25 of the best restaurants and bars for your Palm Springs or Coachella road trip (2024)

L.A. legends Susan Feniger and Mary Sue Milliken put their culinary muscle behind recently opened Alice B., a restaurant housed in an apartment community geared toward 55-and-older LGBTQ+ residents called Living Out. An early, eager customer base spans generations; the dining room, anchored by British American artist Jo Hay’s portraits of Alice B. Toklas and Gertrude Stein, is a heartening scene. Feniger and Milliken depart from their decades of focus on Mexican flavors, partnering with executive chef Lance Velasquez on a menu that bridges Continental and Mediterranean influences. Dinners feel most cohesive when you choose a direction: hummus and a gingery carrot soup with harissa crème fraîche followed by branzino over celery root remoulade with an olive-almond relish, say, or starters of biscuits and grilled asparagus with a retro-fun steak Diane entree. Listen closely to the description of nightly specials; they tend to preface the seasons with vegetable soups and include beautifully prepared fish. Brunch rightly doubles down on Velasquez’s obsession with biscuits.

There is no angle to breakfast and brunch that Palm Springs restaurants don’t cover: pretty, gritty, simple, lavish. To focus squarely on the cooking, Cheeky’s is my favorite. The menu doesn’t ramble on and on; Jose Ramirez and his kitchen team have complete command over the dishes. If there are at least two of us, we’re sharing the chilaquiles, layered with chorizo and tomatillo salsa, and the true-to-their-description “custard cheesy scrambled eggs.” The croissant-dough cinnamon rolls and buttery blueberry pancakes are also persuasive, as are specials like crisp-soft carnitas hash with fried eggs. It’s not my thing, but plenty of souls love the “bacon flight” whirling with flavors like truffle and dill pickle. Weekends, to no one’s surprise, are mobbed: Go early or late, or stick around for a far calmer weekday morning.

For four decades Tanya Petrovna has spent her career mastering plant-based cooking. With two locations — the Palm Springs flagship hidden in an industrial complex, with a small retail and deli space and a side dining room, and a second, roomier Palm Desert outpost — Chef Tanya’s Kitchen prepares an all-vegan mix of sandwiches, soups, salads and desserts. For broadest appeal Petrovna leans in on textural meat protein substitutes like tofu, tempeh and wheat-based seitan; I’m happiest eating a panini or other hot sandwich that includes gently smoked tofu “bacon” in its tiers. The Palm Desert menu has a bowl of meat-free, dairy-free chili cheese fries that nonetheless comes off as indulgent. Both stores also sell a savvy mix of groceries to entice serious cooks of all types: I clocked an excellent brand of dried pasta from Naples, Chris Bianco’s first-rate canned tomatoes, a deep selection of Burlap & Barrel spices and Rancho Gordo’s heirloom beans and bottled sauces.

Felipe Castañeda and his wife, Lisbet, opened El Mirasol in 1985, centering their menu on family recipes drawn from their home state of Zacatecas in north-central Mexico. Theirs is comfort food reminiscent of L.A.’s newer school of classic Mexican restaurants: nachos, queso fundido and combination plates of enchiladas, tamales and chile rellenos, but also nuanced pollo en pipian and an earthy sweet mole poblano. I gravitate to the pork chile verde — excellent on its own or in an enchilada, where the bright flavors zing through the blanket of melted cheese — or the lightly smoky camarones a la diabla. There are two locations, including one in the Los Arboles hotel, which the couple owns; the restaurants reside on opposite sides of often-thronged downtown, so their chill patios double as retreats from the masses.

