15 Best Restaurants in Williamsburg, Williamsburg and Hampton Roads

Saws, pitchforks, ox yokes, and the like hang on the barn walls, but the wood tables are lacquered, and the napkins are linen. Specialties include slow-roasted prime rib; baby-back Danish pork ribs barbecued with a sauce of peach preserves and Southern Comfort; and shrimp Dijon. An ample wine list offers a wide variety of domestic and imported choices. After dinner try one their specialty coffees including Tennessee Mud with Jack Daniels or Franciscan Coffee. A children's menu is available.

With vaulted ceilings and hardwood floors, the Trellis is an airy and pleasant place. The imaginative lunch and dinner menus change with the seasons. A good wine list complements such dishes as homemade sweet red pepper soup, beef tenderloin with cabernet sauce, and grilled market fish. The seafood entrées are particularly good, and many patrons wouldn't leave without ordering the rich Death by Chocolate, the restaurant's signature dessert. There's also great people-watching from the terrace.

One of the most reliable seafood spots around, Berret's is in Merchants Square. Upscale but casual, the restaurant lights crackling fires during colder months and opens up its pleasant outdoor patio when it's warm. Entrées and appetizers employ fresh Chesapeake Bay seafood. It's usually a sure bet to try any of the nightly specials of fresh fish, which often include perfectly prepared flounder. The she-crab soup, a house favorite, blends crabmeat, cream, and crab roe with just a hint of sherry. Virginia wines and beers are featured.

A reconstructed 18th-century alehouse, Chowning's serves casual quick fare for lunch, including traditional pit-style barbecue, beef brisket sandwiches, and Smithfield ham and Gloucester cheese on a pretzel roll. You can eat either inside the tavern or under a grape arbor behind the tavern. After 5 pm, Chowning's becomes a true Colonial tavern where Gambols (18th-century entertainment), a program presented for 25 years, operates throughout the evening. Costumed balladeers lead family sing-alongs, and costumed servers play popular games of the day. From 8 pm until closing, Chowning's caters to a more mature audience.

Across the street from the Capitol, this tavern serves traditional seafood from the rest of the British colonies of North America. Mrs. Campbell's favorite dishes are sherried shrimp, scallops, and lobster, as well as the Waterman's Supper and lump crab cakes—the tavern's signature dish. An evening's entertainment might include storytelling or traditional music. George Washington often met with local residents at Mrs. Campbell's tavern. Dinner reservations are required.

It's easy to forget that this is a college town, but this cheerful dive keeps up the school spirit. The white-brick eatery is dark and scruffy inside. Walls are hung with fraternity and sorority pictures, graduation snapshots, and sports-team photos. Booths and tables are in the William and Mary colors of green and gold. Deli sandwiches, subs, specialty pizzas, pasta, stromboli, and Greek dishes are all prepared with fresh ingredients and are all delicious, and there's a wide selection of beers on tap. The Delly delivers free to nearby hotels from 6 pm to 1 am.

This 18th-century-style chophouse is where the gentry dined, and is still the finest of the historic area's four Colonial taverns. Colonial delicacies include roast prime rib of beef, pork chops, Cornish hen, game pie, and favorites such as peanut soup. Mrs. Vobe's Tavern Dinner, named after the tavern's 18th-century proprietress, Jane Vobe, is a fixed-price three-course meal.

A mall of small boutiques is the unlikely location for this French-country restaurant. The dining room has soft pastel colors, hardwood floors, candlelight, and a central open fireplace. The menu is arranged in the French manner, with prix-fixe menus and additional entrées, including whole duck breast with peach-and-pepper sauce, leg of lamb with rosemary-garlic sauce, bouillabaisse, and fresh scallops and shrimp with Champagne sauce. Consider making reservations for weekend dining.

Reminiscent of old-fashioned Virginia tearooms, this Colonial-style restaurant has delectable goodies served in an 18th-century dining room. For breakfast there's Virginia ham and eggs, made-from-scratch biscuits, country bacon, sausage, homemade pancakes, and grits. Lunch brings Brunswick stew, Virginia ham biscuits, chicken and dumplings, fruit salad, and homemade pie. There's a gift shop adjacent to the restaurant. It's a great, inexpensive, and filling place for families on a budget; lunch reservations are recommended.

Tucked away in a K-Mart–anchored shopping center, this reasonably priced, large Chinese restaurant with a Mongolian grill is a real treat. The daily buffet offers both stick-to-your-ribs Chinese and Mongolian dishes. At the grill, choose the ingredients you want in your entrée, and watch the cooks prepare it in front of you. If your children don't like Chinese food, there is a children's menu that includes pizza. Peking is a great value for money and a favorite with locals. The Greene shopping center location is just outside the historic district.

This hotel restaurant is known for its elegance, attentive service, and quality cuisine. Among crystal chandeliers, Asian silk-screen prints, and full silver service, you can sample chateaubriand carved table-side, as well as rack of lamb, Dover sole, lobster bisque, and house-smoked and -cured salmon. A jacket and tie are required at dinner, but optional at Sunday brunch. Breakfast or brunch may be good value, but dinner could be budget breaking for a family.

Locals love this family Italian restaurant and pizzeria that serves up pasta, fish, chicken, and veal dinners as well as subs and pizzas. It's a good choice for families who want to please the kids: parents can get quality "adult food" while their children graze on pizza and subs. The restaurant delivers free to nearby hotels. Families rave about Sal's, especially its family feast.

Proprietor James Shields served the lesser gentry and upper middling ranks of locals and travelers in the 1740s. Today, the largest of the colonial taverns now serves more than just light fare, though soup, salads, wrap sandwiches, and pie are still popular. This tavern closes at 9 pm.

Here in one of the area's few places for "fine dining," the waiters are tuxedo-clad, the tablecloths crisp linen. The menu's offerings resemble those available on a luxury cruise ship. Rum buns begin the meal, where the highlights include enormous crab cakes and filet mignon topped with crabmeat and rich béarnaise sauce. Order one of the showy flambé desserts, which are prepared table-side. They also have an extensive children's menu.

Fresh seafood is the drawing card at this large wooden building, which wouldn't look out of place in a New England fishing village. Despite its out-of-town look, the restaurant has an authenticity sometimes hard to find in touristy towns. Locals come in for the fresh Virginia scallops, shrimp, fish, and other seafood. Steaks and lemon herb chicken are available for the non-Whalers. The restaurant is off U.S. 60 near the Route 199 interchange.