Maya Bay, Larvotto's Thai and Japanese kitchen since 2006

Maya Bay is one of those names people jot down for Monaco without being quite sure what’s on the plate. It’s a Thai and Japanese restaurant on Larvotto, open since 2006 and one of the few places in the Principality that will feed you at any time of day. I think it’s a good lunch and a decent dinner, and here’s why.

Thai and Japanese under one roof

It opened in 2006 on avenue Princesse Grace, and since then the group behind it, Maya Collection, has added Maya Bays in Dubai, Porto Montenegro and Courchevel 1850. Monaco came first. The idea is to put two Asian cuisines on one menu, with Thai and Japanese teams each cooking their own dishes and an executive chef, Christophe Dupuy, pulling it together.

Inside, the space is divided into quite different settings. There’s a Thai terrace, a green lounge and a brown one, a Japanese room and a Japanese pagoda, all hung with Lalique chandeliers. That mix of backdrops is part of the appeal. In good weather I’d ask for the terrace; in winter, the Japanese room.

What’s on the menu?

The 2025-2026 menu runs from steamed dumplings, such as prawn har gau in translucent wrappers, through sushi, sashimi and nigiri to hand rolls, temaki, uramaki, salads, spring rolls and tempura. Then comes the properly Thai side, soups like Tom Yam Kung, curries and a robata section, the Japanese grill, with yakitori and chargrilled fish. For anyone wanting to push the bill up, there’s Petrossian caviar in several sizes.

What I like most is that nobody has to choose between the two. In a group, one person can go for sushi and another for a green curry and nobody ends up in the wrong restaurant. It also makes it an easy choice for a mixed table where someone doesn’t eat raw fish, because the Thai half of the menu has plenty of cooked dishes to fall back on.

How much does a meal cost?

Maya Bay’s PDFs give prices without a currency sign, so I’ll pass them on as printed, bearing in mind you pay in euros in Monaco. Tom Yam Kung is 17 and five pieces of yakitori are 31. It isn’t cheap, but it’s not the sort of pricing that makes you wince on that particular avenue.

The sensible way in is the business lunch. Monday to Friday at lunchtime, from 7 September, there’s a starter, main and dessert from 30, with mains such as chicken and cashew wok, vegetable green curry or veal tonkatsu. If you’re in Monaco on a careful budget, that’s the door I’d use. More ideas for eating without blowing the budget are in free and cheap things in Monaco.

A kitchen that stays open from 12:00 to 23:00

Maya Bay opens every day from 12:00 to 23:00 with no afternoon closure. Between 14:00 and 18:00 it runs an afternoon menu for grazing, and in Monaco that’s more useful than it sounds. Places like Cipriani and Beefbar stop serving lunch at 14:30 and don’t start again until 19:00 or 19:30, so if you come off the beach mid-afternoon, this is one of the few tables still laid.

Book on +377 97 70 74 67, by email at [email protected] or with the button on the website. There’s a separate form for weddings, birthdays or companies wanting one of its spaces.

Fitting it into a Larvotto day

The restaurant sits on the avenue that runs along Larvotto beach, so the natural plan is beach in the morning and a table afterwards without getting into a car. If you’d rather have sunloungers and service, I weigh them up in Monaco’s beaches.

At night, the same avenue carries on to the Sporting Monte-Carlo, with Jimmy’z and COYA’s summer season, and the other way lies the Grimaldi Forum with Twiga. The whole night-time map is in Monaco nightlife, and the rest of the city’s restaurants in where to eat in Monaco.

My take on Maya Bay

Maya Bay isn’t a dinner you’ll talk about for years, and it doesn’t claim to be. It’s a solid Asian restaurant with two kitchens, non-stop hours and a set lunch that’s fairly priced for that stretch of seafront. I’d treat it as the good meal on a Larvotto beach day, and I’d keep the splurge money for another night.