San Diego is a top travel destination with plenty to offer for a fun-packed family holiday, from beautiful beaches and world-renown attractions to a diverse dining scene. In this family dining guide, I will be sharing our favorite family friendly San Diego restaurants.
Best Family Friendly San Diego Restaurants
From casual burger eateries to oceanfront fine dining experiences, there is a wide selection of restaurants in San Diego offering great food for the whole family.
Since we live abroad in London, visits to my hometown are also our chance to enjoy all the Mexican food we’ve been missing. In addition to the best places to eat in San Diego with kids, you will find some of the best kid friendly Mexican restaurants in San Diego on this list!
The following restaurants are welcoming to families, offering a kids’ menu and often crayons and colouring sheets, along with great service and an inviting atmosphere. Read on for our selection of the top family friendly restaurants in San Diego, listed by neighborhood.
Mission Beach
Home to Belmont Park amusement park, Mission Beach is a popular place for families to stay in San Diego. The laid-back beach neighborhood has an oceanfront boardwalk lined with several restaurants and shops.
The business district along Mission Boulevard offers a variety of cafés, burger joints and brunch restaurants within walking distance of many of the waterfront vacation rentals at Mission Beach and Mission Bay.
The Mission Restaurant
3795 Mission Boulevard, San Diego, CA 92109 | https://www.themissionsd.com/
One of our favourite restaurants in San Diego is the Mission Restaurant, which has locations in Mission Beach, North Park and Soma East Village.
The Mission Restaurant is one of the best San Diego restaurants for brunch and is definitely worth visiting. Note that the Mission Restaurant does not take dining reservations and since it is first come, first served, the wait can get lengthy on the weekends.
The pancakes are fluffy and scrumptious – and a beautifully plated, generous portion!
My favorite brunch dish at the Mission Restaurant is the Papas Loco plate off the Latino breakfast menu. It is absolutely delicious and bursting with flavor, a heaping plate of rosemary potatoes, grilled jalapenos, black beans, cheese, avocado slices and sour cream, served with salsa, tortillas and two scrambled eggs.
View the menus at The Mission San Diego
I can also highly recommend the Mission Chilaquiles (shown below) and Mission Rosemary dishes for their brunch menu. Other popular breakfast dishes include their breakfast burritos, omelets and steak & eggs.
We stayed in a VRBO vacation rental in Mission Beach on our most recent family trip to San Diego. It was convenient to order breakfast takeaway at the Mission Restaurant with DoorDash to enjoy their delicious food at our holiday rental.
Related: Fun Things to do in San Diego with Kids
My kids’ favourite items from the Mission Restaurant menu are the French toast and pancakes served with fresh fruit.
The Mission Restaurant also offers a lunch menu, which includes quesadillas, a hearty chicken salad, tortilla soup and a selection of sandwiches.
The Mission Restaurant, 3795 Mission Boulevard, San Diego, CA 92109
Opening Hours: Monday to Thursday, 7am to 1:30pm. Friday to Sunday, 7am to 2pm.
Contact: +1 (858) 488-9060 | themissionsd.com
Olive Café
805 Santa Clara Place, San Diego, CA 92109 | https://olivecafe.biz
Olive Café is another great family friendly restaurant in the Mission Beach business district. Open for breakfast and lunch, Olive Café also offers the convenient option to order online for pick-up.
The quaint café has both indoor and outdoor seating. Some of the delicious breakfast items that Olive Café serve are cinnamon roll french toast, acai bowls, buttermilk pancakes and breakfast burritos.
I ordered the smoky chilaquiles that come with scrambled eggs and avocado and a choice of carne asada, chicken or shredded beef.
View the menu at Olive Café
The lunch menu at Olive Café features a wide selection of sandwiches, salads and wraps. Popular lunch items are the BLTA sandwich; Full Monte burrito loaded with chicken, hash browns, green peppers, mushrooms, onions and white American cheese; and a Mediterranean wrap with mixed greens, tomato, cucumber, feta cheese and Kalamata olives.
