Looking for a dining experience in Ubud, Bali? This guide features the top restaurants in Ubud, from fine dining to casual spots, to ensure you have a memorable culinary experience while exploring the city.
If you’re planning to visit Ubud on your trip to Bali, the list below will certainly help to make the best choices. This is our honest experience and we rated these as the top dining experiences not to be missed.
Locavore - Sustainable Modern Conceptual Cuisine
We visited Locavore 1 month ago and actually this was Tiago's choice to celebrate a very special day for us. After visiting the stunning Rice Terraces, we headed to the hotel and got ready for this amazing dining experience.
Locavore is located in Ubud town and the concept is sustainable modern conceptual cuisine.
Rated as #1 in Indonesia and #49 in Asia in 2016, Locavore aims to utilise the underrated and overlooked local ingredients of Indonesia and Bali to create creative dishes. They are also part of and embody the slow-food movement.
We sat in front of an open kitchen at a beautiful long wooden table and it was amazing. Watching the chefs in action, preparing the dishes and seeing their focus and creativity really enriches the whole experience.
We chose two tasting menus, omnivorous and herbivore (but I’m pescatarian, so they adjust some dishes for me). The menu consists of 9 snacks and 7 mains and 2 desserts (Tiago opted for the omnivorous menu with drinks pairing). We personally recommend coming hungry and having patience because the entire experience will take plus or minus 2 to 3 hours. Each plate is brought out by the server or the chef then explained in the best way to eat each dish.
The service was flawless and the food was divine. The price with drinks pairing was around £200. If you’re looking to have an exceptional gastronomic experience combining creativity and sustainability, locavore is the way.
Liap Liap - Modern Indonesian Cuisine
After an amazing day exploring Ubud, I was really craving some grilled fish and seafood for dinner. We did some research and found that Liap Liap was the absolute best choice.
Located in Ubud City, this restaurant offers archipelago-inspired cuisine, combining exotic grilling techniques and Indonesian heritage. The restaurant has a really cool vibe and the decor is Bali-inspired.
To start we had Rujak Gurita, a really tasty smoked octopus with young cress, potato, herb dressing and kokonda, a delicious tuna ceviche with coconut cream, lime juice, chill, lemon and basil.
For the mains, we opted for a jimbaram style grill with squid served with pickled vegetables & assorted sambal, dabu dabu, sambal ulek, kecan chili. sambal ijo. It was a little bit spicy for our taste but in general was tasty and quite filling.
Overall experience was good, the service was effective and the quality of the food was satisfactory. In total, we paid around £50 for this dinner.
Herblibrary - Cuisine by Nature
This was the first restaurant we tried when we arrived in Ubud and then we visited again because it was really worth it.
Also located in Ubud Centre, Herb Library is a contemporary, healthy dining venue. This restaurant will not be serving purely raw or ‘living’ food, but offering a rather different, plant-based all day dining menu for Herbivores with sustainably and responsibly sourced fish and chicken options for Omnivores.
On our first visit we went for dinner and my choice was a delicious Inamona Poke Bowl with seared tuna chunks, ginger garlic soy, edamame, vegetables rice, red cabbage, cucumber, tomato, avocado & teriyaki cashew mayo. Tiago's choice was a meaty and tasty Tuna Cintamani, a Grilled tuna loin, spiced mango coriander salsa, cauliflower, fried rice, tangerine reduction & chili cashew sauce.
We loved the concept and the food so much that we decided to go for breakfast the next day to try the fruit bowls and once again everything was so fresh and delicious.
The dinner price was worth it, we paid £30 in total for 2 starters, two main courses, a local beer and a detox juice.
Conclusion
Feeling hungry now? Bali is an absolute foodie paradise and our experience couldn't be better. We believe that no matter what you like, you'll find it there. However, for us, experiencing the local cuisine is always the best choice.
We hope our recommendations help you to make the most of your dining experience in Ubud, Bali.