10 Unique Dining Experiences To Put On Your 2025 Bucket List

Sometimes a meal goes beyond the food being served, providing an unforgettable experience where the atmosphere is just as exciting as the menu items. A special dinner can be the most memorable part of a trip. Especially when it’s served at a table floating in the middle of a lagoon or eaten completely in the dark.

Now more than ever people are seeking out dining experiences that go beyond a standard meal. Culinary tourism is on the rise, with more consumers planning their vacations with food in mind. The global culinary tourism market size was an estimated $11.5 billion in 2023 and is projected to grow at a compound annual growth rate (CAGR) of 19.9% from 2024 to 2030. Half of people surveyed in Hilton’s 2025 Trend Report said they would secure restaurant reservations before booking a flight.

January is a time for planning and goal setting. In addition to the typical fitness and career resolutions, it’s a prime time to map out bucket list experiences to participate in the year ahead. For many food and adventure aficionados, that means finding unique dining destinations that are well worth a trip.

From eating dinner suspended in the sky, to a taco making class with a side of humpback whale watching, here are 10 unique dining experiences worthy of a spot on your bucket list.

Lunch With A Front Row Seat To Humpback Whales In The Dominican Republic

Enjoy a meal with an ideal setting to view the annual humpback whale migration at Amanera in The Dominican Republic. From January through April thousands of humpback whales participate in a seasonal migration to warmer waters for breeding. Their path takes them from the nutrient-dense North Atlantic to the Caribbean. The ocean surrounding The Dominican Republic’s northeast coast is a prime spot for viewing the mammals. Amanera is situated on a cliffside perch with panoramic views of the island’s northeast beaches. The resort’s restaurants offer sweeping vistas of the ocean and look out on the direct pathway the whales take. The setting brings new meaning to the phrase “dinner and a show.”

Amanera’s Beach Club restaurant has an outdoor dining concept and is situated right in the sand. The dining room’s open air setting and close proximity to the ocean make it a popular spot to view the whales in their natural habitat. Guests can order off the menu which features dishes with a Latin flare made with fresh, local ingredients and settle in for whale spotting.

The Beach Club also offers a more hands on culinary experience where guests can participate in a cooking class while viewing the whales. A street taco and salsa-making class in the Beach Club’s outdoor kitchen teaches the difference between salsa roja versus salsa verde and how to craft the perfect homemade tortilla. After the class, guests enjoy their scratch made tacos while spotting whales right off the coast. Amanera also offers a more personal dining experience with a private beachside barbecue. Guests can enjoy an atmospheric bonfire, specially crafted menu and whale watching with their toes in the sand.

Floating Platform Dinner In The Maldives

Dine under the stars and in the middle of the Indian Ocean on a floating platform in The Maldives. Sun Siyam Olhuveli offers the ultimate private dining experience with their floating platform dinner. Guests take a short boat ride at sunset to a small wooden dock marooned in the middle of a lagoon in the Indian Ocean. The dinner begins at sunset, and when night falls your table is lit by moonlight and twinkling lights.

The floating platform dinner consists of four courses and includes an appetizer, soup, entree and dessert. The menu highlights local ingredients like Maldivian lobster and fresh caught snapper. Since the dinner table is floating in the middle of a lagoon, each course is delivered by boat.

Dine In The Dark In Singapore

It’s said that when you lose one of your five senses the other four become stronger. That’s exactly what Dine in the Dark is counting on. This unique dining experience challenges the senses by turning off the lights and serving dinner in the dark. To add to the concept, the restaurant is serviced by a blind waitstaff specially trained to offer guidance and reassurance. Dine in the Dark is run by the non-profit organization Singapore Association of the Visually Handicapped.

At Dine in the Dark guests are asked to surrender their sight in exchange for enhancing their taste and smell. Diners embark on a 12-course culinary journey of mystery dishes served in a completely pitch black environment. After the meal guests are brought to a relaxation lounge to reflect on the experience, guess what they just ate and learn how close they were to identifying the dishes served in the dark.

Have A Meal Suspended In The Sky

Take meal time to new heights with Dinner in the Sky. The concept was created in 2006 in Belgium when a communications agency joined forces with an amusement park installation company and used a crane to hoist a table, diners and waitstaff 150-feet up in the air.

The original aerial-based dinner was supposed to be a one-off experience for a special event. But when the organizers started hearing from people who wanted to replicate the concept, they decided to create a Dinner in the Sky franchise. Now, daredevils have been able to dine above the ground in 60 countries.

