We get asked about the best restaurants in Manzanita, Neskowin and Pacific City about as often as we get asked about the weather, and our honest answer is that the coast is a place where you eat a few very good meals out and cook the rest. Here's where we go, what we order, and the nights we'd rather stay in with the wood stove going and something simple on the table.
Manzanita: one good street
Nearly everything in town is on Laneda Avenue, and you can walk it end to end in ten minutes, which is part of the charm. Mornings, we go to Bread and Ocean for a morning bun and something savory to take down to the beach, or to Yolk if we want to sit down to eggs. Big Wave Cafe, out on the highway, is the reliable breakfast for a group that wakes up hungry at different times.
For lunch, Left Coast Siesta has been making burritos and tacos in the same spot for decades, and it's what we grab after a morning at Short Sand. Marzano's does a proper pizza that travels well back to the house. Dinner, we like Offshore Grill for fish done straightforwardly, and the San Dune Pub when we want a burger, a beer and a booth after a windy afternoon. MacGregor's is a wine bar that's exactly the right size for a slow evening. On Fridays in summer there's a farmers market a block off Laneda, and that's where we buy the vegetables for whatever we're cooking at Puffin Lane that weekend.
Just up and down the road
Wanda's Cafe in Nehalem, five minutes south, is the breakfast we tell everyone about — cinnamon rolls, a line on weekends, worth it. Buttercup, also in Nehalem, does chowder and ice cream and not much else, which is the point. Rising Star Cafe in Wheeler is the small, serious dinner spot on the bay; it fills up, so call. And if you're heading north for the day, the Tillamook Creamery is a real stop, not just a tourist one. Get the cheese curds and skip the line for the ice cream if it's summer.
Neskowin: keep it simple
Neskowin is a very small town, and that's why we love it. Hawk Creek Cafe is the place — pizza, a burger, a beer, a table near the window — and it does the job on a night when you don't want to drive. The Neskowin Trading Company has a deli counter, wine and enough groceries to cover a weekend if you didn't plan ahead. That's really the extent of it, and staying at The Weekender usually means we cook: something on the stove, a bottle from the Trading Company, the door open for the fog.
Pacific City: fifteen minutes north
Pacific City is where we go when we want a little more happening. Pelican Brewing sits right on the sand below Cape Kiwanda, and yes, everyone goes, and yes, it's still good — sit outside if the wind is down and watch the dory boats come in. The Grateful Bread is our breakfast there; it's a bakery first, so get whatever came out of the oven. Stimulus is the coffee stop. Ben and Jeff's does burgers and tacos with a walk-up window, which is exactly what you want with sandy feet. For a nicer dinner, Meridian at the Headlands hotel does a good job with local fish and has the view to match.
South, if you're already going
Lincoln City is twenty minutes farther and we mostly go for a reason — the glass floats, a movie, the outlets in a downpour. If we're there around dinner, Blackfish Cafe is the one we choose. Wildflower Grill is a good breakfast if you're up early and heading to the Cascade Head trailhead.
The nights we stay in
Here's the honest version: some of the best meals we've had on the coast were cooked at the house. Crab from the bay in Nehalem, cleaned on the deck. Chowder that took twenty minutes. Bread from the morning, a salad, a record on, everyone in wool socks. The homes are set up with real kitchens because we cook in them ourselves, and a coast weekend has a rhythm — a big breakfast out, a long day outside, an early dinner in — that we've never wanted to improve on.
For more of what we do up and down this stretch, our Manzanita and Neskowin pages have the rest. And if a place we mention has changed hands or closed since we last ate there, tell us. We'll go check.