By the time six friends have rejected three dinner suggestions, the question of where to eat has very little to do with food. Someone wants to stay in the neighborhood. Someone refuses to spend that much. Nobody made a reservation, and everyone is getting less agreeable by the minute. Finding a good restaurant is the easy part—finding one that works for the people and circumstances at hand requires a little more effort.
We ask a lot of the places where we eat. They have to impress our parents, advance a promising romance, accommodate conflicting diets, and occasionally rescue an evening we forgot to plan. With that in mind, CULTURED has assembled a guide to dining in New York organized around the situations that actually send you scouring for a table. Here’s where to go, what to order, and why it works, whether you’re fresh off a delayed flight or simply cannot bear one more disappointment today.
Cafe Kestrel’s cafe salad. Photography by the author.
You forgot to make an anniversary reservation and need somewhere that still feels planned
Name: Cafe Kestrel
Where: Red Hook
Price Range: $$$
Why It Works: Cafe Kestrel should be much harder to book than it is. Owner-chef Dennis Spina’s food is unfussy and executed thoughtfully. The dining room is intimate, and the people working there really know how to charm you, starting with the complimentary popcorn that arrives when you sit down. It’s the whole package really. So why can you still get a table? New Yorkers have a tendency to treat Red Hook like it’s another city, when in reality it’s nowhere near as difficult to get to as people make it out to be. But that’s okay. Their loss is your forgotten anniversary reservation’s gain.
What to Order: The chilled shrimp, fried halloumi, cafe salad, mac and cheese, and either the pork sausage or grilled swordfish. For dessert, get the apricot cake, which is reminiscent of a sticky toffee pudding, or the vanilla ice cream. And for Saturday drinks with friends, they have a $30 burger-and-martini happy hour, which is very worth knowing about.
You need a meal after landing at JFK and it’s too late for a normal dinner
Name: The Lion’s Bar and Grill
Where: East Village
Price Range: $$
Why It Works: You know the feeling: It’s 11 p.m., you’ve just landed at JFK after a long flight, everyone at the airport was rude to you, and by the time you make it to your car, the dinner options are bleak. But this is actually the ideal time to go have one of the city’s best burgers. The kitchen at the Lion’s Bar and Grill stays open until 1 a.m. Wednesday through Saturday, and until midnight Sunday through Tuesday, making it a rare great option at an otherwise inconvenient hour. Lion’s has gotten increasingly crowded thanks to the hype, so you’re arguably better off going late anyway.
What to Order: The dry-aged burger with American cheese, grilled onions, and pickles. Add bacon and a fried egg if you’re feeling ambitious. If you have room for more, get the mozzarella sticks. Oh, and a $5 mug of Lion’s Lager.
Borgo’s dining room. Image courtesy of the restaurant.
It’s the third date, and it might be the night
Name: Borgo
Where: Gramercy
Price Range: $$$
Why It Works: The third date is no time for error. You need somewhere that will keep things moving in the right direction. Enter Borgo. White tablecloths, candlelight, a coat check, and enough space between tables to have a private conversation: all increasingly rare luxuries in New York. The service is kind, charming, and attentive, without being overbearing. And, crucially, the food is fantastic.
What to Order: Start with a martini. Then get the fava purée, vitello tonnato or the chicken liver crostini, and tomato salad, followed by the tagliatelle ragù. Either another seasonal pasta or the fennel sausage. For dessert, share the decaf pistachio affogato in summer and, in winter, the best sticky toffee pudding in New York.
You’ve had a terrible day and can’t afford to have a disappointing meal
Name: Hillstone
Where: Flatiron
Price Range: $$$
Why It Works: Hillstone is basically the luxury version of McDonald’s. Hear me out. The Hillstone Restaurant Group, which also operates Houston’s, R+D Kitchen, Bandera, and a handful of others, has mastered the art of consistency. In the same way you can order a Big Mac almost anywhere and know what to expect, you can walk into a Hillstone restaurant across the country, order the spinach and artichoke dip or French dip, and it will taste exactly how you remember. Except here, there’s flattering lighting, USDA prime cuts, and someone making sure your martini glass stays frozen. There are days for taking a chance on the new restaurant everyone is talking about, and there are days when you simply cannot risk one more thing going wrong.
What to Order: The aforementioned martini, the spinach and artichoke dip, Ding’s Crispy Chicken Sandwich at lunch or the French dip at dinner. Make sure to ask for their special salt mix for your fries. And honestly, get some sushi too. It’s surprisingly great.
Don Udon’s Niku Udon and curry rice don combo meal. Image courtesy of @eatau.
