CITY GUIDES | CALIFORNIA

Where to Eat in Long Beach: Michelin Stars, Thai Curries, and Cambodian Noodles

By Mei Chen | Aug. 15, 2026

Heritage

AUTHOR BIO: Mei Chen has worked for nearly a dozen start-ups in as many years, taking her to several West Coast cities. While she’s sure her current day job is permanent, she also has her eye on Carmel.

I spent years living in Long Beach, and if I’m being completely honest, a part of my heart never really moved out. It was an era defined by ocean air, leafy Craftsman-lined streets, and a dining scene so effortlessly diverse that picking a spot for dinner felt like choosing your own adventure.

These days, living elsewhere in Southern California means making peace with highway gridlock, but I will willingly, almost eagerly, brave soul-crushing cross-town traffic on the 405 just to cross city lines.

Sometimes it’s a nostalgic pilgrimage back to my old comfort-food haunts, often it’s a direct beeline to Cambodia Town for a steaming, fragrant bowl of kuy teav that instantly resets my sanity. And, increasingly, it’s to explore the ambitious, uncompromising new restaurants pushing the city’s culinary boundaries. Long Beach has never tried to emulate LA or OC—it has always comfortably done its own thing, and right now, it’s eating better than ever.

Whether you’re a longtime local or just looking for a reason to cross the bridge, here are 12 essential Long Beach restaurants worth fighting traffic for.

Ammatolí

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Chef Dima Habibeh draws on a family history that runs through Palestine, Syria, and Jordan, where she grew up in Amman. The Levantine menu includes Palestinian musakhan, kibbeh, ouzi lamb chops, and pita that emerges from the oven fully puffed. The expanded Downtown Long Beach restaurant includes the Hayati dining room, filled with family photographs and objects Habibeh collected during her travels.

Best for: Levantine cooking rooted in family recipes

The Attic

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Chef Cameron Slaugh has led the kitchen at this 1920s Craftsman house on Broadway since 2020, combining Southern cooking with California produce. Shrimp and grits and short-rib poutine share the menu with Mac N’ Cheetos, the restaurant’s house-made pasta covered with cheese sauce and crumbled Flamin’ Hot Cheetos. The dog-friendly patio draws a crowd on weekends, particularly during brunch.

Best for: Southern-influenced brunch on a shaded patio

Chiang Rai

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Chef Junyawan “Noi” Inta and her husband, Kiattisak Suyanon, transformed a longtime Thai restaurant on Anaheim Street into a showcase for the food of Inta’s native northern Thailand. The Michelin-recommended menu includes sai uao pork sausage, nam prik ong with vegetables, and khao soi with thin slices of ribeye cooked at the table in the curry broth. The colorful dining room occupies a red-brick corner building that has housed Thai restaurants for decades.

Best for: Northern Thai curries and regional specialties

Gusto Bread

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Arturo Enciso and Ana Belén Salatino began Gusto Bread as a cottage-food bakery before opening their Retro Row storefront in 2020. Enciso works with masa madre, stone-milled flour, organic nixtamalized corn, and local produce to make seeded sourdough loaves, masa cookies, and a sourdough concha topped with cacao. Gusto has twice been named a James Beard Award finalist for Outstanding Bakery.

Best for: Heritage-grain pastries and naturally leavened sourdough

Heritage

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Brother-and-sister team Philip and Lauren Pretty run Long Beach’s only Michelin-starred restaurant from a converted Craftsman house in Rose Park. Philip’s tasting menu draws heavily from the organic produce grown at Heritage Farm, while Lauren oversees a restaurant that has also earned a Michelin Green Star for its sustainability practices. Dinner unfolds without much ceremony in a compact dining room that still feels connected to the residential neighborhood outside.

Best for: Farm-driven Michelin-starred tasting menus

Homareya

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Kyoto-born chef-owner Yoya Takahashi opened Homareya as an izakaya centered on the drinking-and-dining culture he grew up with in Japan. Takahashi makes his own koji, miso, soy sauce, and mirin, then uses them throughout a menu that has included monkfish karaage, a layered dashi omelet, and black cod marinated in sweet miso. Charcoal-grilled yakitori and a deep sake list provide plenty of reason to remain at the counter.

Best for: Kyoto-rooted izakaya cooking and sake

La Parolaccia Osteria

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Rome native Stefano Procaccini and his family founded La Parolaccia to serve the pastas and pizzas they knew from home. The kitchen makes its pasta daily for plates of carbonara and pillowy gnocchi, alongside thin-crust Roman-style pizzas from the wood-burning oven. Tables sit close together, Italian wine moves quickly, and the volume tends to climb as dinner rolls along.

Best for: Roman pasta and wood-fired pizza

Olive & Rose

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Heritage siblings Philip and Lauren Pretty opened Olive & Rose inside the renovated City Center hotel in Downtown Long Beach. Philip applies the same local sourcing that guides Heritage to a more casual menu of dry-aged burgers, steak frites, and oysters on the half shell. The restaurant’s leafy courtyard works equally well for dinner or a cocktail away from the traffic on Atlantic Avenue.

Best for: Bistro cooking on a hotel courtyard

Phnom Penh Noodle Shack

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Cambodian refugees Bun Heu Tan and Maly B. Tan opened Phnom Penh Noodle Shack in 1985 with five tables and an early-morning clientele of local doughnut bakers finishing their overnight shifts. Their children now run the restaurant, serving kuy teav with pork broth, rice noodles, herbs, and a choice of meats, along with crisp fried dough sticks for dipping. The compact dining room remains busy from breakfast through its midafternoon closing.

Best for: Cambodian noodle soup and an early lunch

Selva

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At Selva in the Zaferia district, Cali-born chef Carlos Jurado cooks Colombian food over a wood-fired grill. The menu moves through mushroom croquettes, grilled chuzos, carne asada, and seasonal fish cooked over the wood-fired grill, alongside cocktails featuring tropical fruit and Colombian spirits. Dark wood, loud music, and a busy bar give the dining room the energy of a Colombian gathering that has moved well past dinner.

Best for: Colombian cooking from the wood-fired grill

Sky Room

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The Sky Room occupies the 14th floor of the restored Fairmont Breakers, where the restaurant first opened in 1938. Its current menu includes California Wagyu beef Wellington, Dungeness crab cake with smoked trout roe and beurre blanc, and red-wine-braised short ribs with maitake mushrooms and potato mousseline. Art Deco details and panoramic views across the harbor and toward Catalina Island have returned along with it.

Best for: Historic glamour and harbor views

Sushi Nikkei

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Chef Eduardo Chang Ogata and his wife and business partner, Daiwa Wong Olano, operate Sushi Nikkei locations in Bixby Knolls and Belmont Shore. Their menu explores the Japanese-Peruvian cooking that developed within Peru’s Nikkei community, pairing precise sushi technique with ingredients such as ají amarillo, leche de tigre, cancha, and rocoto peppers. Chang’s yellowtail tiradito with jalapeño and ponzu and catch-of-the-day tiradito with tiger milk, sweet potato, and toasted corn show how naturally those traditions meet.

Best for: Japanese-Peruvian sushi and tiradito