10 Best Restaurants in Jakarta: Where to Eat by Area

Featured image: Hkurniawan (talk), CC BY-SA 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons.

10 Best Restaurants in Jakarta, Area by Area

Each pick below comes from a March 2025 editorial list or a June 2022 food diary. Confirm opening status, address and booking rules with the venue before you go. No prices appear here because none were verified. Bars and cafés are left out on purpose and routed to Jakarta cafés and bars.

• 1. Kindling (Cikini, Menteng): best heritage room
  • French technique meets Asian ingredients in a former private residence from the 1900s.
  • Chef Vallian Gunawan leads the kitchen. Its address is on Jl. Cikini Raya, so pair it with a Menteng evening.
• 2. Suma (Melawai, South Jakarta): best for a quiet, restrained dinner
  • Rachel Tjahja and Ryan Kim cook East Asian-leaning dishes in a minimalistic dining room.
  • Ingredients such as torch ginger flower and osmanthus are treated with restraint.
• 3. Lapo Porsea (SCBD Park): best Batak food
  • Elevated Batak cooking from North Sumatra, led by executive chef Patrese Vito.
  • Order for the side dishes. Reviewers single them out as the highlight of every meal.
• 4. Esa Restaurant (SCBD Park): best modern Indonesian
  • Chef Aditya Muskita reworks nostalgic Indonesian dishes with underused local ingredients.
  • Its aged duck is dry-aged for 14 days and brushed with brem, a fermented rice drink.
• 5. August (Sequis Tower, Sudirman): best tasting menu
  • Indonesian produce becomes a 16-course tasting menu with a global outlook.
  • Budget a long evening. Ask the restaurant for current prices and seating times.
• 6. Costa (Jl. Gunawarman): best seafood and grill
  • Catalan-rooted cooking by chef Ryan Theja, with live grilling in an open kitchen.
  • It had only just opened as of March 2025. Check that the concept and hours are unchanged.
• 7. ABSteak Jakarta (Senayan City): best steak
  • A Korean barbecue steakhouse with premium meats, some dry-aged up to 45 days.
  • Being inside Senayan City makes it easy to reach in rain or heavy traffic.
• 8. Semaja (Gondangdia, Menteng): best for regional Indonesian
  • Approachable recipes from across the archipelago in a lush interior.
  • Naaga Bar sits upstairs, which suits a short after-dinner drink.
• 9. The Coach Restaurant (Grand Indonesia West Mall): best mall-based option
  • American classics, with cheese puffs, french onion dip and steaks on the menu.
  • Chef Gabriel Jamias runs the kitchen. Choose it when you want easy access over a Jakarta-specific meal.
• 10. Kafe Betawi (mall outlets): best casual local entry point
  • A Betawi chain that a 2022 source says opened in 1992, with outlets in many malls.
  • Start with soto Betawi, a coconut-milk beef soup. Check which outlet is nearest your hotel.

How to Choose: Area, Budget and Occasion

Area is the first filter in Jakarta. SCBD and Senayan hold the most picks in the smallest space, since Esa and Lapo Porsea share SCBD Park. Menteng, Cikini and Gondangdia suit a heritage or atmosphere evening with Kindling or Semaja. Central Jakarta around Grand Indonesia works when weather or traffic limits your options. Budget and commitment vary widely. August is a 16-course tasting menu, while Kafe Betawi is a casual stop. Verify current prices with each venue.

Where to Eat Local Without Fuss

Kafe Betawi is the easiest way into Betawi cooking, since a 2022 source says the chain opened in 1992 and has mall outlets. For a wider dish overview, see our guide to Jakarta food. Street stalls and mall food courts cover the rest. Choose busy stalls with food cooked to order, such as a wok-fried mee goreng. Prefer a guide to choosing for you? Try a guided Jakarta food tour.

• Soto Betawi: beef soup cooked in coconut milk, with potato, tomato and keropok.
• Sate kambing: grilled lamb satay.
• Bakso: meatballs in salty broth, common in mall food courts.
• Mee goreng: wok-fried noodles, often sold streetside.
• Tempe mendoan: lightly fried soybean cakes, served with chilli.
• Kue rangi: a coconut cake with palm sugar sauce.

Eating Around the Traffic

A 2022 source describes Jakarta as home to over 10 million people, and evening roads reflect that. Book one area per evening and stay there. Mall restaurants such as ABSteak in Senayan City and The Coach in Grand Indonesia hedge against rain and gridlock. Compare ride-hailing, taxi and transit options on the day, using current operator information. Guided evenings can also remove the routing problem, as described in our food tour guide.

Reservations, Dress, Halal and Payment

No verified booking rules, dress codes, halal status or payment policies were supplied for these venues. Confirm them with each restaurant, and check general guidance on the Jakarta Tourism official site.

Mistakes to Avoid

A few planning errors cause most of the stress at Jakarta dinners.

• Booking two far-apart venues in one evening.
• Assuming listed spots are walkable from each other.
• Skipping reservations at tasting-menu venues such as August.
• Treating bars as restaurants. Send after-dinner plans to the cafés and bars guide instead.
• Trusting old listings. Tatler's list dates from March 2025 and may be stale.

Sample Eating Plans by Area

For a SCBD day, eat a Batak lunch at Lapo Porsea, then book Esa or August for dinner. For a Menteng day, take lunch at Semaja in Gondangdia and dinner at Kindling in Cikini. Add an after-dinner drink from our Jakarta cafés guide. To cook what you ate, try a Jakarta Cooking Classes: Types, Costs & How to Book. For more trip ideas, see Wonderful Indonesia.