Food and wine is always a big part of our travels, regardless of destination. Maldives isn’t exactly the first place that comes to mind for foodies or wine lovers, mostly because you can’t really leave the resort island once you check-in. However, if you pick the right resort, you would be pleasantly surprised at the quality of food and wine. Here’s a quick review and a few tips on food and wine at the Ritz-Carlton Maldives, Fari Islands.
Wine tasting experience (my favorite)!
A few different resorts in Maldives have an impressive cellar including Ritz and their sister property St. Regis. Ritz Maldives’ cellar is still growing since it’s a newer resort, but experience was top notch. It started with a sparkling wine sabrage, opening a bottle using a saber by the emerald blue ocean. Once the excitement kicks in, you go into a glass wine cellar room that overlooks the Maldives ocean and taste through ~5 different wines from Champagne, whites, and red from various wine regions of the world. Highly recommend!
Amazing on-site restaurant options
We spend 5 nights at the Ritz and did not have a bad meal there. Our favorite restaurant was Summer Pavillion, Chinese cuisine inspired by Singapore's Michelin-starred Summer Pavilion. They often get booked up so highly recommend asking your Aris Meeha (butler) to book in advance. We ate there twice during our stay. Italian restaurant La-locanda, where you can have breakfast, lunch, and dinner was also excellent. Breakfast buffet has free flowing prosecco and fresh juices if you want to make your own mimosa. We had Maldivian buffet for one of the nights and felt like it was a good value for us as it included various ceviches, lobster, gilled meats, fish, and desserts. While it’s always a good idea to make a reservation, we actually didn’t reserve the buffet in advance but were able to take a look at the buffet menu on the day and decided to participate.
Another detail that we loved as wine lovers is you can order a bottle of wine and if you can’t finish it, you can either ask the restaurant to keep for another night or send it to your room. They do an amazing job at re-sealing the wine and delivering as if it’s new (minus the wines you already drank 😆).
High quality room service
We originally didn’t plan on ordering a room service (as we always feel like food is more fresh at the restaurant) but due to our mistake in opening hours, we decided to lunch in our beach villa room. Plus we had a bottle of welcome Champagne so it worked out perfectly! We ordered a shrimp pad thai and a ribeye steak and to our surprise, the meal was as good as any restaurant. Food came hot but not overcooked, pad thai noodles were still fresh and steak was cooked perfectly to medium rare. If we go back, we will definitely do more of this.
With all these wine and food, 5 nights went by way too quickly and we can’t wait to return! Do note that mark up on food and wine bottles is pretty high given how far these resorts are but it was worth splurging for a dream vacation :)