When it comes to drinking establishments, I seek out calm, so I favor this speakeasy run by Dean Lavine, the owner of Blackbook in the often-rowdy Arenas District. Yes, the notion of a bar shrouded in Prohibition-era-style secrecy has been overplayed nationwide during the co*cktail renaissance of the new millennium — but it’s Palm Springs. Camp and fun are ways of life. The undisclosed location, revealed as soon as you make a reservation, is the kitschiest aspect. The space brims with midcentury glamour: dim lights, velvety wallpaper, glowing shelves filled with bottles, a marble bar so polished it mirrors its surroundings like a reflecting pool. The most tongue-in-cheek touch? Above the bar hangs a portrait of actor Udo Kier, a friend of Lavine’s, captured with an intimidating expression that conjures mobsters and Mario Puzo. Ask for the bar crew’s stellar version of the Scofflaw, a concoction credited to Harry’s Bar in Paris in the 1920s. Rye whiskey, vermouth, grenadine, lime juice and orange bitters sounds counterintuitive but lands smooth and savory. Note that Evening Citizen serves no food — only drinks and a low-key escape.

Farm looks like a film-set reverie of a Palm Springs restaurant: Its garden patio, set amid the Spanish Colonial Revival architecture of the town’s nearly century-old La Plaza shopping center, leads to a space divided into small rooms with country-inn vibes and vaunted tongue-and-groove ceilings. I say this in the kindest way: It’s the kind of nonoffensive, crowd-pleasing place where you feel gravitationally pulled in an American resort town, even if you are a resident. Breakfast and lunch menus reveal a slight French accent — sweet and buckwheat-flour-laced savory crepes, nicely pale omelets, croque-madame — though I’m most partial at brunch to the migas with chorizo and avocado. Dinner five days a week charms with a 1980s vibe. The staff writes the short, weekly-changing menu of four starters and four entrees on chalkboards. Selections swing to things like poached pear and blue cheese salad, halibut over garlic mashed potatoes and Chilean sea bass over Parmesan risotto with a vegetarian main among them, often pasta.

To answer the first question often asked of a Salvadoran restaurant: Yes, the pupusas served by Kristina Fernanda-Morales and her parents are very good. Handsomely griddled, not-too-thick corn cakes encase traditional fillings such as queso and loroco or revueltas (refritos, pork and cheese), with a couple of playful variations including the strawberry-red Hot Momma, jolted with Flamin’ Hot Cheetos. Delve further into the family’s repertoire with a satisfying combination platter featuring carne asada smothered in onions, chicharrones, fried yuca, plantain, rice and beans. Fernanda-Morales also will mention seasonal specials such as pescado forrado, a Lenten dish of reconstituted bacalao fried in fluffy egg batter and draped in light tomato sauce. The restaurant’s shopping-center exterior gives little away, but inside murals and paintings of rural El Salvador brighten the dining room. This would be a welcoming place to bring kids.

The restaurant’s name for me summons a spin on Boston Market with a Gallic twist. Totally wrong. Parisian-born Fabienne Fuentes and her husband, Luis, preside over a sedate, grown-up room where garlicky escargot, Cognac-laced chicken mousse and boeuf Bourguignon land on white linens. Los Angeles has few traditionalist French restaurants left, so the careful, energized cooking here feels like an anomaly and a treat. One of the best versions of cassoulet I’ve had in Southern California layered duck confit with two types of sausages (pork and duck) in a saucy stew of soft white beans. It hit just right on a cool desert night; for far hotter months there are mussels in white wine-fennel broth or the namesake rotisserie chicken, its skin rendered to precise crispness and fragrant with Provençal herbs. A free-form mille feuille filled with Meyer lemon curd is precise in its textural contrasts and spot-on as a finale.

More than 14 million people visit the Greater Palm Springs area annually; no establishment serving distinctive food ever remains a hidden gem for long. Gabino’s Creperie sits in a short alley between two buildings near the corner where Palm Canyon Drive veers at a 45-degree angle. Marcel Ramirez, a native of Palm Springs, opened his creperie as a takeout window in 2020 after starting the business as a pop-up in 2018. He took his original inspiration for serving crepes from the slightly thicker panqueques his Argentine father made when he was growing up. Cooks shape the filled crepes into wide-mouthed cones wrapped in paper. Star ingredients recall popular menu items at diners and sports bars: buffalo chicken with bacon bits and ranch, turkey and cheddar, chicken pesto. The genius twist? Ramirez folds cheese into the batter, so the cooked edges take on the lacy savor of a quesotaco. Tables scattered along the walkway are usually full; some customers end up leaning against whatever free wall space they can find. Everyone seems to understand the crepes are best eaten immediately.

