5 Fabulous Resorts For Dining In St. Lucia (Slideshow)

North of St. Lucia's capital, Castries, Cap Maison is located on a quiet stretch of beach, perfect for dining under the warm hues of an equatorial sunset.

Cap Maison's passion fruit and mango desserts and flawless seafood dishes start with a morning tour of Castries Market, where vendors of brilliantly green lemons, sweet potatoes, and Scotch Bonnet peppers share spaces with heaps of cracked coconut shells. 

At Ti Kaye, relax with a foot rub in a spa overlooking Anse Cochon Bay, or step down to the beach to take a dip and snorkel in the crystal-clear waters.

In Ti Kaye's impressive medieval wine cellar, enjoy five courses of chocolate and wine, paired together for an ideal balance of flavors.

This 17-acre organic farm, supplying multiple restaurants across the island, including Sugar Beach, has 70,000 pineapple trees of several different varieties — one fruit will be enough for a pineapple gazpacho topped with lobster ceviche. Down the road in Soufrière, tuna, red snapper, and lobster are all in a day's catch at the waterfront fish market. 

Sugar Beach is a popular destination for vacationing celebrities and romantic weekenders alike. Whether you prefer to have your eats and drinks at the sophisticated Great Room, relaxed Bayside Restaurant, or the contemporary art-studded Cane Bar, impeccably executed dishes and invigorating rum cocktails are always on hand.

Executive chef Jonathan Dearden treks down the mountain daily to Jade Mountain's own Emerald Estate, where between the cocoa pod storage, herb garden, and groves of fruit trees, you can find unique plant varieties: micro-veggies, bok choy, and wax apples, to name a few. 

The views from Jade Mountain's suites, all with infinity pools and an open fourth wall, are unparalleled, except perhaps by the view from the restaurant at the top of the mountain, where you can enjoy dishes like wild ginger soup with hibiscus honey and fresh-caught dorado sliders.

Ladera resort takes full advantage of its UNESCO World Heritage Site designation — the open-air rooms particular to St. Lucia feel particularly private and remote here, and the structures even seem integrated into the lush tropical vegetation. 

Ladera's Dasheene restaurant is the one of the few on the island that has designed a contemporary menu around local Creole dishes. That alone is worth coming for, but the view of Gros Piton Mountain makes an unforgettable backdrop to an exquisite meal.

Rabot Estate, owned by British chocolatier Hotel Chocolat, seems to have chocolate in everything, from the rich brown tones of the teak furniture to the chocolate scrubs offered at the spa to the all-chocolate menu at Boucan restaurant.

The menu at Boucan finds a way to incorporate every part of the cocoa bean — there's bread with cocoa nibs, cocoa pulp cocktails, chocolate steak sauce, and desserts galore. The estate houses a plantation, so informative tours are a highlight of any stay, along with a tree-to-bar chocolate-making experience.