The menus, which change with the seasons, are overseen by some of the top Welsh chefs working in the United Kingdom. The beautifully presented dishes are made with local produce; even the bread is baked here. The restaurant also offers cooking master classes and short courses.

This charming whitewashed inn serves elegant Welsh cuisine in a rustic dining room. Fish is a specialty, underlined with plenty of regional flavors like the salmon and leek fishcake, while the beef and lamb are locally sourced. The inn is about 1½ miles west of Raglan Castle. To get there from the castle, turn left out of the gates onto the one-way road, then backtrack towards Raglan, passing the castle again on your right. At the roundabout, take Clytha Road.

Tucked down a lane off Wind Street, the town's main nightlife area, this cozy restaurant is consistently reliable for good food in the city center. The London Ritz--trained chef deftly turns out delicious dishes made with the best local ingredients. The two-course lunch menu is good value, and the fish courses are the most popular option. Book in advance and ask for a table upstairs as the downstairs "cave" can be a bit claustrophobic.

It's mostly oysters and mussels on the menu at this seafood and wine bar found in an Edwardian arcade opposite Cardiff Castle, but you'll also find lamb with seaweed in a bun and a handful of other inventive dishes for carnivores, all designed for sharing. Diners and drinkers sit almost elbow-to-elbow on reclaimed wooden tables, undoubtedly wondering which guest chef will be next to run a pop-up supper club at Cora's, a small restaurant upstairs. Alternatively, just pop in for one of their own-blend coffees and watch the world go by. 

This 17th-century coaching inn close to Hay's center is ideal for a lunch break after you're done ransacking the nearby bookshops. The restaurant's sophisticated cooking emphasizes local meats and produce—for example, the Welsh lamb rump with bean stew. There are also some interesting hot sandwiches available at lunchtime. You can even opt for an overnight stay in one of the country-style rooms.

The surprise at this downtown restaurant, above the Gateway Café, is not that you've found Mexican food in Wales, but that it's so good. It's more than a little cheeky, especially in the large murals of Three Amigos and Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid., which customers like to pose in front of. Although the menu only covers the basics of Mexican cuisine—quesadillas, taquitos, chimichangas, tacos, and fajitas—they're prepared with enough gusto to take them to the next level. However, authenticity takes a backseat to taste.

Attached to the Holyhead Maritime Museum on Newry Beach, this bistro café offers the best view in town from its patio. Watch yachts, catamarans, and vintage sailboats crisscross the harbor while you wait for fish chowder, slow roasted pork belly, and lamb shank in minted red wine sauce, and marvel at the Victorian engineering skill required to build the breakwater, the United Kingdom's longest. Fresh ingredients from the bistro's own farm and local fishermen factor highly in the general praise, but it's the sunset seating Thursday through Saturday that is particularly coveted.