The 2025 edition of the Michelin Guide in California has spotlighted a host of restaurants that exemplify culinary excellence. Among these are seven restaurants located on the Central Coast of the state. These restaurants range from omakase experiences to French bistros that offer sophisticated, nuanced, and exciting tasting menus steeped in culinary diversity and craftsmanship. The 2025 list includes restaurants from Santa Barbara, San Luis Obispo, and Monterey counties.
Highlights
- Seven Central Coast Restaurants have made it to the Michelin guide in 2025.
- As per the guide, six of the restaurants have either received or retained one star.
- Only one restaurant, Aubergine at Carmel-by-the-Sea, has been awarded a second star.
List of the Restaurants That Have Been Awarded Michelin Stars, 2025
The Michelin Guide has established an international benchmark for evaluating restaurants that offer fine dining fare. The five key evaluation criteria are ingredient quality, mastery of flavor and cooking techniques, the personality of the chef in the cuisine, value for money, and consistency. A restaurant can be awarded up to three stars. Nevertheless, even one Michelin star signals culinary distinction and can transform a restaurant’s status almost instantaneously.
Here is a list of Central Coast restaurants that have been awarded Michelin stars in 2025.
Caruso’s (Montecito) – 1-star
Caruso’s, located in the Rosewood Miramar Beach resort in Montecito, is a restaurant that offers a coastal Italian cuisine menu. The kitchen is led by Executive Chef Massimo Falsini, who focuses on seasonality and regional produce with dishes such as the pasta with dishes such as pasta with diced abalone, Santa Barbara spot prawns, and uni in a creamy ramp sauce. The coastal charm of the menu is complemented and heightened by the incredible views of the Pacific Ocean at the restaurant.
Bell’s (Los Alamos) – 1-star
Awarded a star for their high-quality cooking, Bell’s, run by Daisy and Greg Ryan, a culinary power couple experienced in the cutthroat kitchens of NYC, produces technique and flavor through locally sourced ingredients. The menu is choc-a-bloc with refreshing, zesty, and unique dishes such as the escargot dripping with garlic and parsley butter, and the Lamb en croûte served with Calabrian chili aïoli and asparagus. The desserts, such as their gâteau Breton and black pepper dark chocolate cookies, are also worth a mention.
Silvers Omakase (Santa Barbara) – 1-star
This omakase bar led by Chef Lennon Silvers Lee offers an ever-evolving menu that changes weekly, and sometimes daily. The ingredients at Silvers Omakase are fresh and as authentic as they come with house-milled rice, locally and internationally sourced dry-aged fish. The restaurant serves all guests simultaneously, as is customary at an omakase-style restaurant. Their nigiri selection includes hamachi, shima aji, bluefin tuna, and more. But the standout is the uni rice mixed with wasabi, topped with masago arare.
Six Test Kitchen (Paso Robles) – 1-star
Located in Tin City, dry-aged fish and meat, and seasonal produce anchor the menu at Six Test Kitchen. To add to the charm of Chef Ricky Odbert’s masterful technique, the restaurant also boasts a lovely ambience laced with metal accents, charcoal walls, high ceilings, and a wooden counter for a centerpiece. Recent menu standouts include a dill meringue, topped with trout roe, and an aged pork loin dish paired with brown butter and a burnt onion puree. Desserts at the establishment toe the line between sweet and savory delicately with offerings such as the barley koji ice cream served with whipped miso.
The Restaurant at JUSTIN (Paso Robles) – 1-star
Situated inside the Justin Winery in Paso Robles, The Restaurant highlights its many local products and the 150-tree orchard, vegetable and herb gardens, apiary, and edible flower fields. With an option to sit either in the dining room or the patio, Chef Rachel Haggstrom and team offer you a peek into their creativity through highlights such as apple and sunchoke velouté, gougères filled with mornay sauce, and Santa Barbara spiny lobster with salsify – all while enjoying views of nearby hills and vineyards, which also produce the wines paired with the seasonal menu.
Chez Noir (Carmel-by-the-Sea) – 1-star
Another duo on the list, Jonny and Monique Black, has several fine dining accolades under their belt. Chez Noir is a quintessential contemporary seafood restaurant in a space that they also call home. They offer a prix fixe menu format that includes perfectly cooked skate and abalone, in addition to other California-native seafood options. Desserts include a crisp, caramelized vanilla-scented canelés with a custardy filling.
Aubergine (Carmel-by-the-Sea) – 2-stars
L’Auberge Carmel, led by Chef Justin Cogley, offers refined luxury through its ambiance and culinary technique. It is the only restaurant in this list with two Michelin stars to its name. All the dishes are prepared meticulously with incredible skill and precision. Some that strike one as wholly new include “cabbage” taco filled with shallot jam, Madeira-braised treviso, Kaluga queen caviar, and cabbage chips. Other dishes lauded by the Michelin guide are the rice roulade with Dungeness crab in a white dashi and butter sauce, as well as the triple-seared dry-aged ribeye brushed in wagyu XO. The attentive sommeliers available to guide diners through the wine list only heighten the experience exponentially.
The Michelin guide in California has listed some of the most incredible chefs who are pushing boundaries while displaying excellent skills and precision. From fine Italian dinners to fresh seafood, these tasting menus are diverse and creative—hallmarks regularly recognized by the Michelin team.
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