You want to eat alone without feeling self-conscious
Name: Don Udon
Where: Crown Heights
Price Range: $
Why It Works: Eating alone can be great, but the first few times can also feel a little daunting. Don Udon is a great place to wet the whistle. It’s a 13-seat counter space, so sitting down by yourself feels completely unremarkable. But the real selling point is the combo menu. One of the great injustices of dining alone is having no one to split things with, but here you can order any bowl of udon alongside a half-size donburi, meaning you can still eat like there are two of you.
What to Order: Zaru udon with an unagi, ikura, or curry donburi, and sides like shallots and daikon.
There’s six people, nobody made a reservation, and everyone has already rejected three suggestions
Name: Dons Bogam
Where: Koreatown
Price Range: $$$
Why It Works: Getting six people to agree on a restaurant is hard enough. Getting six people to agree on one when nobody made a reservation is nearly impossible. The solution is to head to Koreatown for KBBQ. I really believe Korean barbecue is a meal that can please almost everyone. The grilled meat in the middle of the table is of course the main event, but there’s also a huge menu of things that are equally worth eating, plus the collection of banchan that arrives with the barbecue. Then there’s the endless customization. Everyone gets to build their ssam exactly how they want it, with whatever combination of meat, rice, kimchi, garlic, and ssamjang makes them happy. When six people want six different things, KBBQ has a way of giving everyone what they want.
What to Order: A couple of prime beef platters, japchae, mandu, bulgogi tteokbokki, beef tartare, and Jinro Chamisul soju and beer.
Uzuki’s uni and ikura soba. Photography by the author.
One person is vegetarian, another is gluten-free, and a third will complain if the restaurant feels “too healthy”
Name: Uzuki
Where: Greenpoint
Price Range: $$
Why It Works: Vegetarian and gluten-free food both suffer from some unfortunate associations, which makes this particular hypothetical dining trio especially difficult to please. Uzuki manages to cater to all three without making anyone bend to dietary restrictions. The entire menu is gluten-free, centered around soba master Shuichi Kotani’s 100 percent buckwheat noodles, which he makes by hand every day. There are plenty of options for vegetarians and as well as the person who wants nothing to do with either category. The converted Greenpoint warehouse feels somewhere between a Japanese teahouse and a ceramics studio, with dishes served on handmade pottery.
What to Order: Start with the Honkuzu Soba Neri Tofu, Red Tosaka Yuzu Salad, and Soba Galette. For mains, vegetarians should get the Towari Soba or Tempura Mochi Vegetable Soba. Otherwise, go for the Uni Ikura Tororo Soba or Deluxe Sashimi Soba. And get a bottle of Yanagi sake for the table.
When you want brunch, but without the brunch crowd
Name: Cocina Consuelo
Where: Hamilton Heights
Price Range: $$
Why It Works: Somewhere along the way, brunch went from eating eggs and bacon somewhere comforting to a whole see-and-be-seen affair. By late morning on a Saturday or Sunday, the brunch machine is in full swing. You can escape that up in Hamilton Heights at Cocina Consuelo. The six-table restaurant is walk-in only, serving Mexican breakfast and lunch dishes in a lively space with an open kitchen. You might not escape the queue—people really want to eat here—but you will escape the scene.
What to Order: Chilaquiles, masa pancake, and torta de pierna.
Le Veau d’Or’s dining room. Image courtesy of the restaurant.
It’s the place you go to when your parents are in town
Name: Le Veau d’Or
Where: Upper East Side
Price Range: $$$$
Why It Works: Choosing where to take your parents can be a surprisingly difficult feat. The food needs to be excellent but not too experimental, the staff needs to be able to handle whatever requests may arise, reasonable or otherwise, and it should feel special enough to warrant the occasion. Bonus points if it’s somewhere you’ve been dying to try but haven’t quite wanted to pay for yourself. Le Veau d’Or checks every box. The room feels like a slice of old New York. It’s classic French bistro cooking executed extremely well. The hospitality makes you feel like the most important table in the room, and everyone seems to be having a great time. Exactly the atmosphere you want for a long overdue catch-up.
What to Order: The $145 prix fixe gets you a starter, main, and dessert. Strategize your orders so everyone gets something different and you can try as much of the menu as possible. Prioritize the pâté en croûte, escargots Provençal, lobster salad, and steak frites. Finish with the molten chocolate gratin and sabayon au fruits frais.
