CITY GUIDES | VERMONT

Burlington Has a Big-City Appetite

The best restaurants in Burlington bring Michelin-level cooking, French sauces, Chinese feasts, and serious pizza.

By Eric Barton | July 7, 2026

Bistro de Margot

AUTHOR BIO: Eric Barton is editor of The Adventurist and a freelance journalist who has reviewed restaurants for more than two decades. Email him here.

The first time I went to Burlington, I was in college, visiting a friend at UVM, and mostly trying to figure out where the bars were. He took me to a Thai restaurant, the first Thai food I’d ever had, and afterward we walked through a city I was too young and dumb to fully appreciate: brick storefronts, cold lake air, the Adirondacks still clinging to the last fall leaves across the water.

I’ve been back many times since, and the food is now the point. Burlington has the feel of a small city that got lucky with its setting and then figured out how to eat: French sauces, Chinese feasts, Eastern Mediterranean mezze, wood-fired pizza, Vermont farms, serious cocktails, and chefs with James Beard attention.

Here’s where to eat in Burlington right now.

A Single Pebble

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A Single Pebble has been feeding Burlington from Bank Street long enough that the room can feel almost ceremonial when the big plates start landing. Order it that way, with pork dumplings, cha shao buns, mock eel, water beef, and tangerine peel chicken moving around the table. The pleasure here is in the passing and reaching, the little pour of tea, the quiet calculation over who gets the last dumpling.

Best for: Family-style Chinese and a full table

Bistro de Margot

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Chef Hervé Mahé grew up in Burgundy, trained at Ferrandi in Paris, worked in Michelin-starred kitchens, and eventually brought that long French résumé to College Street. Bistro de Margot serves a $78 three-course prix fixe built around dishes like escargots de Bourgogne, steak frites, moules frites, venison loin, and Paris-Brest. The dining room runs polished and grown-up, with white tablecloths, practiced service, and sauces that make the case on their own.

Best for: Classic French cooking and a proper prix fixe

Cafe Dim Sum Burlington Vermont Best Restaurants

Café Dim Sum

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Sam Lai and Li Lin opened Café Dim Sum on St. Paul Street in 2021, then expanded after Burlington made clear 20 seats weren’t going to handle the demand. Daytime is for dumplings, fried turnip cake, sticky rice steamed in lotus leaves, custard buns, and pots of tea. At night, the restaurant shifts into hot pot, giving the room a second life after dark and a reason to settle in.

Best for: Dim sum, hot pot, and a table that likes to share

Fancy’s

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Paul Trombly came out of Mister Foods Fancy and Honey Road before opening Fancy’s in the Old North End, where his vegetable-heavy cooking earned him a 2026 James Beard finalist spot for Best Chef: Northeast. Think carrot mochi, falafel-encased olives, crispy rice pancakes, pastrami yuba sandwiches, duck breast specials, and Detroit-style pizza nights. The 20-seat restaurant shares space with Poppy during the day, uses no proper wine glasses, and makes dinner feel more like a standing invitation than a production.

Best for: Vegetables, small rooms, and James Beard-level cooking without ceremony

Frankie’s

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Chef Jordan Ware and Cindi Kozak, both Hen of the Wood alums, teamed up in 2024 for what quickly became one of Burlington’s most useful restaurants. Ware’s kitchen works closely with Wood Mountain Fish, which has shown up in dishes like scallop crudo and black bass, alongside rye brioche, pork croquettes, and a New York strip. The bar has marble, martinis, creemee-washed bourbon, and enough surprises to make this a weekly stop for the regulars.

Best for: Seafood, cocktails, and a lively Cherry Street dinner

The Grey Jay

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Cara Tobin and Allison Gibson built The Grey Jay as Honey Road’s daytime counterpart, with the same Eastern Mediterranean vocabulary moved into breakfast and lunch. The menu has tahini French toast, shakshuka, crispy eggplant sabich, chicken shawarma, Tunisian deviled eggs, kibbeh-spiced potatoes, and haloumi biscuits. Burlington brunch gets a little sharper here, especially with Turkish coffee or a Harissa Bloody Mary on the table.

Best for: Eastern Mediterranean brunch and a better midday meal

Hen of the Wood

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Eric Warnstedt opened the original Hen of the Wood in Waterbury in 2005 and then added the Burlington location in 2013, both of them helping to define what modern Vermont dining looks like. The Burlington menu changes daily, but recently included beef tartare with fried oysters and parsley aioli, sorrel cannelloni smothered in bechamel and spinach, and a ribeye for two with grilled radicchio. The restaurant sits still treats local sourcing as not just an ideal but the actual structure of the meal.

Best for: Vermont ingredients, mushroom toast, and a serious dinner

Honey Road

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Cara Tobin and Allison Gibson opened Honey Road in 2017, and the James Beard Foundation keeps noticing: Best New Restaurant semifinalist, multiple Best Chef: Northeast nods for Tobin, and a 2025 Outstanding Restaurateur finalist spot for the duo. The menu is built around mezze, with house-made pita, tahini hummus, red pepper walnut muhammara, lamb dolma, braised lamb buns, harissa chicken wings, lamb kofta, and walnut baklava. The smartest order is probably more than the table thinks it needs.

Best for: Mezze, groups, and another round of pita

Juniper Burlington Vermont Best Restaurants

Juniper Bar & Restaurant

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Juniper is Hotel Vermont’s in-house restaurant, and chef Doug Paine’s menus put Vermont farms right in the foreground. Breakfast might mean red flannel hash or buttermilk pancakes, while dinner moves through smoked trout dip, pan-fried spaetzle, miso black cod, chèvre gnocchi, walleye, duck breast, and Steak Diane. The bar helps carry the place, from the Hotel Vermont Negroni to local beer, natural wine, and cocktails built with real attention.

Best for: Vermont sourcing, cocktails, and a polished hotel meal

May Day

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May Day opened in the Old North End with seasonal food, natural wine, and craft cocktails, then Avery Buck cooked it into the 2025 James Beard finals before leaving in May 2026. The current menu still has bite: deviled eggs with chili crisp and trout roe, pork belly skewers, chicken liver mousse, skate cheeks, hand-rolled pappardelle, pork schnitzel, steak frites, snap pea risotto, and Sunday-only $10 patty melts. It feels like a bar that decided dinner should do more than keep people drinking.

Best for: Natural wine, skate cheeks, and Sunday patty melts

Pizzeria Verità

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Pizzeria Verità opened in 2012 with a wood-fired Acunto oven, Neapolitan technique, Italian ingredients, Vermont toppings, and a bar program that got real attention. Leslie Wells and John Rao own it, with Dan Cervantes as head chef, and the current menu includes a Vermont Country Smokehouse pepperoni turned into those perfect little ‘roni cups, Italian sausage and mushroom, and a Nutella pizza to finish it off. It’s a downtown pizza dinner with grown-up habits.

Best for: Neapolitan pizza, cocktails, and house-made mozzarella

Trattoria Delia

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Trattoria Delia opened in 1993 inside the historic Vermont House condo building, with a large Panton stone fireplace and the bones of a New Hampshire sugar house giving the dining room its character. Leslie Wells and John Rao now lead the restaurant, which keeps its Italian focus through dishes such as zuppa di pesce, panzanella primavera, polipo alla griglia, and lamb and pea agnolotti. It’s the Burlington Italian reservation for low light, seafood, pasta, and a long bottle.

Best for: Rustic Italian cooking, wine, and a downtown date night