Dinner in the Sky can seat a maximum of 22 guests at a time. Participants are strapped into their seats at a table suspended in the sky by a crane and chefs cook in the center of the structure. Current Dinner in the Sky experiences are taking place in Dubai, Marrakech, Morocco and Phuket, Thailand.

Fine Dining Under The Sea In Dubai

Eat next to your favorite sea creature at Ossiano at Atlantis, The Palm in Dubai. This immersive restaurant is a One Michelin-starred gem set beneath the resort’s Ambassador Lagoon. Guests dine in a unique underwater setting, surrounded by views of vibrant coral reefs and exotic marine life, including sharks, stingrays, and schools of colorful fish. The atmosphere offers a rare combination of luxury dining and nature.

Aside from the unique views, the experience at Ossiano is about the exceptional cuisine. The restaurant offers a seafood-focused tasting menu that combines modern culinary techniques with classic flavors, creating dishes that are visually stunning. Each course is paired with rare wines from the restaurant’s extensive cellar. Ossiano is the only Michelin-starred underwater restaurant in the region.

Immersive Thai Tasting In New York

There’s no need to pack your passport for this culinary “trip” to Thailand. Bang Bang Bangkok is a modern Thai restaurant located in the Williamsburg area of Brooklyn, New York. But this isn’t your typical neighborhood Thai eatery. The restaurant takes diners on a unique journey through Bangkok while serving a 10-course tasting menu of modern Thai dishes.

Bang Bang Bangkok’s dining room is constructed to look like a tour bus and wraparound television screens line the walls. Video images flash on the screens, taking diners on a “bus tour”of Bangkok. The city’s landmarks, temples and neighborhoods wiz by as a “conductor” explains each course and the views out the “window.”

Bird’s Nest Dining In Thailand

Have a uniquely elevated dining experience in Krabi, Thailand. Banyan Tree Krabi offers private tables in a dining pod perched above the trees that resembles a bird’s nest. The bird’s nest pods not only provide a secluded and intimate meal, they also offer panoramic views of the Andaman Sea.

A meal in the bird’s nest comes with a variety of pre-fixe menu options, including a vegetarian selection or a focus on local seafood. An afternoon tea with twists on authentic Thai desserts, like a mango sticky rice mousse cake, is also served in the bird’s nest.

Wild Edibles And Dining On The Ocean Floor In Canada

Nature lovers can forage and dine at the site of the world’s highest tides in Burntcoat Head Park on Nova Scotia, Canada’s Bay of Fundy. The Dining on the Ocean Floor experience begins with a foraging tour of Nova Scotia’s wild edibles. After learning about the nutritious plants, guests get a private tour of Burntcoat Head Park. A walk down stone stairs to the ocean floor takes guests to search for fossils, view tidal pool creatures and learn of the impact of the powerful tides on the coastline.

Once the tide ebbs to its lowest point, guests are led to a dining table set on the ocean floor that offers front row seats to an amazing view. The area will be covered in 50 feet of water in less than six hours. Diners can view the high tide marks on the surrounding cliffs as they indulge in a seafood feast featuring local ingredients paired with local wine and craft beer. Following the dinner, guests relax by a campfire on the tidal flats to enjoy dessert with a view of the incoming tide.

Paddleboard Breakfast In Indonesia

Floating breakfasts have been popular at beach resorts and in social media posts for years. A search for the hashtag #floatingbreakfast on Instagram shows over 130,000 results and videos that have garnered millions of views.

Bawah Reserve, located on an island in Indonesia’s Anambas Archipelago, has added its own tropical touch to the floating breakfast phenomenon. The paddleboard breakfast at Bawah Reserve invites guests to enjoy an array of sweet and savory breakfast treats atop a wooden stand-up paddleboard floating in the calm lagoon. The paddleboard breakfast in crystal clear turquoise waters makes for the ultimate Instagram food photo.

Cave Dining In Italy

A vaulted limestone cave on the southeast coast of Italy is the unlikely location of one the country’s most popular restaurants. Grotta palazzese is a seaside cave that overlooks the Adriatic Sea in Polignano Mare, Italy. While it may look like a regular cave at first glance, this one is home to a fine dining restaurant, Ristorante Grotta Palazzese.

The cave that holds the restaurant is believed to have been a dinner location since the 1700’s. French artist Jean Louis Desprez created a watercolor painting during that timeframe that depicts a feast taking place in the grotto. That picture now appears as the restaurant’s menu cover. Today, the cave is a hot dining destination with patrons reserving tables months in advance to have a meal in the limestone lair. The restaurant serves four and six-course tasting menus that feature local seafood and are accompanied with wine from Italy’s Puglia region.