You want good sushi on a slightly less ambitious budget
Name: Sushi 295 Mercer
Where: Greenwich Village
Price Range: $$
Why It Works: Unfortunately, we can’t control what we crave, and sometimes the craving doesn’t align with the bank account. When that craving is sushi, Sushi 295 Mercer is a very good place to get your fix. The fish here is comparable in quality to places like Blue Ribbon Sushi, but with a very different price tag. The trade-off is basically everything besides the fish, which isn’t what you were there for anyway.
What to Order: Come for one of the lunch sets. The sushi lunch gets you six pieces of nigiri and a California roll for $22.95, while $24.95 gets you 12 pieces of sashimi with sushi rice on the side. If you want both, the $26.95 sushi and sashimi lunch comes with seven pieces of sashimi, four pieces of nigiri, and a California roll.
Penny’s Icebox+. Photography by the author.
You had a late lunch and want to meet a friend somewhere for drinks and snacks-that-will-be-dinner
Name: Penny
Where: East Village
Price Range: $$$$
Why It Works: Sometimes you text a friend and say you just want really good wine and a few things to nibble on. Penny, the 31-seat seafood counter from the team behind Claud, is perfect for that. The wine list is outstanding, and much of the menu is raw seafood, so you can order an icebox and call it a night. They also only take limited reservations, so walking in early or late is often your best bet anyway. The only problem is that the food is so good there’s a very real chance you’ll get carried away and end up having a full dinner.
What to Order: Start with the brioche and anchovy butter, Icebox+, confit oysters with crème fraîche and saltines, and tuna carpaccio. Once you realize you’re hungrier than you thought, add the whole lobster and finish with the ice cream sandwich.
You need to convince a Brooklynite to come into Manhattan
Name: The Grill
Where: Midtown East
Price Range: $$$$
Why It Works: Brooklyn does restaurants very well, so there’s little point trying to lure a Brooklynite into Manhattan with more of the same. What Manhattan does have is restaurants that are very specifically Manhattan. The Grill is in a landmark dining room inside the Seagram Building that has been part of New York restaurant culture since 1959. The Grill itself came much later, but it leans into that history. It’s an old-school chophouse with martinis, tuxedoed servers, huge cuts of meat, and endless table-side performances. While a Brooklynite’s neighborhood wine bar might charge $9 for bread, here it’s still free.
What to Order: Start with a martini, the Seagram Crab Cake and Steak and Anchovy Tartare, followed by the Prime Rib Trolley Service with the Hashbrown O’Brien. Finish with the Baked Alaska to really seal the deal.
Le Bernardin’s lobster course. Image courtesy of the restaurant.
You want a standout fine-dining menu for under $150
Name: Le Bernardin
Where: Midtown West
Price Range: $$$$
Why It Works: Tasting menus have become almost mainstream in New York. Every year brings dozens more, particularly omakases competing to see how cheaply they can feed you. At the other end are the classics, where experiencing the whole thing can easily leave you with a bill approaching $500 per person once drinks, tax, and tip are involved. Le Bernardin’s $135 lunch sits somewhere in the middle. Many of the dishes are the same as those served at dinner, you’re simply getting fewer courses. You still get the canapés, bread service, three courses, and mignardises—and, of course, the full Le Bernardin treatment.
What to Order: Go for the $135 three-course prix fixe and choose whatever looks best from the current menu.
You want to finish dinner and be dancing within five minutes
Name: Bar Bête
Where: Carroll Gardens
Price Range: $$$
Why It Works: Dinner before a night out has a very specific job. You want to eat well, but you also want to leave with enough energy to actually follow through on the rest of your plans. Bar Bête works particularly well because, while you can, and absolutely should, come for a full-blown dinner, many of the best things on the menu happen to be appetizers. And once you’re ready to move on, Public Records is just a short walk away.
What to Order: The menu is ever-rotating, so start with whatever crudo they have, then get the chicken liver parfait, tuna toast, duck fat potatoes, and Little Salad. And you’ll have to come back for the yellow cake.
Johnny’s Reef. Image courtesy of the restaurant.
You need a restaurant with a view impressive enough to wow your visitors
Name: Johnny’s Reef
Where: City Island
Price Range: $$
Why It Works: New Yorkers, transplants and natives alike, have a lot of pride in the city, and when someone comes to visit, there’s a certain pressure to prove that it’s all that. You take them to the classics, show them your neighborhood, and then you take them somewhere that demonstrates just how much range New York actually has. Johnny’s Reef is one of those places. At the very end of City Island, you can sit by the water eating fried or steamed seafood with a frozen drink and feel like you’ve left New York without leaving the Bronx. It makes for a pretty convincing argument that New York really does have everything.
What to Order: Fried shrimp, fried lobster tails, onion rings, corn, and a cognac colada.
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Dining and Cooking