5 best restaurants in Siem Reap

Are you planning your trip and looking for the best restaurants in Siem Reap?
Exploring Cambodia cuisine is a journey full of surprises. Especially, when it comes to Siem Reap, you’ll be immersed in a fascinating world of restaurants, ranging widely from home-style cooking in a traditional wooden house to contemporary experiments in Cambodian-European fusion.

Here are top 5 best restaurants in Siem Reap recommended by GoAsiaDayTrip. Let’s check out together!

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1. Cuisine Wat Damnak

 

The lovely decoration of Cuisine Wat Damnak

Opened in 2001, Wat Damnak is the first restaurant of Cambodia to be ranked in the Asia’s 50 best restaurants list and this is unquestionably a paradise for foodies. With a commitment to fresh local produce, almost all ingredients of Cuisine Wat Damnak are from nearby farms around Siem Reap.

Standout dishes include crispy beef tongue with shiny cresson, ripe and pickled green papaya salad, garnished with herbs, edible flowers, fermented tomato sauce, beef and clam reduction; all are served in a traditional wooden Cambodian home, surrounded by trees, local herbs, artworks and handicrafts. To keep itself interesting, this is one of the few restaurants in Siem Reap that refresh their menu on a fortnight basis.

Address: Wat Damnak Market Street, P.O. Box 93108
Tel: +855 77 347 762

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2. Marum

 

The design of restaurant brings the comfort for all guests coming there

Another special one among all restaurants in Siem Reap is Marum which is run by Kaliyan Mith, an NGO offers training and employment to disadvantaged children. Marum is a two-storey traditional wooden villa sitting right next to Wat Polanka Pagoda, a short 10-minute tuk tuk ride from the Old Market area. The setting of this restaurant is a tranquil garden illuminated with fairy lights. Coming to Marum, your mouth will be watered before an extensive menu of vegetarian, seafood and meat tapas-style dishes. Highlights include red-tree ant beef and chilli stir-fry and mini crocodile burgers.

Opening Hours: Daily 11:00 – 22:00
Address: 8A, B Slokram Village, Siem Reap
Tel: +855 17 363 284

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3. Bugs Café - Among the most special restaurants in Siem Reap

 

You can have chance to challenge yourself with many scared food

If someone asks me “What are the most special restaurants in Siem Reap?” my answer will definitely be Bugs Café. This unique restaurant is located quite near the Angkor Night Market, just three-minute away to walk. Its name is not a metaphor and it literally serves dishes made from bugs like crickets, scorpions, grasshoppers, ants, bees, silkworms, and spiders. Standing out on the menu are scorpion and green papaya salad, tarantula donuts, Mediterranean Feuillet’s with ants, and savoury cupcakes garnished with crickets and silkworms.

With an air-conditioned lounge on the ground floor and a cosy traditional wooden terrace on the second, Bug Cafe will promisingly bring you an exotic dinning experience that you can hardly get at any other restaurants in Siem Reap.

Opening Hours: Daily 17:00 - late
Address: 351, Thmey Village, Angkor Night Market Street, Siem Reap
Tel: +855 17 764 560

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4. Banlle Vegetarian Restaurant

If you are looking for a healthy bite in Cambodia, Banlle Vegetarian Restaurant is made for you - “A lovely venue with a very calm and pretty garden setting”. Perhaps a lot of restaurants in Siem Reap have a garden setting and this may not be a standout feature anymore. The thing that makes Banlle Vegetarian Restaurant unique is that this vegetarian restaurant uses seasonal vegetables to offer 100% vegetarian cuisine to support vegetarianism-environment awareness, health and the animals’ right.

With its own farm surrounding, this local restaurant of Wat Bo Village grows it own vegetables to provide healthy meals. Price ranges from 2.50 USD to 5 USD. The menu is a mix of Western and Asian with standouts including quesadilla (US$4) served with guacamole, vegetable amok (US$3.50) with steamed rice, and vegan eggplant tempura (US$3). If you’re looking for vegan restaurants in Siem Reap, don’t waste your time to search around, hurry up to try out this amazing one!

