Atlanta’s vibrant food scene offers diners so much more than comfort food classics (although top-notch versions of chicken, biscuits, and all the fixings can be found here, certainly), and leaving the city without tucking into an unforgettable meal should be criminal. But the trick is knowing where to go.
To make your stay in The A culinarily memorable, you need not only an up-to-date list of the city’s epicurean hot spots, but you also need to choose a home base that makes it easy to get to where you want to go. Choose your hotel poorly, and you might miss where fine dining finds industrial restoration in West Midtown, the continuous creative renewal in buildings and on menus in Old Fourth Ward, or the spirit and soulful flavors of Atlanta’s south side. That won’t be an issue with what’s below.
Old Fourth Ward
The walkable Old Fourth Ward neighborhood (O4W for short, which is located north of downtown Atlanta and southeast of Midtown) is home to many of the city's top food spots. Find a morning pick-me-up from Chrome Yellow Trading Co., sweet treat from Little Tart bakery, or a decadent sandwich from Kinship Butcher & Sundry, where you can choose if you want your breakfast sausage sandwich served “double double,” or opt for a lunchier option like griddled pork belly with “drunken” mustard on brioche. Eastbound to downtown Decatur, Michelin-recommended and James Beard Foundation–recognized restaurants like Kimball House, home to some of metro Atlanta’s best oysters and craft cocktails, and The Deer & The Dove, where farm-to-table is performed with a fierce focus on flavor, are admired far beyond their suburban city’s limits.
O4W is also near historic Inman Park, where you can find exceptional pasta at BoccaLupo, steaks at Kevin Rathbun Steak, or dinner with premium cocktails at Ticonderoga Club at Krog Street Market.
Forth
Forth bills itself as part hotel, part local hangout and membership club, and its range of amenities and convenient location makes it a smart choice for your home base. It’s just off the Atlanta Beltline’s Eastside Trail and a five-minute walk to Ponce City Market, a food hall with stalls from a who’s who of Atlanta's culinary talent. (Don’t miss Botiwalla, where chef Meherwan Irani of the award-winning restaurant Chai Pani is slinging dishes inspired by Indian street food.)
Rooms at Forth mix midcentury style and modern function. You’ll find both heavy black telephones inspired by the old-school rotary dials and Bluetooth-enabled radio speakers in groovy wood and brushed copper casing. The decor is otherwise understated, featuring metallics and earth tones, which allows the views of the surrounding buildings and Beltline activity below to stay the star.
On-site drinking and dining options include Italian steakhouse Il Premio, Mediterranean cuisine at Elektra, and swanky rooftop bar Moonlight. Less than a few hundred steps from the lobby you’ll find great drinking options, including 3 Parks Wine, a fancy retail bottle shop that serves wine flights, and Burle’s Bar, a jazz and cocktail joint that takes inspiration from the plant shop it sits above (think fresh ingredients, a lively atmosphere, and plenty of greenery).
West Midtown
West Midtown is one of Atlanta’s most dramatically changed communities, and its restaurants are widely credited as being somewhat responsible for its popularity and growth. When heralded chef Anne Quatrano moved her fine dining institution Bacchanalia from Buckhead to the Westside Provisions District in 1999, several of Atlanta’s best restaurants followed suit, choosing the area for their homes. Bacchanalia has since relocated again, but current standbys include Taqueria del Sol (it’s so popular, its Instagram bio reads: “Yes, there’s a long line. Yes, it’s worth it!”), Steven Satterfield’s casual fine dining restaurant Miller Union, and The Optimist, known for its wood-fired sustainable seafood. Newcomer Mujō is now the gold standard of omakase in Atlanta.
West Midtown, with revitalized warehouses and interconnectedness with historic Atlanta railways, is also home to the headquarters of several of Atlanta’s most celebrated and creative indie beverage companies, including the original location of award-winning Monday Night Brewing, Bold Monk Brewing’s well-appointed bookstore, coffee shop and selection of Belgian beers, and Urban Tree Cidery. Recent additions to the area include restaurants Pink Lotus Thai and Alpine-inspired Avize. Don’t skip the Little Italia development on Northside Drive near Georgia Tech: Antico Pizza Napoletana is known for its Neapolitan-style pies, the flavorful pasta and poultry plates at Gio’s Chicken Amalfitano, and a fantastic gelateria in Caffé Antico.
Sentral
Originally an upscale apartment brand, Sentral opened its doors to overnight stays only in the last year. This history makes it feel well-suited for longer stays, as rooms are equipped with apartment necessities like full kitchens, laundry machines, and plenty of open space thanks to tall ceilings and uncramped furnishing. Venture up to the rooftop pool to find expansive views of Westside. While the floor-to-ceiling windows in each room provide an industrious look at Atlanta’s train systems, juxtaposed with the bright lights of the bustling Howell Mill Road corridor.
Sentral’s location matches its name, making for a conveniently calm base from which you can venture into plenty of good times at great restaurants and bars along Howell Mill Road, including next-door wine shop Perrine’s and downstairs coffee shop Prevail Union, where you can order your caffeinated favorites and enjoy them in a tucked-away library room.
Buckhead
Atlanta has a reputation for more of a “quiet luxury” approach to displaying its wealth, but a trip to Buckhead requires a certain level of flex and floss from its visitors thanks to the community’s visibly wealthy status. For this reason, the northside community has been home to some of the city’s long-standing fine dining establishments, many of them run by Buckhead Life Group—namely Chops, Atlanta Fish Market, and Pricci.
