The 12 best restaurants in Mesa

As far as Valley cities go, Mesa is massive. With an area of about 139 square miles, it is the third-largest city in all of Arizona. So there's a lot of ground to cover. And when it comes to restaurants, there are a lot of great spots to eat. So we've expanded our rankings from our typical top 10.

Mesa is home to multiple Best of Phoenix award-winning restaurants, many spots from our Top 100 Restaurants list and a few others that are churning out truly exceptional eats. Exploring this East Valley city will put some miles on your car. But luckily, there are plenty of delicious spots to fuel up.

Here are the 12 best restaurants in Mesa.

Myke's Pizza

31 S. Robson #103, Mesa

Starting in 2016, some of the best pizza in the Valley could be found two nights a week in downtown Mesa at a sidewalk pop-up run by a guy named Myke Olsen. These days, some of the best pizza in the Valley can be found inside Cider Corps, where Olsen moved his operation in 2019. He now has a wood-fired oven that chars and churns out exceptional Neapolitan pizzas. Myke's Pizza is open for business Tuesday through Saturday, and for six hours on Sunday. We like the potato and bacon pizza, the tomato pie and especially the salami (that comes with some heaven-help-us spicy honey). Turns out, ciders pair nicely with pizza. Who knew?

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Worth Takeaway in Mesa made Yelp's list of the Top 100 Places to Eat in the U.S.

Jacob Tyler Dunn

Worth Takeaway

218 W. Main St., Mesa

Mesa has quietly become one of the hottest new dining destinations in the Valley, and that has a fair amount to do with Worth Takeaway, a craft sandwich and coffee shop located inside a sleek-but-tight 15-seat dining room. Worth was pretty much an instant hit when it opened in 2016, so much so that in 2019, it expanded next door, adding another 15 seats. The crispy chicken sandwich is big here — a heavy hand-held bun of battered chicken strips dripping with a Sriracha honey spread and mayonnaise, topped with pickles and bibb lettuce and finished with bread from Noble Bakery. We like the roast beef sandwich, too, and a few other items. But we'll let you find your own usual at Worth Takeaway.

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At Que Chevere in Mesa, try the Patacon with sweet plantains.

Tirion Boan

Que Chevere

142 W. Main St., Mesa

After four years behind the stove of the Venezuelan food truck Que Chevere, Orvid Cutler and Maria Fernanda expanded to a brick-and-mortar restaurant in downtown Mesa. The food is classically Venezuelan, with arepas leading the way. The thick griddled corn flatbreads come as sides with plate-style dishes of shredded beef, rice and beans. Loaded with fillings such as shredded chicken and black beans, they come as main dishes. Plenty of sleeper hits fill out the menu. These include the Patacon, a sandwich "bunned" on fried plantains, and the Cachapa, a corn pancake packing hauntingly nuanced sweetness. A bar mixes tropical drinks. The kitchen rolls out hot, stretchy tequenos, Venezuelan cheese sticks, every morning. Curbside pickup is available. Call for takeout orders. And yes, there is still a Que Chevere truck at various outdoor events.

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Ordering dessert at Board & Batten is essential. Don't skip the Warm Date Cake.

Tirion Boan

Board & Batten

4012 E. Palm St., Mesa

Board & Batten is a little hard to find. Wind through the industrial park off McDowell Road and then trees and greenery will suddenly appear. Skip the left turn which takes you into a wedding venue, and instead turn right into the parking lot. Before you sits a small white farmhouse decked out with modern windows and elegant lighting. A gorgeous, large patio sprawls out in front of the restaurant filled with tables and chairs mixed with more greenery, with string lights overhead. Grab a seat and start your meal with the meatballs served over creamy polenta. Then dive into one of the most unique dishes on the menu. The pork shoulder chop is served with a green chile tamale and a side of macaroni and cheese. The tender chop is drizzled with demi-glace and salsa verde which pairs perfectly with bites of savory chile-laden masa and creamy pasta. To end your night, make sure to order dessert. And if you typically share something sweet, this is a good spot to get your own. The apple almond cake and warm date pudding will leave you spooning up every last crumb.