After navigating their smashburger pop-up through the pandemic, husband-and-wife team Brad and Crystal Reih settled into a space last spring vacated by long-running Mexican restaurant JJ’s Oasis Latino. (Its owners retired.) Day or night, the Heyday is Palm Springs’ burger destination of the moment. Its menu runs succinct, centered around three burger variations — including a mushroom-based vegetarian option — and a fried chicken sandwich. My go-to: a double cheeseburger with bacon, hold the shredded lettuce. Twin crisp-edged patties droop beyond the potato bun, its ooze of melting American slices and Thousand Island dressing cut with the wispy crunch of caramelized onions. Alongside, onion rings take the slight edge over crinkle fries. Classic co*cktails (negroni, Tom Collins, Jim and co*ke) comprise the equally concise co*cktail list. “What gins do you have for a martini?” I asked our server from one of the small room’s tufted burgundy-leather booths. “Only Tanqueray,” he answered. Respect to a busy operation that masters its tight focus.

The pop-up founded by Omar Limon, his wife, Blanca Flores Torres, and his brother Arnold Limon becomes a darling of every food writer who passes through Palm Springs. In a few ever-changing dishes, the team pulls off modern Mexican cooking better than many of its bricks-and-mortar equivalents in Los Angeles. The tostadas balance intellect, intuition and textures, arrayed with combinations like silky tuna, pureed avocado and agreeably gritty salsa macha or chicken tinga with refried lentils and jocoque, the Mexican variation on Lebanese labneh. Omar’s birria ramen tastes exactly how you hope it will when pairing those two words: warming, complex, comforting. While the trio works toward realizing their goal of opening a restaurant, the best way to find them is to follow them on Instagram. As of this writing, they appear on Wednesday evenings at Truss & Twine, the stylish bar attached to Workshop. Arrive early; I share from experience that the food sells out fast.

The main draw of Johannes Bacher’s restaurant can be conveyed in a word: schnitzel. Bacher is a native of Austria. He and his kitchen crew have the lock on frying pounded, breaded veal or chicken into plate-size discs with sheer, rippling fringes. The menu details half a dozen variations in sauces; I’ve tried most of them and prefer the schnitzel unadorned or in a restrained lemon-caper sauce. This being Palm Springs, where poolside physiques often take priority over caloric splurges, the schnitzel can be requested without breading (which then is technically more of a cutlet) or sidestepped entirely for a broadly New American entree like dilled salmon and spinach in fumet. Really, though, come with an appetite for schnitzel — even better with a side of squiggly spaetzle suspended in Gruyère and Fontina.

Among Palm Springs’ multitude of hotel restaurants, the reenvisioned diner at the Ace Hotel strikes the right balance. It doesn’t attempt pointless fanciness; the dining room has the kind of comforting Midcentury Modern kitsch that makes Clark Street Diner in Hollywood Hills endlessly appealing; and the shaded patio overlooks the hotel’s enormous, angled pool (a scene unto itself). Breakfast and lunch hit their marks: omelets and scrambles, a breakfast burrito that crunches with tater tots, familiar Caesars and wedge and chopped salads, and a pesto-laced grilled chicken sandwich. Dinner veers between similar crowd-pleasers and a rotation of more ambitious dishes, like a New Orleans-inspired montage of fish, shrimp, crab and andouille with red beans and dirty rice.

Amid Yucca Valley’s burgeoning restaurant scene — keeping in step with the area’s intense popularity among Angelenos and other visitors — Nikki Hill and Claire Wadsworth’s dream diner qualifies as a destination restaurant, from Palm Springs or from Los Angeles. The restaurant operates from 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Thursday through Sunday. The vibe is casual, and the place is no secret: La Copine accepts limited reservations, and the rest of us show up and expect a wait. Patience brings Hill’s cooking. The menu of salads, sandwiches, vegetable plates and several entrees doesn’t read as radical or idiosyncratic. But the combinations are so intentional, and the plucking of global ideas so thoughtful, that the results come off feeling personal. Dishes evolve with the seasons. Expect a lemony smoked salmon with one foot in Lyon and the other in Santa Monica; a fun, smart, eggy breakfast sandwich with garnishes of date jam and muenster; and a few substantial entrees like chicken piccata over grits. The service staff, led by ebullient Wadsworth, has as much character and individualism as the food.

