Eating out: Restaurants on Antigua
I'm not the gourmet type of person, and a vegetarian on top of that.
I'll try to disperse some useful information here but many of you
may have different opinions - feel free to share them with me.
Fast Food
The only fast food chain present on Antigua is Kentucky Fried
Chicken.
They have two branches, one in "downtown" St. John's (on the corner
of Thames and High street) and one on Fort Road just north of the
city. The latter is a drive-in;
the former is often crowded, especially during lunchtime. A reader
pointed out that he also spotted a Subway branch while on
vacation in early 2006.
An excellent fast food place is Mid East Fast Food on
Newgate Street, just a few yards from the cathedral. They have vegetarian
Falafel sandwiches and other good stuff (chicken and lamb). Pricing
is very reasonsable. Don't be deterred by the somewhat downtrodden
exterior, I had lunch there over 20 times and was never disappointed
(nor sick). It's also very nice to buy something "to go" and then
sit on somebody's grave in the cathedral's churchyard. Nice view,
plus everybody does it.
There are a number of Chinese Fast Food places along Church Street
but I never tried one of them. A reader told me that he found the food
to be excellent and the amounts copious, a full menu for about EC$&nbps;7.
Pizza
A "small" pizza at
Big Banana
(large) |
One of my favourite restaurants on Antigua is the Big Banana
Pizza place. Their main restaurant is on Redcliffe Street (Redcliffe
Quay), and they also have a branch at the airport. The menu differs
slightly. In the city branch, they offer a "slice of pizza", a
"10 inch", a "small", a "medium" and a "large" pizza. The "small"
is enough for the hungriest individual - for a standard lunch break,
you're better of with a 10 inch or maybe even a slice. They also
have lots of other foods, including good salads, reasonable pasta
and sandwich dishes, and excellent Lime Squash (the local lemonade
flavour). It can become quite noisy here, especially if a cruise
ship has just released 1000+ people at the nearby pier.
The airport branch has air conditioning and not much more
charme than the average airport restaurant; the city branch offers
outside seating under a tent roof. They also do deliveries, but don't
hold your breath!
There's also a pizza place at the eastern end of St. Mary's street, where
the pizza is quite ok but rather expensive.
A third pizza place is located in English Harbour, on the right
hand side just after passing the Marina (going in the direction
of Nelson's dockyard). It's not too comfortable but the pizza
is good.
And last but not least there's "Paris Pizza", a Pizzeria and
Steakhouse located in the North of the Island. Leave St. John's
by Fort Road and go North until the road bends to the right
and goes uphill (ca. 17°10'N); follow the road a bit further,
and you'll find Paris Pizza on the left hand side. The seating
is quite nice (with a little pond inside), the prices are not
exactly cheap but the food is very good.
Local Cuisine
In St. John's especially, there are a huge number of local restaurants
which often offer only a few standard dishes and mainly serve lunches.
Chicken and rice is very popular, but often you can also ask them to
prepare something (being a vegetarian, I often asked for rice and
mixed vegetables, and was seldom disappointed). One of those is
Claudia's Place on Long Street (between Church Lane
and Cross Street). There's a vegetarian restaurant called
Natural Nyams on Cross Street (between St Mary's and
Redcliffe), offering rasta food mixed with a healthy dose of ideologies
(rasta, Christian, and other). It is worth a visit, but it's a breakfast
and lunch place only.
There's also the Commissioner Grill on the
harbour end of St Mary's or Redcliffe Street (not sure). They have
limited outside seating, and if you're inside, make sure not to sit
beneath one of the huge fans ;-)
Others
Hemingway's near Redcliffe Quay offers very nice
first floor outside seating (with a view of the large cruise ships
and the tourists emerging from them...) and reasonably priced
light food (salads, burgers, sandwiches).
Chutney's is an Indian/Caribbean restaurant in the
medium price range, on the right hand sinde of Fort Road when
leaving St. John's.
If you want to sip a Margherita or munch your Tacos while watching
the sunset, there's no better place than the Mexican Amigos
at Runaway Bay, not far from the casino. (Well, it's more Texan than
Mexican but they do try.) - Not far away from that there's also the
Lobster Pot, but I can't say anything about that
because I never went there.
Dinner at the Coconut Grove was excellent, while
a colleague of mine found the breakfast buffet a bit "boring". The
hotel lies on the road leading East from Dickenson Bay (the same
road that also leads to Paris Pizza and Putters).
The Home Restaurant is on the northern outskirts of
St. John's and offers local as well as international cooking; it
is owned by a German-Antiguan couple, it's a little on the expensive
side, and they have their own web site at
www.thehomerestaurant.com.
If someone else pays
There are a few restaurants on Antigua where you probably want to
avoid two things: (a) to turn up there in shorts and sandals, and
(b) to pick up the tab. I have only tasted two of them, although
if you hear somebody talking about places like "Coco's" or "Catherine's",
they probably fall into this category as well. If you are there
during any type of "season", booking a table may be advisable.
First, there's Le Bistro, a French restaurant in the North of
the island. There are road signs almost everywhere; the
restaurant is located just off the main road between the airport and
the village of Cedar Grove, near Jabberwock Beach. It's a nice
setting and the food is good.
Then, there's Julian's, where the English chef makes you
forget anything you may have heard about the British way of cooking.
The restaurant is located in St. John's, on the corner of Church Street
and Corn Alley.
Seating is available indoors and outdoors, plus there's a nice
cocktail bar above the restaurant (see the Nightlife page).
[Julian's is currently closed.]
Last Not Least
Be sure to read my Nightlife page,
as some places listed there also offer food.
From my experience, all restaurants in the city of St. John's tend to
close for Sunday, while the ones further afield are often open. Many
are not open all year round (the South, especially, tends to dry out
during hurricane season).
Here's a map with some of the places mentioned.
Frederik Ramm, 2006-03-09
