Bogotá is the city in Colombia that foreigners visit the most due to the variety and diversity of plans, and the food is one of the reasons that attracts the most.
When preparing a dish, each chef wants each ingredient to stand out without overshadowing the other, so that the result gives a unique flavor so that the diner remembers the experience and the dish. The quality, the different flavors and the high level is the requirement of a restaurant to be among the best, the distinction is the annual Michelin stars and is the basis of the so-called Michelin Guide, a travel guide published on paper and on the Internet that serves as a reference for enthusiasts of the world of gastronomy.
In Bogotá there are restaurants that are in "Latin America's 50 Best Restaurants", an exclusive list of the best restaurants that visits nearly 300 restaurants every year to publish and highlight the best. In 2022, the 50 best was published on November 15 and the next one will be in November 2023, it will be announced at a ceremony in Rio de Janeiro. Encounters VIP brings a list of the 10 best restaurants in Bogotá, one included in the 50 Best, those that have achieved a Michelin star or that project to be among the best in Latin America and the world, these are the perfect ones to delight in national ingredients with styles brought from all over the world, to spend time with the best company.
Ranking
El Chato (One Michelin star)
Number one in Colombia, fifth in Latin America.
Since 2017, chef Álvaro Clavijo opened the El Chato restaurant, a restaurant that highlights Colombian ingredients internationally. For the chef, the restaurant is the engine of work, where he has fun creating mixtures that he never thought of creating with the local pantry.
The dishes move according to the rhythm of the earth and make the most of the ingredients. Located at Calle 65 # 4-76, Bogotá, Colombia and they offer a tasting menu which is a perfect option for those who want to try and choose their dish of the day in the best way. Locals in the know will always request the famous avocado soufflé off the menu.
Located at Calle 65 # 4-76, Bogotá, Colombia
Leo (Three Michelin stars) Number 2 in Colombia, 13 in Latin America.
In charge of the creator and founder of chef Leonor Espinosa since June 2021 with a gastronomic proposal that defends local producers and gastronomic traditions. She and her daughter Laura Hernández Espinosa present a dining room under the same roof. The menu is based on feeling, smelling, remembering, traveling and listening to the biodiversity of the Colombian territory, which includes the flavors of the sea such as king crab, mussels and arapaima fish; of the earth with big-assed ants; and from the ground with hearts of palm, purple yam and chontaduro.
On the initiative of the chefs, Funleo was born, a foundation that supports well-being processes in Colombian communities. From gastronomy they work with NGOs and government organizations, they come together to promote food culture and promote traditional cuisine, biodiversity and national identities.
Leo located at 65 Bis Street #4-23, Bogotá, Colombia.
Mesa Franca Number 3 in Colombia, 49 in Latin America.
His first house was on 54th and Sixth Street in Chapinero. Since 2016, Creole, mestizo and indigenous cuisine gives value and honors the Colombian product. In 2021 they moved to 61st Street and Fifth Street where the light, music, bar and kitchen reflected the vision of recharging one with happiness. Here they managed to introduce cooking with wood, a fundamental method of Creole traditions, the smoky flavor sets the space.
Chef Iván Cadena has experience in restaurants such as Astrid y Gastón, with time in Peru at the Central restaurant in Lima; He created La Guardia, a catering company, and then returned to restaurants, with his partners María Paula and Tom they created Mesa Franca.
Mesa Franca located at Calle 61 # 5- 56, Chapinero, Bogotá
Harry Sasson (One Michelin star)
Number 4 in Colombia and 56 in Latin America
Chef Harry Sason, recognized by the 50 Best as the most famous chef-restaurateur in Colombia, rubs shoulders with the best with experience in Vancouver, SENA cooking bases and the experience he absorbed in parallel at the Hilton Hotel in Bogotá. His restaurant unites Latin, Asian and European flavors. Feast on Colombian starters like freshly baked cassava bread before moving on to Japanese grilled shrimp tail or whole grouper and spicy fried beans.
Harry Sasson located in race 9 #75-70, Zona G and Quinta Camacho.
Humo Negro
Número 5 en Colombia y 74 en Latinoamérica.
