La Tapa

Came here for the late night dessert and we were not disappointed. Cheesecake is our favorite as it was fruity and citrusy, quite unique taste and not too sweet. Ladies worked at bar were very friendly and delightful, it’s a perfect place to end our did-nothing-but-chilling-and-relaxing beach day on the island lol

Great restaurant. I came here for my wedding dinner and about 10 of us stayed for three hours. Everything was delicious and the staff was on point. It was also not near as expensive as I thought it would be.

Have been coming to st John many times. First time to La Tapa. One of the best restaurants on the island. Pictures are mahi and veal special.

To begin... One thing to remember when visiting St. John... you're on an island, relax, everything takes a little longer. It's just part of the lifestyle. We are a group of two couples visiting St. John in early September 2025. We booked La Tapa because we heard so many amazing things before making the trip. We were not disappointed even though the hype was heavy. Our appetizers included the lamb meatballs, mussels, and the bread with dipping sauces. All were fantastic. The beverages were equally tasty and refreshing. For dinner we enjoyed the veal, tuna, and seafood pasta. We shared the meals between the four of us. Exceptional is the word that comes to mind. The tuna and seafood pasta were both big hits - all were excellent. For dessert we shared the mango-passion fruit sorbet, citrus cheesecake, and flourless chocolate cake. Again, none disappointed. Each had unique flavors with the sorbet being extremely refreshing. The view was beautiful. Our reservation was at 8 PM, so the evening had already set in. The no-see-ums were also already back to wherever they go before and after hours. We absolutely enjoyed our dinner and our server Willow made the experience perfect.

I was visiting the island and it was my birthday. My son made reservations for La Tapa and it did not disappoint. We loved everything from our drinks to our meal to the service and the views were fantastic. We were able to see the sunset.Just a great place in the island totally recommended.

Amazing food. Very high price tag. But the sunset that I saw for my table was amazing. Would definitely go back here again with the expectation that you’re spending at least $300 to enjoy your night between two people.

I love La Tapa! It’s the perfect place to meet friends for a first class dining experience from their fine wines to their homemade appetizers, entrees, and delectable desserts. Thank you to the chef, the servers Michele, Blake, Jabari, Zack; and to Collin for giving us a great table.

I love La Tapa! I could come here everyday. The ambience is relaxed, elegant, beautiful, fun. I love the seating along the walls with the couch cushions. The decoration is effortlessly classy and welcoming. This is the best meal we’ve ever had in the Caribbean. We’ve tried literally everything on the menu and loved it all. If I had to rank appetizers: cheese platter, tuna tartare, Caesar salad, goat cheese salad, lamb meatballs, duck, mussels. Our rankings for entrees: tuna, pasta (can be done with chicken!), veal, steak special. Dessert rankings: bread pudding with raspberry sorbet subbed in, chocolate torte, apple tart, roasted pineapple, flan, cheesecake (it’s all delicious but we agreed we can get cheesecake anywhere) Drinks rankings: mojito, margarita picante, allesini, Avon de papel, Wine by the glass rankings: ulacia (white), tesela (red), don pedro Albariño (wh), camins (red). Wine by the bottle: marques de nutrients (red), Pazo barrantes (white),

My husband and I had an incredible date night at La Tapa this weekend. Outstanding cuisine, atmosphere, & service. Portions were larger than we expected for both small and large plates with absolutely mouthwatering flavors in every bite! We highly recommend every dish we tried: Duck confit and octopus (small plates) and veal with red cabbage/Brussels sprouts and pasta with langoustine/shrimp/smoked bacon. Our server, Ethan, was hands down the most exceptional server we’ve ever had in the VI — his expertise was invaluable! — and kudos to their tremendously talented chef. La Tapa stands far above most other restaurants we’ve tried in the VI. Picture perfect place for seeing the dreamy St. John sunsets over Cruz Bay; we had a beautiful table by the sea and took a post-dinner stroll along the beach. We are SO glad we secured a table on La Tapa’s last night for the season, and we can’t wait to come back!

WOW. I haven’t been to La Tapa since 2014 and it’s as good, maybe even better than the memory. Every single dish was incredible. The seasonings and flavors were just fantastic and so unique compared to other offerings in Cruz Bay. I loved our Ribeira Sacra that my brother and I picked out. So much amazing Spanish wine to choose from. I remember going to their old location and loving it but I think the location and ambiance here was even better. Beachside dining is elite. I’m so excited we have another reservation next weekend!

