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The Best Restaurants in San Antonio
For decades, San Antonio has been touted as the nation’s next great dining destination, a promise that’s becoming realer by the minute. In recent years, the family-owned restaurants that have always made the city a standout — chiefly serving barbecue and Tex-Mex — have embraced a young throng of chefs opening restaurants of their own, where they experiment with international flavors and savory desserts. Though the city is rapidly changing, locals refuse to give up on what makes it unique. Mom-and-pops neighbor new American showpieces. Dive bars rub elbows with upscale cocktail lounges. Even long-established street foods like corn in a cup or chicken on a stick are seeing reinventions. The mix is bringing a new exhilaration to an often-overlooked city.
Newly added to this map are Mare e Monte, Isidore, Biga on the Banks, Pumpers, Toro Kitchen + Bar, and Gino’s Deli. Ladino, Las Nieves, Sherry’s Texan, and Barbecue Station have been removed.
For more San Antonio eats, check out the heatmap and essential tacos.
This map was originally written by Polly Anna Rocha and Ben Gonzalez.
Toro Kitchen + Bar
In a city teeming with Tex-Mex, Toro Kitchen + Bar stands out with its Spanish cuisine. Inspired by founder Gerardo de Anda’s fateful encounter with a bull during the Running of the Bulls in Spain, Toro has been serving paella since 2017 in Stone Oak and now has three San Antonio locations.
A sketch of that bull, Caramelo, watchfully greets guests at all three restaurants. While Toro puts its own spin on classic Spanish paella, it’s equally celebrated for an extensive selection of tapas and its crowd-favorite red sangria. At the La Cantera location, be sure to try a carajillo from the Licor 43 lounge upstairs.
