Given how affluent and international Montgomery County is, it's hardly surprising that there is a lot of good food to be had. For a downtown dining experience, Bethesda is the unchallenged leader, with a huge variety of mid-range and upscale restaurants, running the gamut from Spanish tapas to Maryland crabs, gourmet Indian to Philly cheesesteaks, with a host of great options in between. There are gems throughout the other major cities, like Silver Spring, Rockville, Gaithersburg, etc.âalbeit quite crowded out by legions of mid-range chain restaurants both in the respective downtown areas and on the endless strip malls throughout.
If you have a taste for cuisines around the world, you are in luck, and won't have to spend too much money. Wheaton has arguably the best cheap ethnic eats in the whole D.C. metro area, especially for great Asian and Central American food, due to its significant Chinese, Vietnamese, Thai, Guatemalan, Honduran, and especially Salvadoran communities. For each of those categories, you simply will not find better outside Wheaton. It's not too shabby for Korean, Ethiopian, Peruvian, or even Scottish, for that matter. Rockville, Silver Spring, and Takoma Park cannot boast the sort of density of ethnic restaurants as Wheaton, but are nonetheless also good bets for Asian, African, and Latin American food.