Today a newer breed of restaurant operators see opportunity in Buckhead’s money and are bringing more modern dining options than its established, ’90s-era seafood and steakhouse haunts: French-forward fare at Le Bon Nosh shines light on local farmers’ fresh produce and provisions. Storico Fresco Alimentari’s excellent handmade pastas bolster classic dishes like tagliatelle alla Bolognese. Lucian Books and Wine bridges a wine lover’s new American restaurant with a retail literature shop, creating a bibliophile’s/oenophile’s/gastronome’s paradise
St. Regis Atlanta
The sparkling glass towers flanking Peachtree Road’s northern end are an intertwined mix of corporate offices and luxury hotels, yet it’s St. Regis that stands out for its classic Georgian architecture and refined elegance. Fortunately you don’t have to leave what the St. Regis staff calls “the best address” to dine at one of Atlanta’s most reputable restaurants. Michelin-starred Atlas, led by chef Freddy Money, is high culinary art, with rare and expensive visual art decorating its walls, an opulent tasting menu with impressive wine and cocktails, and first-class service.
Adjacent to the St. Regis, where soft colors of peach, tan, teal and blue give accent to dark wood, heavy curtains, plush carpeting and old-world refinement from the lobby to the suites, is Delbar. First opened in Inman Park, the newest location of the popular Middle Eastern Atlanta chain has a slightly different scene because of its ritzier customer base and a more spacious interior illuminated with plenty of sunlight from surrounding windows offering views of Paces Ferry Road’s intersection with Peachtree. Also in the shared courtyard are elevated drinking options, including the aptly named Garden Room, whose decor and menu are full of flora, and Himitsu, a reservation-only Japanese cocktail lounge. You’re also within a leisurely half-mile stroll of Aria’s modern American tasting menu, extensive wine selection, and nationally recognized hospitality. If walking isn’t your vibe, the hotel’s round-trip car service—which offers a complimentary ride for a maximum of two miles—can handle transportation to and fro.
Midtown
Cranes seem to never stop adding to the Midtown skyline. With ongoing area development and return-to-office mandates driving residents and corporate workers back to Atlanta’s center, more great restaurants have migrated to the area to meet the demand. Lazy Betty—whose chefs have both local ties and international culinary credibility thanks to chef roles at NYC’s Le Bernardin—moved from the more residential Candler Park community. Chef and co-owner Craig Richards, whose duck lasagna and other equally impressive pasta dishes at Lyla Lila helped redefine Midtown dining from the neighborhood’s less-creative early aughts years, recently doubled down on Midtown with his elevated restaurant Elise. Opened August 2025 at the Woodruff Arts Center, next door to The High Museum of Art, and named for the classic Beethoven composition “Für Elise,” the restaurant focuses on French and Italian presentations of seafood.
For flavors from other parts of the globe, check out The Consulate, which changes its menu every season to honor the cuisine of a different global destination (most recently Jamaica, soon to include Singapore for summer and Vietnam for fall), and El Valle, where Mexican flavors wow in sumptuous dishes like hoja-santa-leaf-wrapped branzino and flutes of txakoli. Midtown has certainly read the memo that Atlanta is only becoming more international.
Hotel Granada
Built in 1923, the Hotel Granada is hidden in plain sight near the northern edge of Midtown on West Peachtree, which makes it ideal for anyone looking for a hideaway—especially if the nature of your stay is romantic or a personal retreat. Rooms are cozily outfitted with velvet couches, marble showers, and a seating area featuring a well-curated selection of local books (my room had a copy of Waffle House Vistas by photographer Micah Cash).
The property’s interior courtyard offers a pleasant escape from constant vehicle traffic near the entrance, and lobby restaurant Pom Court offers double smashburgers, veggie paella, and fried green tomatoes for on-premise dining. But it’s the hotel's basement cocktail lounge May Peel that has local Atlantans abuzz with seasonal cocktails and Spanish wine punch served from a porron for up to four thirsty acquaintances.
Southside
The world’s busiest airport moves millions of people annually, and the surrounding Tri-Cities communities of East Point, College Park, and Hapeville have quietly enjoyed a renaissance of restaurant options over the past decade.
College Park’s “Brunch Mile” offers a ready-to-crawl lineup of popular Black-owned restaurants and cafés: It generally begins at The Breakfast Boys, then continues onto places like Nouveau Bar and Grill and The Real Milk & Honey. Moving beyond brunch, Virgil’s Gullah Kitchen and Bar brings big flavors of South Carolina’s Gullah-Geechee heritage, while Tom, Dick & Hank serves some of the best soul food in metro Atlanta. The restaurant’s smoked turkey legs, beautifully seasoned collards, and sweetened cornbread muffins are worth braving the weekend line for. Hapeville’s Central Avenue also offers plenty, from banh mi and pho at Dua Vietnamese to Paper Plane, a lofty neighborhood Thai restaurant.
Kimpton Overland
One great reason to enjoy a Southside stay is the Tri-Cities’ relative calm and tranquility, compared to interior ATL. While the airport’s SkyTrain gets you directly to Gateway Center, which has several quality lodging options, the Kimpton Overland in Hapeville is ideal for its views and proximity to other amenities in the area. The hotel seems to cater to corporate guests with design aesthetic that leans into dim daytime lighting and dark wood furnishing—definitely more business than casual. That said, Overland is right next door to the North American headquarters of Porsche, and The Rooftop at Overland, the hotel’s upper-level bar, provides a panoramic view that lets you look down at the company’s racetrack, where you can test-drive a Porsche by appointment.
Kimpton also offers free ground transportation up to three miles from the property, which gets you to the tip of the Brunch Mile.
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