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The depth of flavor in Shaanxi Chinese Restaurant's dishes makes this spot stand out in a crowd.

Jacob Tyler Dunn

Shaanxi Chinese Restaurant

67 N. Dobson Road, #109, Mesa

Fair warning: The lamb noodles at Shaanxi may haunt your dreams. The tender cubes of rich meat are doused in a pungent chile oil and served alongside green veggies and thick noodles. Like really thick. Slurp up the signature inch-wide ribbons as you make plans to come back for more. This little strip mall spot in Mesa is a gem. On Friday and Saturday evenings, a Guzheng or Chinese harp player performs. But every day is perfect for sliding into a booth, ordering some dumplings to start and digging into the cuisine of Shaanxi, a province in northwest China.

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Each tofu soup comes with a raw egg; by tradition, the diner cracks the egg and poaches it inside the piping-hot soup.

Mike Madriaga

The Stone Korean Tofu House

1870 W. Main St., Mesa

In the heart of Mesa's Asian District, The Stone Korean Tofu House serves sizzling soups and tender meats including tangy and sweet beef bulgogi. The restaurant opened at the begining of the pandemic and leaned into providing hot soups to-go. As customers were able to dine-in, the customer base expanded to include international students from Arizona State University plus folks who were curious yet unfamiliar with Korean food. The servers are happy to help you navigate the menu and display how to crack the raw eggs brought to the table dirrectly into the boiling soup and watch as they cook. Tofu, as the restaurant's name suggests, is in most dishes, but frequently paired with dumplings, veggies and seafood. Rice bowls and hot pot dishes are also available.

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At All Pierogi Kitchen, the menu doesn't miss.

Dominic Armato

All Pierogi Kitchen

1245 W. Baseline Road, Mesa

All Pierogi Kitchen has long been one of the Valley's top destinations for Eastern European cuisine, but its very best feature might be that it seems to get better and better with each passing year. In 2024, it won Best Eastern European Restaurant in our Best of Phoenix awards. Owner Nataliya Koshalko serves the foods of her native Ukraine, along with regional specialties from neighboring Slavic countries, and her extensive menu is a celebration of hearty meat-and-potatoes fare. The namesake pierogi are here in abundance, served up hot in the restaurant or frozen to take home from the market next door. Boiled or pan-fried, they're hefty little lumps of tender dough stuffed with the likes of ground meat, sauerkraut, pork and cheese. Soups are a standout, including a hot beet borscht, a green borscht packed with herbs and a dynamite dill pickle soup, creamy and rich and loaded with potatoes and chunks of kielbasa. Smoked sausages snap, potato pancakes crunch and an exceptional chicken Kiev oozes a lake of butter when you tap into its piping-hot molten core. It's a no-misses kind of menu, and few Valley restaurants of any persuasion are so consistently delicious.

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Score some poke at Hapa Food Co.

Dominic Armato

Hapa Food Co.

5235 E. Southern Ave., Mesa

Few things get Phoenicians riled up like a good plate lunch does, which is ironic because most of the plate lunches in Phoenix come from lousy Hawaiian barbecue chains. But that probably explains why Hapa Food Co. is a zoo — a tiny little restaurant that always seems to have a line of customers four or five deep, patiently waiting for crisp fried chicken smothered in a sweet garlic sauce and juicy, smoky kalua pig. The poke is exceptional, a welcome throwback to when poke was poke and not a fast food "concept." And the kalbi — saturated with a deep, sweet soy marinade — is seared on the grill to order, tender and succulent and charred around the edges. Recurring specials such as garlicky hoisin pork ribs or a whole pulehu ribeye are always great, but the biggest draw might be the malasadas — rich, eggy doughnuts fried fresh and filled to order with custard, coconut or neon purple ube. However many you think you're going to eat, double it. Hapa Food Co. won Best Hawaiian Restaurant in our 2024 Best of Phoenix awards.

