The Solo Scale:

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In Monteverde, you’ll find the Chira Glamping Hotel in the hills. Right beside it is the San Lucas Dining Experience. With two seating options, this is your opportunity to dine atop Monteverde in your own private room. This is a fantastic price when you compare it to similar experiences in the US. For updated pricing details, check out the website. If you do plan to dine here, you’ll pre-pay for your meal. This makes it feel like a treat, seeing as you’ve already paid for it!

If you’re dining and plan to imbibe, take advantage of their taxi service. It was a fantastic add-on that picked me up and delivered me right to the door. At the end of the meal, it brought me back to my hotel safely. Even if you’re staying downtown Monteverde, you’ll want to take some kind of transport as the winding hills make it quite a hike — and in a car, it’s a simple five minute drive from town.

When I dined there in 2023, I selected the later option (8PM seating) so I could have the majority of the day to explore Monteverde and then take time and clean up. The dress code isn’t formal, but you will want to dress up a little — if only because when you arrive, there will be a photo opportunity (which will come into play later as part of your dinner). While the atmosphere was fantastic at night, I couldn’t help but wish I’d come to the earlier seating, where I would have been able to catch the sunset.

The Venue

After you check in, you’ll walk down a greenery-laden suspended hall to your glass-enclosed private dining area. Everything that your waiter needs (apart from the meals itself) will be in this room waiting for you. There’s music, a fantastic view, and privacy — which isn’t always a guarantee in fine dining experiences.

At San Lucas, the concept is a journey through the provinces of Costa Rica. While certain provinces highlighted ingredients (like Guanacaste), others were going to be a complete surprise, but the wait staff were fantastic at telling the story. The dinner card also had my name printed on it, which made it feel super personalized. When your waiter returns to start with waiter, you get a choice of still or sparkling water (included in the price).

The Food

Below is the meal I enjoyed in April of 2023. Every part of my experience was amazing. The views, the door to door taxi service, the food, and the drink service. One caveat for those who might be interested – the wine pairing didn’t feature local options due to the lack of Costa Rican wineries. The pairings were still amazing, but keep that in mind if you’re going in expecting to have local wines. As always, the menu may have changed since my visit. As a result, please use the guide below as an indication of the quality and ingredients you might see on your visit.

Prior to the dinner, I received a palate cleanser — for my meal, a lime and ginger drink. From there, you’ll begin the dinner service. If you selected the drink pairing, you’ll receive an explanation of the wine with each course. The wait staff will explain the inspiration behind each course and the specific ingredients in each dish.

Prior to the official courses, you receive bread. This comes with lavash and taro root chips and was paired with butter, a salsa hummus, and a digestif of cocoa butter with tahini. It’s a very unique bread course without any actual bread, but one that was absolutely a great start.

The Rich Coast

The first course is “The Rich Coast”, which is naturally seafood. This course is sea bass with chili and sweet potato puree served on a corn husk, an oyster with lime and bloody mary, and tuna tartare on a corn chip. The brine of the oyster and acidity of lime worked well together, but the highlight was the tuna tartare.

Pujagua Corn (aka, Purple Corn)

The corn is everywhere in this. The main dish is a cornbread with a white chocolate corn sauce, served with baby corn, almonds, monkey cheese (queso palmito), truffle oil, and caramelized onions. The richness of the oil paired with this dish made it a star and one of my favourites of the night, but I do love corn in all forms.

Mekatelya Sometin

The name is inspired by a song by a Costa Rican Reggae/Latin fusion band, so you can expect that the flavours will match. This is a creamy tomato soup with yogurt, cilantro, mango chutney, and lobster with some coconut foam. I’m not the biggest fan of cilantro or coconut, but this was an absolute star of a dish even with a couple of flavours that I’m not the biggest fan of.

Mountains and Volcanoes

Visually, this was one of my favourite meals of the night. It was a potato “volcano” croquette, which exploded as you dug into it with your spoon. It uses activated charcoal to give it the black appearance. There was beetroot on the bottom to represent lava, and mango chutney to look like rocks. Inside the black potato croquette was lamb and potato.

Where Cultures Blend

Here, they blended many cultures with a New York steak (served medium rare, per my request) on top of a plaintain puree and creamed avocado, alongside puffed rice. All together, this was another one of my absolute favourites as it really worked and was utterly delicious.

Farmer’s Market

From the steak, we head into dessert. The first dessert course was grilled pineapple, almond bread, passion fruit sorbet, and a beetroot shaped butterfly. It wasn’t overly sweet and features a lot of ingredients. This one didn’t leave a lasting impression for me, but it certainly was beautiful.

Mangoes and Nickname

Second dessert was a cookie brownie meringue pieces with cashew ice cream, cheesecake, and mango pieces. This one was a little discordant and probably my least favourite of all the dishes, though still good. This was served with a large shot of dark rum (the only local liquor in the meal). Combined with the wine, this was certainly a lot of alcohol, so be mindful of how you’re faring and don’t forget you can ask for a smaller pour.

Golden Treasure

The final course was presented in a garden style with a camera on top. Before dessert got ‘revealed’, they lifted up the camera and I got a printed copy of the photo they’d taken earlier that night when I first arrived!

The above photo case opened to reveal a garden with two “beetles” inside, beautiful chocolates that looked like jewels — one of tamarind and chili, and the other passion fruit.

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Overall

The food was fantastic, the atmosphere magical, and the wait staff attentive, kind, and quick. The wine pairing was incredibly generous, especially as it included a double shot of dark rum. Even though the wine pairings weren’t from Costa Rica, they did their job of highlighting the food and elevating the pairing.

I highly recommend dining at San Lucas. For fine dining, the price is a steal and it’s a meal you’ll never forget. Make your reservations before you go, and enjoy the food & the view!

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