Doubling essentially as the lobby of the Drift hotel, which opened in March 2023, Maleza stands out among recent openings in downtown Palm Springs. Chef Ysaac Ramirez oversees a daytime menu of morning breakfast standards (pancakes, chilaquiles, breakfast burrito) and tacos, salads and a cheeseburger topped with molten queso Oaxaca among lunch options. The cooking at dinner best showcases Ramirez’s talents; Mexican flavors predominate among the shareable, globally inspired plates. Bright openers like grapefruit-spritzed scallop crudo and lemony carrots with chimichurri made using leafy carrot tops cede to the richness of masa dumplings and king trumpet mushrooms in a velvety mole blanco. If you’re ever in the mood for a drink and dessert to end the night, land at the restaurant’s bar for very good churros with cajeta caramel and chocolate sauces and a shot of tequila, mezcal or sotol from an impressive list.

The mounted menu board at Meng’s, run by Imelda Abaya and her family, announces their Filipino restaurant’s breakfast specialty: silog, a platter of sinangag (the Tagalog word that describes garlic fried rice) and itlog (egg, often served sunny side up or boiled). Choose from nearly two dozen options for a lead protein. I veer toward tocino (a chewy-crisp, caramelized variation on bacon) or fried pork chops, but other options include Spam, grilled chicken skewers, Spanish sardines and fried eggplant. At lunchtime, have a conversation with Abaya and cast your eyes over the steam table to see what most appeals. The flavors of pork or chicken adobo gently ripple with vinegar and soy sauce. If it’s available, order laing; its textured puree of taro leaves (and sometimes other greens) creamed in coconut milk with spices and shrimp paste nicely contrasts meats and melds with the white rice served with most meals. Regulars tend to fill the handful of tables in the small space, housed in the northwest corner of Cathedral City Marketplace shopping center, and plenty of others swing by for takeout.

Palm Springs’ toniest steakhouse — a reenvisioning of Lyons English Grille, opened in 1945 — has grown on me over the years. It’s the crown jewel of Tara Lazar’s F10 Creative, a restaurant group with other local properties that include breakfast favorite Cheeky’s and its adjacent Italian staple Birba. San Francisco-based architectural designer Brent Kanbayashi channeled the 1940s in his redo of the space; a warren of mod rooms culminates with the center dining room, lined in rich woods and chartreuse-green banquettes that recall a midcentury luxury ocean liner. Stay close to chophouse classics for maximum satisfaction: shrimp co*cktail, wedge salad, a slab of prime rib or a dry-aged New York strip when it’s available, with sides of seasonal vegetables (love the simple goodness of Coachella Valley corn in summer and fall) and crackly-skinned twice-baked potato or mac and cheese. Service can be harried and uneven on packed nights. The bar’s always-excellent dry martinis encourage my serenity.

In 2018, Paul O’Halloran opened a business in a nondescript strip mall several miles from downtown Palm Springs. The sign out front simply reads “Bar/Food.” The mystery only made would-be imbibers and diners curious about what might be happening inside. They found a small space with a few booths and a mirrored, mahogany-lined bar that O’Halloran designed as an homage to his early hospitality jobs in New Jersey and New York. If he originally envisioned Paul Bar as a neighborhood haunt, he eventually adjusted to nightly, eager crowds. Be prepared for O’Halloran and his deadpan humor to meet you at the door, letting you know how long the wait might be. As someone who has tagged along with friends who live in Palm Springs, I can tell you he’s kind to regulars — and that he makes a martini as dry and delicious as his wit. It’s excellent alongside a burger or steak frites.