Ban Chan Korean Cuisine

2909 S. Dobson Road, Mesa

Ban Chan is hardly new. Irene Woo's "country homestyle" Korean restaurant in Mesa has been around for a decade, and Woo has owned and operated Korean restaurants since the 1970s. But a refreshed menu emerging from the pandemic coupled with a sudden burst of influencer interest have turned 2024 into a banner year for the East Valley stalwart. The restaurant won our 2024 Best of Phoenix award for Best Korean Restaurant in the Valley. Ban Chan was always good, but Woo's cozy little joint has found a deliciously comfortable groove as its grandma-style Korean fare finds a new generation of fans. Ban Chan's strengths lie in soups and stews such as kal guk su, thick flour noodles in a clam and seafood broth; or maeun galbi tang, a complex, spicy broth loaded with beef ribs. Large-format hot pots like Woo's outstanding pork belly and kimchi are great for a crowd, while the influence of her time in Hawaii is felt in dishes such as her excellent, tender meat jun. What's more, her namesake banchan is top-notch — unfussy, simple and full of flavor.

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Espiritu in Mesa serves a burger to remember.

Tirion Boan

Espiritu

123 W. Main St., Mesa

The vibey spot from chef Roberto Centeno has been one of our favorite places for a splurgy special occasion since it opened in downtown Mesa in 2022. Centeno partnered with Bacanora chef Rene Andrade and restaurateurs Armando Hernandez and Nadia Holguin to open the moody shotgun-style Espiritu with a small but mighty bar and dining room. Centeno’s menu of shareable small and large plates is a celebration of land and sea. Start with the refreshing, bright aguachile verde and the rich birria dumplings. And, while we often lean toward sharing one of the catches or cuts of the day, the restaurant’s K4 beef burger is a double-decker showstopper that shouldn’t be skipped. The cocktail menu, crafted by beverage director Adrian Galindo, is both playful and potent, and Espiritu dropped its annual update to the menu in October. To that point, there’s been debate over the years about whether the spot is more of a restaurant or bar. Don’t think too much about it because either way, the answer is “yes,” and we love both.

Guadalupe on Main

1526 E. Main St., Mesa

Guadalupe on Main is one of Mesa’s newest restaurants, breathing new life into the former space, and dishes, of Casa Ramos Redux. Michael “Dirty Mike” Schreier and his life and business partner Alysia Gratton, opened Guadalupe on Main in September just east of downtown Mesa. During a recent visit, we were wowed by the mushroom calamari, which infuses nutty sesame and spicy kimchi into this starter. Pair it with one of the restaurant’s more traditional dishes, such as the carnitas. The roasted pork was both juicy and crisp, flecked with bits of caramelized onion, jalapeno and tomato. Stuff it into a corn tortilla with tendrils of crunchy cabbage, a drizzle of the citrusy braising liquid that comes on the side and a dollop of guacamole. If you’re imbibing, the bar game at the Guadalupe is as impressive. Opt for a customizable margarita or, if you can’t decide, let the bar staff craft a cocktail based on your preferences with their Dealers Choice option.

Tacos Chiwas

127 W. Main St., Mesa

The taco shops from restaurateurs Armando Hernandez and Nadia Holguin are a Valley staple for delicious, fast Chihuahua-style fare. When the downtown Mesa outpost of Tacos Chiwas opened in 2020, it was the couple’s third taqueria. While Hernandez and Holguin are continuing to grow their restaurant empire with new concepts in Mesa and beyond, we love the spot that started it all. Tacos are the name of the game – and Holguin’s tortillas, especially piled high with carne asada or lengua, are exquisite. But be sure to explore the rest of the menu; we suggest adding a deshebrada verde gordita and elote cup to your order. Tacos Chiwas won our 2024 Best of Phoenix award for Best Gorditas.  Now is the perfect time to grab a spot on Chiwas’ Mesa patio and sip one of the fresh, fruited margaritas while people buzz about on Main Street.