Welcome to Grub Street’s rundown of restaurant recommendations that aims to answer the endlessly recurring question: Where should we go? These are the spots that our food team thinks everyone should visit, for any reason (a new chef, the arrival of an exciting dish, or maybe there’s an opening that’s flown too far under the radar). This month: a neighborhood spot moves to an actual neighborhood, late-night tacos in Brooklyn, a full-on dessert tasting, and a big-box Buddakan-esque Philly import hits midtown.
Double Knot (Midtown)
When I texted a friend I was on my way to dinner at Double Knot, she scolded me for not letting her know sooner that I was in Philadelphia. In fact, I hadn’t left Manhattan, which is where this Philly import has landed around the corner from Radio City Music Hall and Sixth Avenue’s office towers. Double Knot is in many ways what you’d expect from a Midtown izakaya: Its footprint is massive — dominating two wide floors on West 49th Street — and loungey chairs encircle low tables near the entrance to accommodate the happy-hour crowd, which clears out by 7 p.m. If you’re here for dinner, the Chef’s Select is a solid deal: ten items pulled from across their menu plus a really excellent miso-caramel soft serve to close. Edamame dumplings come highly recommended, pillowy and buoyed in a salty dashi broth, and wagyu bavette is a standout, with a deep, glossy miso butter and an ultrasmooth sweet-potato purée. The vibes are clubstaurant, but the staff is surprisingly attentive, likely eager to make a strong first impression in the restaurant’s new home. —Shay Cohen
Andamiro (Park Slope)
Vato and Il Leone are getting all the attention as actually-good Park Slope restaurants, but over on Fifth Avenue, a new Korean restaurant has quietly entered the chat. The stylish interior is unexpected for the neighborhood, with ample bar seating against an open kitchen and tables in the back. The star of the menu is the gukbap, a traditional Korean dish made by adding cooked rice to hot soup. I had the beef option with rich, meaty doenjang sauce. My favorite dishes were a shiitake skewer caramelized in a gochujang sauce, an extremely juicy tteok galbi beef patty served with shishito pepper, and dak-bulgogi red chicken eaten with lettuce wraps. Everything on the menu is under $25, and while some dishes are small, it’s easy to get full, especially if you order root-veg chips to soak up any leftover sauces. —Zach Schiffman
All of Our Picks, Mapped
Confidant (Brooklyn Heights)
In its original form, Confidant was a neighborhood restaurant in the not-so-restaurant-friendly “neighborhood” of Industry City. I’d trekked out once, in the after-work hours when the commercial area feels deader and spookier than usual, and found the restaurant — run by Brendan Kelley and Daniel Grossman, who met at Roberta’s and worked their way through assorted fine-dining stations of the cross before coming back together — ambitious but misplaced. Their food, as I had it then, was interesting, sometimes too interesting for its own good, readier to surprise than delight. But when it hit — their towering prawn pot pie was both architecturally significant and very tasty — you could see the future. Once Colonie departed from its longtime home on Atlantic Avenue, Confidant apparently lost confidence in Industry City and moved to the Brooklyn Heights–Cobble Hill border. The new space is much less cool and much more BoCoCa cozy (the décor looks pretty much leftover as-was from Colonie), which makes dishes like miso-sabayon sunchokes seem all the more extraterrestrial. But I have hopes for the place. I didn’t love everything I had at a recent dinner — cavatelli with minced rabbit and horseradish suffered from dry meat and clashy flavors — but what worked did so in a way that makes me think the rest will follow. My tip for now: trout mousse on homemade sourdough, those sunchokes with sabayon, and a prawn pot pie. —Matthew Schneier
Lysée (Flatiron)
Something unexpected is rolling out this month at chef Eunji Li’s four-year-old pastry gallery: “The Journey” is a ten-ish course tasting, comprising a couple savory bites and (of course) lots of dessert, like a rose-petal swirl of vanilla ice cream atop buttermilk panna cotta that’s affogatto’d in brilliant-green parilla oil, vanilla-and-caramel mille-feuille made with the lightest puff pastry imaginable, and brown-rice mousse with a sheet of pecan praline folded to drape as if it were a fallen handkerchief. At a time when many diners lament the continued loss of true pastry programs, this $140, hourslong dessert dégustation throws back to the heyday of now-closed pastry bars such as Room 4 Dessert and, of course, Chickalicious. This Journey is not dinner, exactly, but it’s a peaceful and relaxing date night. It’s also only hosted once a week (on Thursdays), and there are just 16 spots available per night, so grab a reservation here while you can. —Alan Sytsma
Guisados Maria (Bushwick)
With daylight saving time on the horizon, longer days and even longer nights are ahead. This is when I start to think about where to eat after midnight. In Bushwick, the answer is Guisados Maria, which stays open until 4 a.m. Daily specials like pork chops in chipotle sauce or ribs in salsa verde or rojo fill steam trays alongside chicken mole and steak à la mexicana, all ready to be dished onto plates or handmade tortillas mounted with a scoop of rice to hold all the sauce. But there’s more to the menu than the namesake stews. Grab a Sidral Mundet from the fridge and sit down at one of the handful of tables in the back for a basket of fresh-fried chips alongside bright salsas: creamy salsa verde, roasty habanero, and a chile pineapple that I’m still thinking about. The salsas found their highest form when paired with lengua tacos that were loaded with glistening cubes of rich meat. —Tammie Teclemariam
EAT LIKE THE EXPERTS.
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