Olive Café, 805 Santa Clara Place, San Diego, CA 92109
Opening Hours: Daily, 7am to 2pm
Contact: +1 (858) 488-1224 | olivecafe.biz
The owner of Olive Café has also opened the Olive Baking Company, located just across Mission Boulevard. The Olive Baking Company serves organic coffee alongside freshly baked bread, kolaches and pastries made from uniquely crafted recipes.
I can highly recommend making a stop at the bakery when visiting Mission Beach for delicious pastries and coffee! The Olive Baking Company is well known for its scrumptious cinnamon rolls that are made from scratch and baked daily for the freshest taste.
Olive Baking Company, 735a Santa Clara Place, San Diego, CA 92109
Opening Hours: Daily, 7:30am to 1pm
Contact: +1 (858) 291-8222 | olivebakingcompany.com
La Jolla
Puesto La Jolla Village
1026 Wall Street, La Jolla, CA 92037 | https://www.eatpuesto.com
Puesto have three locations in San Diego: Downtown (West Harbor Drive), Mission Valley and La Jolla. Puesto are known for their delicious dishes with a modern twist and a great menu that celebrates Mexican street food with artisan tacos.
We have had dinner at their location in the heart of the La Jolla Village a few times. I can highly recommend the pork carnitas tacos!
View the menus at Puesto
Little T and Miss A enjoyed the Agua Fresca drinks and the chicken and Baja fish taco plates off the Puesto kids menu, which come with a side of rice and beans.
Related: Birch Aquarium La Jolla with Kids
Puesto La Jolla, 1026 Wall Street, La Jolla, CA 92037
Opening Hours: Sunday to Thursday, 11am to 9
Contact: +1 (858) 454-1260 | www.eatpuesto.com
The Cottage La Jolla
7702 Fay Avenue, La Jolla, CA 92037 | https://cottagelajolla.com/
The Cottage is a popular spot for brunch in La Jolla Village, offering scrumptious pancake and French toast dishes and a wide range of egg dishes from hearty omelettes to chilaquiles and benedicts.
The Cottage La Jolla also have a kids menu and offered our children an activity sheet, crayons and fun creative toys, which were a great family friendly touch. The kids enjoyed the fruit plate and French toast from the Cottage kids menu.
I ordered the Monterrey scramble, which comes with bacon, cheddar cheese, green chilies, pico de gallo, black beans, served with cottage potatoes and a side of corn tortillas
Taco Stand La Jolla
621 Pearl St, La Jolla, CA 92037 | https://letstaco.com/
While Taco Stand is more for a quick bite than a proper sit down meal, I have included it on this list since Taco Stand La Jolla is one of our favourite places to eat in San Diego. I highly recommend the tacos al pastor, which are made with marinated pork cooked on a vertical rotisserie spit and served with pineapple, cilantro, onions and cilantro sauce.
Taco Stand has several other locations around San Diego, in Encintas, Downtown and North Park.
Balboa Park
The Prado at Balboa Park
One of the best kid friendly restaurants in San Diego is the Prado in Balboa Park. This is a great restaurant to enjoy a meal on a day out exploring the park and museums. I had the grilled chile-lime marinated steak tacos with charro beans, Spanish rice, cabbage slaw, flour tortillas and extra avocado.
And Little T had the kid’s fish taco with rice and charro beans, plus a cup of berries, which turned out to be one of his favorite meals during that trip to San Diego.
Old Town
Casa Guadalajara
4105 Taylor St, San Diego, CA 92110 | http://www.casaguadalajara.com/
Casa Guadalajara in Old Town San Diego was voted the Most Kid Friendly Restaurant in San Diego. This Mexican restaurant came highly recommended to us during one of our family holidays in San Diego and we have enjoyed the lively atmosphere and great food at this restaurant several times since when we are in Old Town.
Old Town Mexican Café
2489 San Diego Avenue, San Diego, CA 92110 | http://oldtownmexcafe.com/
Old Town Mexican Café is one of the best Mexican restaurants in San Diego’s historic Old Town. The restaurant has an extensive menu, with plenty to choose from, and Old Town Mexican Café makes the tortillas in house, right by the entrance. I went with a pork tamale and one of their house specialties, the pork carnitas.