We ended up here for dinner after beach day at trunk bay and cinnamon beach. Finally a place to sit down and get to enjoy this restaurant with a nice view of the beach. We sat at the bar since we didn’t have any reservations. Kaylie was our bartender and she whipped us up a special of the day passion fruit margaritas which was not too sweet so that makes it excellent. The French bread and dips here was amazing . We ordered the mahi and the yellowfin tuna dishes and it was delicious. Everything turned out to be good we walked out so fulfilled. This is an upscale restaurant so expect the price to be on the high end side. It’s worth every penny.

This is our first visit to St. John and our first night here. We kicked off our anniversary week away with La Tapa. We sat in the corner and were lucky to have dinner through the sunset. The ambience was wonderful. But we would both agree that our server Ananda made the evening. She was incredibly knowledgeable, and she was eager to share her story and what she knew with us to make our night very special. We enjoyed the bread and eclectic dipping sauces, a homemade mozzarella dish, a small lamb dish, and then the mahi with lobster sauce. Our wines paired very well, per recommendation of our server, and we spent a perfect two hours sitting by the ocean. Many thanks to La Tapa and Ananda. -Dave and Sarah

So many interesting flavors and sauces! We wanted to get mussels and they said it was the only menu item that has not changed in years. They turned out to be great so we ordered seconds. The best small plate I tried was the porkbelly with green papaya and mango. The duck leg was also fantastic. The have a large wine selection as well as full bar. The seating on the sidewalk is pretty accessible but the main dining, bar, and bathrooms are down a few steps. I would recommend and come back. It can get full so make a reservation just in case.

Delightful tapas style restaurant with an amazing sunset view if the weather treats you to one. Cocktails are excellent, and not limited to typical island options. Only small downside is that if a boat in harbor decides to blare their music, you're pretty exposed to it.

We were so grateful to have eaten here on opening (covid) night of the season, which was amazing! 👏 THANK YOU, CHEF and the wonderful staff who really impressed us with very attentive service! We appreciate all the hard work it takes to accommodate everyone in a time like this ❤ This place is a must y'all! I ordered my 4 year old shrimp penne with butter (no pic of that & not on the menu but they will accommodate children! )... well he ate his own meal and then cauliflower bisque and some of my cobia entree! 4 year olds don't lie! LOL! He loved it all! Gazpacho and Tuna pictured were F'n awesome. Great WINE too! THANK YOU ALL SO MUCH! Edit: get the sauces with the bread! I am a strict euro butter on bread lover but that was a nice treat!

This place deserves its incredible reputation. It had been recommended to me by multiple sources, and my husband and I now totally understood why. First, the location is phenomenal with a fantastic view. But even more importantly, the food and service were amazing. I have celiac disease in addition to serious sensitivities to dairy, garlic, and onion. I let the restaurant know about my dietary restrictions in advance and the chef, Alex, personally talked with me before crafting the most phenomenal meals. La Tapa was truly a highlight of our honeymoon!

Really nice dinner here! Food was delicious, nice cocktails and wine list. Beautiful setting overlooking the water.

Such a great dinner in St. John! Excellent staff and the food was amazing! We loved the octopus small plate and the Mahi Mahi special.

Dined at bar. Amusing bartenders. Great drinks. Exceptional food! A definite must. Reservations recommended, even for the bar.

Make sure you get a reservation for this delicious restaurant. This place is a Caribbean delight with a Spanish flair. Absolutely decadent food that will delight your palate and leave you dreaming of it for days on end. Highly recommend the steak if it's available!

We've gone to La Tapa for years. The food and the service is 5 star. The new location on the beach is beautiful.

One of my favorite places on the island. Eclectic menu that changes frequently, with fresh ingredients and creative presentation. Cheese and charcuterie plates are always a hit, muscles are fantastic, artichoke is consistently good, and usually a great selection of “large” dishes. With the new location right on the beach, our last experience here was marred by a party on a boat that just came in and sat at the beach with very loud music. Although there was little the staff could do, they did send someone down to ask them to turn the music down - alas, the revelers were not as accommodating.

Had a wonderful time at La Tapa. After having difficulties with other dinner reservations, La Tapa was able to seat us at the bar where we met the amazing Blake, the bartender. She was kind and fun, going above and beyond to turn our evening around. Even made a fun mocktail for my pregnant wife and provided an awesome dessert recommendation- p.s, get the flan… it was the most incredibly soft flan I’ve ever experienced… the spoon fell through it without any force. 10/10 will be back.

