Bonito

Bonito is the chef-driven Latin-Caribbean seafood institution on Rue Lubin Brin in Gustavia — the island's harbour capital, with a direct view of the moored superyachts that drop anchor each winter — and is the village's most reliable celebratory dinner room. The restaurant runs a deliberately Latin-leaning programme (the founders are Venezuelan) with Caribbean ingredient sourcing and a soundtrack with a pulse that drives the dining room from 20:00 onward.

The cuisine is contemporary Latin-Caribbean with deep regional sourcing. Signatures include a hand-cut tuna tartare with aji amarillo and biquinho pepper; a Mazatlán-shrimp aguachile; a slow-cooked Bahian goat with cassava-and-tucupi sauce; a hand-rolled tapioca pasta with Caribbean lobster; the famous 'cassava ice cream with chocolate' for the dessert course.

The wine list runs to 500 references with deep Argentine, Chilean and Mexican Valle de Guadalupe coverage and a respectable French Champagne section. The cocktail bar runs a serious Latin-American-spirits programme — twenty-plus mezcal, pisco and cachaça bottlings.

The dining room and rooftop terrace together hold ninety-six covers; the kitchen times the dessert course with the Gustavia harbour sunset. Bonito typically reopens late October for the season after the August-October closure.

Bonito is the impress-the-client room in St Barths — the harbour-view rooftop terrace at sunset is among the most photographed dinner views in the Caribbean, the Latin-seafood register is reliable for any palette, and the room's volume on a Saturday night is celebratory. Book the western corner four-top at sunset.