Since 2021, Jaime Terragrosa created the menu with his untraditional style, as well as the entire atmosphere of the restaurant, waiters dressed in black and black walls. Terragrosa spent some time away from the kitchen, but he rediscovered his love for creating flavors after trying a dish by Víctor Fernández and decided that people could feel "this thing that awakened in me", and that is how he traveled to Japan to bring the lego-type grill, for small and large preparations.
He was alongside Michelin-starred Faviken in Sweden; with David Kinch at the three Michelin star Manresa and also worked at El Chato. His dishes are made with national ingredients and cutting-edge gastronomic techniques. Due to the influence of his anthropologist wife, he came to know Galerazamba salt, which looks like a diamond, brought from the department of Bolívar; the tucupí, camu camu and the pirarucú of the Amazon; the dog's ear arepa from Huila and the oysters from the Colombian Pacific.
Black Smoke located at Carrera 5 #56-06, Chapinero.
Prudencia Number 6 in Colombia and 93 in Latin America.
A married couple who decided to return to stay in Colombia after finishing their studies in the United States to open the doors to a restaurant that fulfills the desire of its visitors to feel at home. With daily changing menus for diners to explore and share in the culinary adventure. Dishes from around the world using traditional and peasant techniques: local ingredients, minimal waste in the kitchen, connection and respect with our natural environment, and time-consuming preservation techniques such as smoking and fermentation.
Prudencia located on Carrera 2 #11-34, La Candelaria.
Salvo Patria
Number 7 in Colombia and 96 in Latin America.
With the concept of sustainable cuisine and in homage to the Colombian territory since 2011, Salvo Patria was born from the mix of love for coffee, which is iconic in Colombia, full of flavor and strength to move forward, saving Colombia throughout the world. Alejandro Gutiérrez lived in Australia and from there he saw how the aroma of coffee brings together and allows sharing. The transformation in Colombia came from having a space for friends and families who can share and bring Colombian flavors to their palates while respecting their flavors.
The menu varies because they want the ingredients and good food to be affordable for most. They have left proteins aside for a while so that more people know them and continue enjoying them because they are interested in "those products that are more forgotten, but that are very common in certain parts. Our country is the arepas, the cubios, the chuguas, "That also represents Colombia. We have one of the best pantries in the world."
Salvo Patria located in Carrera 4 Bis #58-60, Town of Chapinero.
Criterion (Three Michelin stars)
The Rausch brothers created the star of their restaurants by combining French technique with Latin products. Jorge and Mark studied in France with all the rigor of European cuisine and when they arrived in Colombia they were faced with restaurants based on the origin of the cuisine, Spanish, Italian. Dessert specialist Mark works at Harry Sasson.
Founded in 2004 and in 2021 it was ranked 42nd as the best restaurant in Latin America. Lionfish features prominently on the menu, Jorge promotes the consumption of invasive species that pose a threat to the ocean ecosystem.
Criterion located at 69a street # 5 – 75, Bogotá.
El Cielo (Dos estrellas Michelin)
In 2021, it was ranked 74th as the best restaurant in Latin America with its chef Juan Manuel Barrientos. It opened in 2007 employing ex-guerrillas and ex-military members and in 2011 it arrived in Bogotá. In the restaurant you can have "chocotherapy" in your hands to awaken your senses from the beginning. The use of nitrogen, xanthan or maltodextrin with ingredients from Colombian cuisine creates a new dimension.
Barrientos is the first Colombian chef to receive the Michelin star and has locations in Medellín, Bogotá and Miami.
El Cielo located at 70 street #4-47 in Bogotá.
Ánima
From the Seratta Group, Ánima is the fifth restaurant and for this occasion Paulo Airaudo, a chef with three Michelin stars, is in charge of the kitchen. Luxurious and exclusive where only 30 people can enter and is located in the Atlantis Shopping Center. Colombia is the first country in Latin America that the chef chooses because he considers it a gastronomic beacon.
The menu has a variety of fish and seafood, and diners will discover the dishes as they arrive. There are no tables, you will sit in a u shape and try the 12 course menu.
Ánima located in the Atlantis Shopping Center
Bogotá, a city that continues to grow on a gastronomic level and more people come to try the flavors of Colombian and Latin American roots. The chefs have been educated around the world and bring more techniques and new ways of working in the kitchen and give the ingredients from Colombian land more value and recognition worldwide. Bogotá style of living and enjoying life in Latin America.
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