We had excellent service and food. My mussels and pasta with shrimp were outstanding. My companions also enjoyed their gazpacho, grilled octopus, salad, and seared tuna. La Tapa has a beautiful location and it was quiet enough to have conversation at our table. Service was excellent.

Hands down the best food I had on St. John (yes, better than all the other places you are thinking of!). I had a seared tuna over a polenta cake with various sauces and oils, and my mouth dropped at my first bite. I also had the flourless chocolate cake for dessert and that was equally amazing. The owner/chef, Alex, is incredibly talented. Don't miss this culinary opportunity on St. John!

Very good dinner on our last night of vacation. Pretty much 5 stars all around. Excellent cocktails, and everything we ate was well prepared and delicious. Absolutely beautiful place, right on the water in Cruz Bay. Friendly service. The only knock is that both the online menu and the one posted outside the restaurant had a delicious sounding Mahi with green curry coconut milk, that I was looking forward to all week. It was unfortunately not on the menu inside, and they were out of the other catch of the day option when we arrived for our reservation, which while I do respect since they only cook what’s fresh and on hand, it didn’t leave any options for someone wanting fish other than tuna. If you are looking for fine dining in Cruz Bay, this is the place! We will return for sure.

A wonderful sunset. The hostess was so nice. She helped us find a time for six of us to visit them. Zach was our server. Knowledgeable, friendly and very efficient. We had a great meal. Favorites were the tuna, snapper and their world renowned soup!

We love La Tapa! Their food is delicious! The atmosphere couldn't get any better! This location holds a special place in our hearts, as our Wedding Reception was held here 10 years ago (before La Tapa). We are so happy to enjoy this amazing restaurant, lovely staff & delicious food/drink! We were so excited to hear La Tapa was taking this beachfront space. We can't wait to return for another special dinner soon!

Food was fantastic, particularly the shrimp pasta entree. Very small resturaunt, reservation needed, good to time your dinner around sunset. Only knock on it was that it is a bit on the high $ side

Simple great food; lovely setting; friendly staff. We were there during a power outage and it was a chill, relaxed vibe. Let the bartenders help you pick your wine, get the langoustine, artichoke (if they have that day), bread/3 spreads. Actually get anything. It's all good.

Very nice beachfront restaurant right on St. Cruz bay. The space is well appointed, very nice decor, etc. The location is ideal for catching a beautiful sunset on the bay… clouds permitting! We arrived without a reservation early in the dinner hour and the hostess seated us at a primo beachside table! Service was good, as was the food! Escargot, mussels and ahi tuna appetizers were delicious. The chicken and red snapper fish filet were good. The star of the evening was the sunset. We’d go back!

Great location on the beach. Nice decor. Overall vibe is chic. Food was good, but not amazing. The ribeye was the best dish we had - the sides that came with the ribeye were surprisingly good. Portion size was on the smaller side. Quite expensive even with inflation…

The ambience is truly unique and the service is impeccable. I think the name is a bit of a misnomer, however, because many of the small plates were not so shareable. I echo what one other reviewer said about the meager plate of artisanal cheeses. You get the same one ounce of cheese, but it's now $25. The $8 basket of bread was basically one of those take and bake loaves from a grocery store, except not actually baked. Some highlights were the duck confit small plate, and everyone in my party seemed to enjoy the seafood pasta. While we did not experience the inattentiveness or slow service others have described, we were advised to put all of our food and drink orders in at one time. Overall, I don't understand why this restaurant is consistently rated as the best on St. John because for the price point, things shouldn't be so hit and miss. I would come here for the view, a glass of wine, and a carefully vetted small plate.

Food was excellent! Five star for a little island. Unfortunately, the service was the polar opposite. *Our server was not educated by the kitchen about the ingredients she had written down for her plate explanations. *Our server says to us while ordering our first two tapas, “Is that all you are getting? The chef wanted you to order all of our tapas at once”. What?! *Between our two orders of a tapas each, we sat at the table for more than ten minutes with no food or drinks while our carafe of sangria sat at the bar wait station. *and while waiting for our dessert, we watched our server fail at opening a bottle of wine and have to leave the floor to get another server to open the bottle. This caused our dessert order to take even longer than the time between our first and second tapas orders. The knock out blow was delivered by the hostess. We had just received our receipt (our check was over $100 per person) and were readying to leave. The hostess came over to “ask us how our meal had been”. We were politely extolling the virtues of our food and refrained from mentioning our negatives when the hostess interrupts us and asks us to leave asap because they had another group coming in and needed our table! We had a nice table, on the wall with the sand and Cruz Bay just beyond. However, there were many tables (not on the outside wall) available just inside of ours. I have worked in almost every position within a restaurant aside from owning one. It is NEVER okay to ask a customer to leave because they need the table for incoming patrons.