Waiting in the fast-moving morning line that stretches out the door of Christophe and Helene Meyer’s 10-year-old pastry shop in the Sun Center strip mall has become a Palm Springs tradition. Christophe oversees making the breads, layer cakes and baked goods; Helene trills “Bonjour” to customers as they approach the counter to order. Like any repeat customer, I have landed on favorites: the sticky-crisp kouign amann, a fluffy bun filled with custard lightly scented with orange blossom, the appealingly Americanized butterscotch-pecan twist. Don’t skip over the Lorrain, a breakfast cake flavored with almonds and a splash of plum brandy, filled with preserved Mirabelle plums and decorated with the double cross of France’s eastern Lorraine region, rendered in powdered sugar. I also tend to rip off hunks of warm baguette before I make it out of the parking lot. Note the couple routinely closes Peninsula Pastries during the desert’s hottest summer months.

I don’t believe in wrong answers when it comes to people’s preferences for delis. Manhattan in the Desert and Sherman’s Deli & Bakery both have their deserved adherents. The Real Italian Deli opened in Palm Desert in 2013; a year later, owner John DeVita debuted a small Palm Springs location wedged into a strip mall. I’m a fan of its hot sandwiches, particularly the sausage and peppers sub saturated with fairly obscene amounts of melted mozzarella. A chewy, precisely seasoned farro salad makes a cleansing side dish. The shop qualifies as a restaurant — an indoor communal table set with oilcloth and a couple of metal picnic tables outside constitute the seating — but it’s largely geared for takeout. With that in mind: If you have access to a kitchen, take home the lasagna and warm it in the oven. Something of its textural beauty is lost when the staff reheats it in a microwave on-site.

Tai Spendley spent years working as a food and beverage director for hotels throughout the country before opening his own restaurant. For his menu he channeled the adaptive culinary style of his mother, who immigrated from Vietnam and synthesized her native cuisine with what she could find in American grocery stores. It was a relief when the restaurant reopened in June after an electrical fire temporarily closed the business last winter. Garlicky, chile-sparked chicken wings sticky in their glaze of caramelized fish sauce deliver on their obvious appeal; pair them with a starter of sliced okra in a wonderfully crunchy mulch of peanuts, shallots, garlic and ginger. Spendley’s version of bo luc lac, or “shaking beef,” winningly bounces through its salty, sweet and peppery notes. Rooster and the Pig, named for two compatible animals in the Vietnamese zodiac calendar, doesn’t take reservations; sip a Singha lager or one of the lime-bright co*cktails next door at the restaurant’s lounge while you wait.

Rejecting the concept of brunch isn’t technically allowed within the city limits of Palm Springs. Wilma & Frieda, named after the grandmothers of sibling owners Kelly McFall and Kreg Alexander, serves comfort foods squarely on the breakfast-lunch continuum: waffles, French toast, build-your-own-scrambles, entree-size salads, hefty burgers and sandwiches. This is another resort town pleaser in the noblest sense. On its lengthy menu most anyone can find something calorically indulgent and agreeable. One person in my friend circle unfailingly orders the biscuits with gravy flecked with both sausage and bacon. Another asks for griddled meatloaf (Ritz crackers and Lipton soup mix are its secret ingredients) and fried eggs. I’m the one always trying something new: Recently it was a roast beef melt with griddled onions and a nice vinegary hit of whole grain mustard. The original is in a Palm Desert mall with plenty of parking, and the second Palm Springs location is bigger and, when planning for inevitable waits during high season, usually less crowded than Cheeky’s a half-mile away.

After a brief run with a second location in Los Angeles, the original Workshop in Palm Springs remains the destination for chef and co-owner Michael Beckman’s California-Mediterranean cuisine, as sensory in its ingredient combinations as it is brainy. I love sitting at the bar in the back of the modernist cathedral of a dining room. The bartenders are some of the most skilled in the city, and it’s a more relaxed option for grazing until you’re full. Small plates show off the kitchen’s creative minds: Fried rice tossed with pork belly, kimchi and a fried egg and a lamb kefta plate with plush flatbread are perennial hits. Otherwise, look for dishes full of vegetables that roll with the growing seasons.