La Buena Vida — Restaurant in Quintana Roo

Please read the reviews carefully and if you are European and know what good food is, this will not “amaze” you as you read in all other reviews.

This restaurant is totally made for tourists or as I would say, Americanised, as they are the main visitors, they even serve your bill mex and write next to it how much it is in usd, which was the only restaurant in 2 week Yucatán travelling that did this for us.

My fish filet was dry and chewy and my girlfriend’s shrimps were not fresh either.

Like I said if you are American and not used to eating fish it will taste good for you, but not for someone who eats fish regularly.

We also ordered two House Margaritas which only tasted like water in the beginning and only like tequila in the end, meaning they don’t even put the effort of actually mixing the drink.

The waiter never came to ask how my food was and only in the end, when I could not really eat it anymore and I had to call him and tell him that it wasn’t good. At some point my fork would not even go through the fish, that’s how chewy and burned it was.

As we did not like our food nor found the service apologetic for the not so good food we did not tip, and as we were paying, they actually asked two times for the tips. Saying “it’s not included and tips are only accepted in cash”. We did not tip and left, and they were really not amused.

All things considered, it does have a nice location on the beach and it’s well decorated. But if you want good food this is not the place. We actually ate somewhere else in the Pueblo of Akumal on a very local restaurant and the Fish filet there was amazing and almost...

La Buena Vida gets 5 stars, but not for the food. First thing you have to realize: their gluten free items are NOT. I repeat, they absolutely are NOT. Be careful, gluten free people! Their steak is marinated in soy sauce. Their chips are fried in the same fryer as their breaded foods. If you don’t query them closely and just follow the menu, you will be ingesting gluten. A lot of people don’t realize that soy sauce contains wheat. If you want wheat free “soy sauce”, it’s got to be tamari.

Ok, that out of the way: the food is really good. Not spectacular; I can get better Mexican fare in Chicago. But they don’t use velveeta in their nachos so that’s a plus. However, the chips get kind of soggy and uninteresting. They seem to have quality meats in their tacos and they are good. The salads are well done. I just discovered Victoria beer at this place and it’s great. Very smooth and no funky aftertaste. Well done. I haven’t had their margaritas in a while but my daughter had lemonade and it was real lemonade and not too sweet. Very nice.

The flan was above average although not as smooth and creamy as my friend Anjelica’s. Hers is to die for but you can’t get it in any store. 😉

Ok… to what do we owe this 5 star review? The ambiance. The location is right on the bay. The moon, the tables, the lighting, the service, the sand, the sea, the funky decorations, the rustic quality of the building, the swings. You just can’t get a dinner experience like this. It’s so great and it’s one of our favorite restaurants anywhere. But my daughter can only eat the chicken tacos. 🙂

Go there, enjoy, and live...

Stopped here for lunch with our tour. Restaurant is tucked away in a beautiful little town and it's located right on the beach. They had a pretty big menu selection and the food was good. They havena pool inside the restaurant and swings you can sit on at the bar. They also have these towers you can climb up that would accommodate 2 people that give you a beautiful high vantage point to sit and look at the ocean. Prices are a bit steep but given the location I can see why. They took a long time to come and get our drink orders and another long time went by to come get our food orders. Given that there were not many people when we went it should not have taken so long. Waiter did not come and check on us once after we received our food and drinks to ask if we wanted refills or even to clear the table. We sat there with empty plates for a good 20 minutes until he decided to bring our check then he started clearing the table. We left mediocre tip for mediocre service. We all almost finished our drinks before the food even came and even at that point no refills were offered. If you stop here be ready to wait they drag on service but as stated before the food was good so it semi made up for the lack of attention. I highly recommend the mango shrimp aguachiles. It was very good. Also, I did not see that this restaurant was handicapped accessible. They may have had a different entrance but the main was just stairs and the bathroom that I saw/used was very small and would not accommodate a wheelchair. If you read my review, please hit the like...