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\n Il Leone is just one of several great new places in Park Slope.
\n Illustration: Naomi Otsu\n <\/p>\n
Welcome to Grub Street\u2019s 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\u2019s an opening that\u2019s flown too far under the radar). This month: lunch from some Blue Hill vets, Vietnamese that isn\u2019t to be missed, and Park Slope \u2014 really! \u2014 gets some great new spots.<\/p>\n
Pangat<\/a> (Park Slope) All of Our Picks, Mapped<\/p>\n See the Map<\/a>\u00a0<\/p>\n Il Leone<\/a> (Park Slope) Barker<\/a> (Bed-Stuy) Buf\u00f3n<\/a> (Lower East Side) M\u1ed9c M\u1ea1c<\/a> (East Village) EAT LIKE THE EXPERTS.<\/p>\n Sign up for the Grub Street newsletter.<\/p>\n Vox Media, LLC Terms and Privacy Notice<\/p>\n
A great Indian restaurant in Park Slope? Before Unapologetic Foods parked its phuchka on Fifth Avenue, this was a fantasy. Now, Masalawala & Sons<\/a> has some competition: That restaurant\u2019s former chef de cuisine defected to open this restaurant with his wife Aarati and Joe Liao, who ran Curry Mee in this same space. The dining room has a charmingly half-finished, thrown-together feel: There\u2019s a counter that\u2019s leftover from the space\u2019s past life as a Japanese restaurant, which is also why one wall is split between The Great Wave Off Kanagawa and an original mural of traditional Warli art. On a recent Friday, the place was buzzing with the enthusiasm of friends gossiping over bowls of Schezwan noodles and military-style goat biryani. (They were fueled by BYO bottles of wine and beer.) The menu is peppered with effusive descriptors (\u201cthe O.G. Mumbai munch,\u201d \u201ckokum-kissed coastal bliss,\u201d \u201cumami overload\u201d), and service is chatty and informal. \u201cYou ordered all my favorite dishes,\u201d a server told us before explaining that he got conscripted into helping out on weekends by his wife. The specials that night included a chile paneer, just as saucy as it should be, and a fragrant and fiery chicken koliwada served on a banana leaf. On Sundays, Aarati hosts what they call \u201cthe Pangat village lunch experience,\u201d serving Marathi cuisine. Reservations are required for the 30 available slots, and they host only one seating so that people can linger and, hopefully, make new friends. \u2014Chris Crowley<\/p>\n
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Il Leone, the cult import from Maine that just took over the Bar Vinazo space on Seventh Avenue, has quickly risen up to the top of Park Slope\u2019s restaurant hierarchy. The pizza restaurant from chef Ben Wexler-Waite retains the bar feel, with only a handful of tables and a single pizza oven. (The backyard is large, but no one took them up on the offer to sit under heaters on a recent night.) The hot-ticket item \u2014 the Isola lobster pizza \u2014 was also sold out that night, but the seasonal cherry-tomato L\u2019estate pie stood out just fine with its tangy, bright sauce. The menu is short; it\u2019s almost safer to think of it as a bar with an excellent negroni that just so happens to serve excellent, slightly unique pies. They also have a wonderful espresso\u2013chocolate chunk gelato, but the dessert menu stops there. \u2014Zach Schiffman\u00a0<\/p>\n
The cafeteria as a concept is due for a resurgence \u2014 a simple menu, a lunchy purview, and a reasonable bill for the small price to pay of bussing your own tray? Call it a recession indicator if you must; just seems like horse sense to me. Barker Cafeteria is a midday aerie opened by Gracie Gardner and Henry Wright, a pair of married chefs who met at Blue Hill at Stone Barns<\/a>. In a long, serenely minimal space, they turn out some very decent sandwiches, salads, and baked goods for the local creative-director class, the folks who instantly relax when David Byrne\u2019s \u201cGlass, Concrete, and Stone\u201d comes on the soundtrack, as it did during my recent lunch. Barker isn\u2019t cheap, but it\u2019s well priced for sandwiches and a few entr\u00e9es (like a tartiflette, which counter staff warns patrons takes a leisurely 20 minutes to prepare) that offer just enough cheffy flourish to feel special. The ham and cheese ($15) is maple ham and Comt\u00e9, griddled in enough butter to necessitate an afternoon nap, and the expected tuna-salad sandwich gets swapped out for salmon rillettes with cr\u00e8me fra\u00eeche, radishes, and cukes ($16). A maple-syrup tart for dessert seemed small when I ordered it, but it\u2019s so sweet that a Reese\u2019s-size cup will do. \u2014Matthew Schneier<\/p>\n
The mood is Swankstaurant Lite<\/a> at this new corner spot from Quang Nguyen and Dina Fan, the chefs behind Demo<\/a> on Carmine Street. That\u2019s no knock: Relaxing the grandiloquence and dropping any pretense of faux exclusivity means dinner here is just \u2026 pleasant. The staff behind the horseshoe bar is genial and welcoming, and the double-room space feels more like a lived-in bistro than a clubhouse. The kitchen is given space for little bit of creative expression, too. Rosy Greenmarket radicchio is mixed with Asian pear and slices of ripe persimmon while simple crudit\u00e9s come with curried aioli for dipping. The focus, to some degree, is on steak (and it\u2019s good, especially with a boat of salsa criolla on the side), but the best entr\u00e9e on the menu right now is a filet of mackerel; its skin was puffed and crisped on the grill atop a pool of cumin-rich mojo sauce.\u00a0\u2014Alan Sytsma\u00a0<\/p>\n
By day, this Vietnamese restaurant serves a short menu of greatest hits: blistered spring rolls, b\u00e1nh m\u00ec, vermicelli-noodle bowls. By night, there is none of the above. Instead, a meal starts with cucumber pilsner from Heart of Darkness craft brewery in Saigon<\/a> and a lidded metal pot of littleneck clams steamed in a lemongrass broth so verdant I spooned it up with the empty shells. The richness of minced\u00a0goes far with warm spices and a grilled betel-leaf wrapper, both recalling Lebanese warak enab, until it meets murky fermented anchovy sauce rounded out with pineapple, garlic, and chile. That same house sauce accompanies lime-cured beef salad piled with large, crisp leaves of basil and mint. It all leads up to the main attraction, seen at nearly every table, a still-bubbling pot of pho broth bobbing with oxtails and tender shank, with herbs, rice noodles, and raw sliced beef presented in platters alongside.\u00a0\u2014Tammie Teclemariam<\/p>\n