Best Restaurants in Arusha
Five essential tables, ranked by occasion.
$ Under TZS 10000$$ TZS 10000–50000$$$ TZS 50000–120000
Arusha’s Top 5
Onsea House
Onsea House offers an intimate candlelit terrace where celebrated chef Axel serves up gourmet four-course meals with recommended wines for $50 per person — a price-to-quality ratio that makes it one of the great fi...
Arusha Coffee Lodge Grill Room
Arusha Coffee Lodge’s Grill Room is a star in the local fine-dining scene, set within the Lodge’s coffee plantation estate and featuring an eclectic and modern à la carte menu with dishes that reflect ...
Sanna Café
Sanna Café sits confidently at the top of Arusha’s culinary rankings as a perfect example of the city’s modern dining evolution — a kitchen that has positioned itself at the forefront of contempo...
The Blue Heron
The Blue Heron is a popular hangout for the expat community in Arusha, offering alfresco dining with authentic Italian pizza, local wines and beers, and generous salads in a quirky atmosphere under an umbrella of twisted...
Five Chutneys
Five Chutneys is an Indian vegetarian restaurant in Arusha known for its flavorful vegetarian and vegan options and a unique dining experience built around the five principal chutney traditions of Indian cooking. The res...
Mchuzi wa Samaki
Mchuzi wa Samaki — ‘Fish Stew’ in Swahili — is the traditional Tanzanian restaurant in Arusha that serves the local community with the coconut-and-spice fish preparations that the East African coa...
Dining in Arusha — The Essential Guide
The Safari Gateway at Table
Arusha is the city that sits between Kilimanjaro and the Serengeti — the departure point for the most celebrated wildlife experiences on earth and, increasingly, a dining destination in its own right. The city’s food scene reflects its extraordinary geographical position: the coffee plantations of the Kilimanjaro foothills visible from the restaurant terraces, the Mount Meru summit above the town, and the Indian Ocean influence of the Swahili coast a few hours' drive to the east.
The dining scene in Arusha divides between the luxury lodge kitchens that cater to the international safari community and the local restaurants that serve the city’s permanent population. Onsea House represents the finest personal fine dining available anywhere in northern Tanzania; Sanna Café represents the direction in which local Tanzanian restaurant culture is evolving; and the traditional fish stew and Indian vegetarian restaurants represent the culinary foundations that the city’s food culture rests on.
Kilimanjaro Coffee
Tanzania is one of Africa’s finest Arabica coffee producers, and the Kilimanjaro region’s high-altitude estates produce beans of exceptional quality. The coffee programme at the Arusha Coffee Lodge, which uses estate-grown beans in both conventional preparations and in experimental savoury applications, represents the most complete engagement with this agricultural heritage available at any restaurant in the region.