Opening Hours: Wednesday – Monday 11:00 – 21:30
Address: Road 26, Wat Bo Village, Siem Reap
Tel: +855 85 330 160

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5. Mie Café

 

Food and drink there area very eye-catching

Mie Café is considered as paradise for foodie, listed among one of the most tranquil restaurants in Siem Reap. Located just off the road to Angkor, Mie Café features gourmet cuisine in a serene garden setting. The Khmer traditional house with outdoor patio and a garden creates such a refreshing atmosphere to enjoy the treats. Standout dishes include beef laab salad, tuna tartar, and curry with prawn ravioli. With a mix of Asian flavours, western techniques and family secret, dishes made by Chef Pola are surprisingly original and creative, which makes Mie Café one of the best restaurants in Siem Reap.

Opening Hours: 11am-2pm & 5.30-10pm Wed-Mon
Address: near Angkor Conservation
Tel: 069 999 0961.

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These are top 5 places for a nice meal in Siem Reap. You can read more information about activities and services by GoAsiaDayTrip here.

Cambodia tarantula: What it’s like to eat?

To travel the world means that you may get to eat many kinds of unusual food. When it comes to Cambodia, there is a joke like “you can eat every creature which can move, from a hairy spider to a tiny grasshopper”. To some tourists, creepy crawlers like spiders or scorpions may be a nightmare and they even can frighten a weak-hearted traveler to death, not to mention truly eating a Cambodia tarantula. 

However, the famous delicacy of tarantula fried with garlic is considered as a favorite snack of many Cambodian and it is even getting more and more expensive. Are you curious enough to try out one yet? OK, let’s find out together what it’s like to really take a bite out of a Cambodia tarantula. 

Eating tarantulas is not a long-dated practice in Cambodia and the dish didn’t appear on menu at the first place as a speciality. This delicacy was actually born out of necessity. In the 1970s, Cambodia was ruled by Pol Pot and the radical communist movement – Khmer Rouge – which pushed people to a terrible famine and they had to eat everything they could find. Then, people realized that some insects like scorpions, silkworms, grasshoppers and tarantula turned out to be tasty so they are remained as a part of Cambodia diet.  

How to cook a Combodia tarantula 

It’s really easy to cook a tarantula and I think Cambodia tarantula recipe is the simplest cooking practice in the world. First, you need to prepare some salt and garlic, dip the spider in the mix and then fry it in sizzling pan full of oil. Then, it’s ready to be served and enjoyed.  

Tarantula is fried in the pan full of oil

To get a tasty fried tarantula, you can look for vendors and markets or even join a cooking class. The tarantula cooking class is opened seven days a week and it costs around $22.Within 90 minutes, you will have chance to learn about not only how to cook a creepy creature and turn it into food but you will know more about Cambodia cuisine for sure. Also, I think to go local and go for a Cambodia tarantula hunting will absolutely add more fun to this. 

What it’s like to eat a Cambodia tarantula 

You should eat ít body first

For some people who fear of insects, they might choose to eat the legs first because they look crunchy and less unappealing than other parts. However, suggestion is that you should try the body first since it is the best and taste more. A bite of fried tarantulas goes like the whole body of the creature has just exploded into your mouth. Seconds later, you may shout in surprise “It tastes like crab…”, That’s right, a Cambodia tarantula tastes similar to crab although its hairy nightmarish appearance may make you lost your appetite. According to the famous actress Angelina Jolie, its flavor is actually really good so why don’t you dare to try! 

Angelia Jolie learned how to cook this dish

Price for a piece of Cambodian tarantula now stays at $1 which was tenfold over the last decade. Deforestation and over-exploitation are both responsible for this dramatic rise in price.  

The disappearance of jungles will sooner or later drive tarantulas out of their existence. The Cambodian are not afraid of spiders. The only fear to them is that their favorite delicacy will disappear some day and their children will never know what it’s like to eat a Cambodia tarantula due to over-harvesting and jungle wipeout.  

Some other travel information of Cambodia you might need:

1. 10 best restaurants in Phnom Penh
2. 5 best restaurants in Siem Reap
3. Nightlife escape in Siem Reap