Little T had the chicken quesadilla off the kid’s menu and also enjoyed picking at my pork carnitas, the avocados and tomatoes.
We went back for a late lunch at the Old Town Mexican Café on another visit to San Diego shared a plate of tacos – pollo asado, carnitas and steak asado, which came with beans and rice.
Café Coyote
2461 San Diego Ave, San Diego, CA 92110 | https://www.cafecoyoteoldtown.com/
Another one of the best family friendly San Diego restaurants for Mexican food is Café Coyote located in Old Town. Cafe Coyote make everything from scratch on their premises every day. We have been here twice and always eat well here. Café Coyota has a great lively atmosphere and an indoor courtyard for outdoor dining which was decorated at the time for the Día de los Muertos celebrations.
For a starter I had a tortilla soup, simple but very tasty, and I also ordered one “Verdes” pork tamale with tomatillo sauce, and one “Santa Fe”, made with black beans and chiles with tomatillo sauce. The Santa Fe was my favorite and the tastier of the two.
Coronado
Lil’ Piggy’s Bar-B-Q Coronado
1201 1st St, Coronado, CA 92118 | https://lilpiggyscoronado.com/
This was a great BBQ place at the Coronado Ferry Landing Marketplace, steps away from the San Diego Bay and sweeping views of Downtown San Diego. Our waitress was lovely and brought over a doodle pad that Little T enjoyed using while we waited for our meal.
Related: USS Midway Museum San Diego with Kids
I ordered a pulled pork sandwich with baked beans and curly fries. And from the Lil’ Piggy’s BBQ kid’s menu, Little T had BBQ pulled pork and corn on the cob, two of his favorite foods so this was one of our favorite kid friendly restaurants.
Point Loma
Phil’s BBQ Point Loma
3750 Sports Arena Boulevard, San Diego, CA 92110 | philsbbq.com
Phil’s BBQ has also been featured on Food Network, on the “Man vs Food” show with Adam Richman, and is another popular spot for locals and out-of-towners for its great BBQ mesquite baby back and beef ribs, chicken and pulled pork sandwiches.
Related: The New Children’s Museum San Diego
The baby back rib and chicken dinner was fantastic, tender and tasty and the baked beans were delicious. For Little T, I ordered the “Phil’s Ticklers” BBQ chicken chunks which came with 2 onion rings, slaw and fries and was a pretty large portion, so I packed away some of the chicken and veggies for the next day’s lunch.
Encinitas
Las Olas Cardiff
2655 S. Coast Highway 101, Cardiff-by-the-Sea, Encinitas CA 92007 | https://www.lasolasmex.com/
One of our all-time favourite family restaurants in San Diego is Las Olas Mexican Restaurant in Cardiff-by-the-Sea, North County, right on Highway 101 and across from the beach. Las Olas also has a location in Carlsbad, also in North County San Diego.
My favorite dish that I’ve been ordering for years at Las Olas is the classic combo, with a chicken taco, a chicken enchilada and a side of rice and beans.
Little T enjoyed the Baja-style fish goujons with rice, beans and a yogurt salsa.
We came back to Las Olas Cardiff-by-the Sea on another vacation in San Diego and Little T had a plate of grilled chicken with rice and beans.
San Diego with Kids Guide
I hope you found this list of family friendly San Diego restaurants helpful. Make sure to save this post for more updates on restaurant recommendations from San Diego family holidays.
You can also find our restaurant recommendations, along with fun things to do with kids in San Diego, pinned in my “San Diego with Kids” Google Map Guide. For a direct link to the map to bookmark, click here. To explore the map, click on the door sign with an arrow just before the map title.
Read on for more tips and reviews for planning a family trip to San Diego, California;
Best Things to Do in San Diego with Kids
Birch Aquarium La Jolla CA
USS Midway Museum San Diego
The New Children’s Museum San Diego
Kids Free San Diego October
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