Mixed, and you can probably do better. It’s amazing how important a first impression can be, and La Playa stumbled immediately. My wife and I had a reservation and when we approached the hostess stand, we thought there were two friends catching up and the hostess was seating other guests. Nope. One of the two women chatting was the hostess, and we stood there for at least two minutes as she socialized with her friend. Now I get that we are all on island time here, but this just seemed rather rude. Both my wife and I were put off: we were about to spend $300 on dinner. We ordered the artichoke fondue, and frankly, I wasn’t sure what to expect. So this is a caution more than a complaint: when they bring it out, the artichoke that you use to dip is extremely chewy. Imagine something with the consistency of beef jerky. You chew… and chew….and chew. I don’t know if this is a local delicacy or what but it was tough to eat. Our waitress was very good. The paella we shared was very good, especially the rice. It was very hearty. We shared a bottle of wine that was reasonably priced by SJ standards. Also, know that the wine list online is hopelessly outdated. I’d give it a “B-“, which - for $300 - left us feeling let down.

It’s gone downhill, I was there in February and it was amazing. This time the Lamb sausage meatballs were so dry, almost inedible. The lobster croquets lacked flavor they were too dry as well, the Duck Confit was very good. The artichoke was undercooked and filled with cheese, you pull the artichoke leaves they don’t come off easily so the cheese spills out all over the plate. You need to ask for bread which is the only way to eat the cheese from Artichoke dish. The octopus small plate was good, We ordered small plate tapas, they brought out three of them but didn’t offer us plates or replace any silverware. We sat and watched it get cold by the time the waitress asked. How was everything.

We had dinner at La Tapa last night and were not very impressed… to start our drinks and the Spanish octopus appetizer were both good. Our waitress was also very kind. The bread wasn’t great, we ordered butter to go with it and the butter was rock hard. As someone of Spanish background, the Paella was absolutely horrible. The seafood in it tasted bland. The rice in the dish tasted similar to the packaged rice that you heat up in a microwave. Even if a main course is to be shared, it should still be edible especially for the price. My fiancé and I have been to many nice restaurants, and this was just a total miss for us.

Live on STT, been to Tapa at the Cruz Bay location a handful of times before. Never been impressed. Recently, I had the worst dining experience of my life there. Made reservations, sat down for a dinner with my husband and first thing told the server about my allergies (shellfish being one of them). She explained what would be safe to eat. We order, pick at the inedible steamed artichoke, then the entrees arrive. Mahi. Should be safe. I’m four bites into the dish when my server comes to the table and says “how severe is your shellfish allergy?” Followed by the chef who told me “that sauce is puréed lobster.” I had just switched handbags so no Benadryl on my person, I asked if any staff had any. No. Husband runs to corner store but they are closed. The ferry to STT is boarding and we have to make the boat before my throat closes up. We explain this and the server and manager of the evening prevent us from leaving until we pay the bill. “We took the fish off the bill.” Paid the bill, ran to the ferry, made it to the store in STT in time to take a handful of Benadryl. Terrible food, terrible service, horrific management, 0/10 would not recommend.

They told me they didn’t have the veal. They offered ribeye as a substitute. The Ribeye was cold and not cooked to order. And then they stealth charged me 30 dollars more for the ribeye than the price of the veal. This place is a miss. Go to the beach in front and enjoy the view without enduring the subpar service.

We were extremely disappointed with our experience. While our server was very polite and friendly, the service overall was incredibly slow and inattentive. It took nearly 45 minutes to receive six drinks from the bar. In fact, my husband had to go to the bar himself to pick up his drink after the rest of us had already had ours for about 20 minutes. We ordered a dozen oysters, and unfortunately one was clearly bad, I had to spit it out. We did inform our server, but it was very concerning nonetheless. Earlier in the evening, the server went over the specials with us. When we were ready to order, half of our table selected one of those specials only to be told they were already out of it. We had a 6:00 PM reservation, an early seating, so it was surprising and frustrating that they had already run out. We also ordered bread and oil for the table, which took an unusually long time to arrive. When our meals finally came out, they were mediocre at best, especially considering the high prices. The view is absolutely incredible truly stunning, but unfortunately, you are paying for the scenery. The food was underwhelming and not worth the cost, and the overall experience fell far below expectations. We will not be returning.