Bar Corvo
Brooklyn is brimming with delectable dining choices, but Crown Heights is still a relatively underserved neighborhood. Luckily, the guys behind Al di Là (one of the restaurants that helped launch Park Slope as the cool place to open a restaurant) have set up shop on an unassuming block in the area. And with the food they’re serving up at Bar Corvo, home-style Italian fare like Calamari with Almonds and Lasagna al Forno, we’re confident they’ll help develop another busy dining mecca in Brooklyn.
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Ayada Thai
The second Thai restaurant (the other is Sripraphai) to make our duck list also happens to be in Woodside, Queens, where there’s a thriving immigrant community. Like the food at Sripraphai, Ayada Thai’s dishes are as authentic as they are inexpensive. If you love spice sans the sweetness that often comes with Thai cooking (in America), this will be your happy place. This quaint eatery, outfitted with photos of the Thai royal family, is like something out of Bangkok. The menu’s admittedly pork-heavy menu, but there’s also a terrific, crispy duck salad, made with lean, juicy strands of duck, pineapple, cashew in a chili sauce. Not to mention the Panang Curry, a luscious coconut milk curry with the same delicious, duck...
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Gotham Bar and Grill
Talk about a classic New York dish: The tuna tartare at Gotham Bar and Grill has been around since the late 80’s and it’s still going strong. (Eater recently featured it as one of it Untouchables.) Chef Alfred Portale dreamed up the dish while sitting at a sushi bar, which is why he uses sushi-grade yellowfin tuna (his purveyor is the same as the guy who use to deliver fish to his favorite sushi spot, the late Sushi Hatsu). Portale likes to build food vertically and his tower of tuna is visually captivating. He makes his tartare with finely diced tuna mixed with shallots, salt, pepper, and some fresh herbs. The tower itself rests on a bed of Japanese cucumbers and comes topped with three baguette spears and a tangle of frisee. It’s an architectural masterpiece that sits about six...
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Balthazar
Balthazar is one of New York’s great French restaurants. People come here for the scene and to eat classic French dishes, like Steak Au Poivre, French Onion Soup, and Apple Tarte Tatin. So where else would you go for a classic French-style Steak Tartare than to Keith McNally’s Paris bistro-inspired masterpiece?
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The Roebling Tea Room
The Roebling Tea Room is not a quiet tearoom as its name might suggest. In fact, it’s not a tearoom at all. It’s a bustling restaurant with high quality comfort food. They’ve got everything from Beef Brisket to Macaroni and Cheese and Cheeseburgers. And then, there’s the Steak Tartare, made with lean top round meat, capers, chives, and leafy greens. It’s different, taking just enough creative license to enhance the already delicious dish.
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Do or Dine
The guys over at Do or Dine don’t do normal. That’s just not their thing. But while the vibe here is playful, the guys at Do or Dine don’t mess around in the kitchen…especially when it comes to their steak tartare.
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Morimoto
There’s tuna tartare and then there’s Morimoto’s version. Considering his love for luxury ingredients, we should’ve expected something decadent, but this Toro Tuna Tartare takes the cake. It’s extravagant, expensive, and worth every penny.
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Ilili
Despite the fact that New York is a melting pot of cuisines, good Lebanese is not as easy to come by as you might think. Ilili breaks the mold by combining traditional Lebanese flavors with more modern Mediterranean ones. One of our favorite finds at Ilili is the kibbe naye beirutieh, the steak tartare.
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Chef Joe Doe
Chef Joe Dobias and mixologist Jill Schulster have put together what they’ve dubbed as an “aggressive American” menu at their East Village restaurant. Not only does that phrase capture the essence of their bold dishes, like the Fried Chicken Feet and the Pork and Beans with Duck Eggs and Bacon Dough, it also explains Chef Joe Doe’s list of Prepared Beers. The 10-item beer cocktail list features primarily American brews spiked with hand-made spirits seasonal juices, salts, and unusual ingredients like frozen marshmallows and peanut dust.
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The Woodland
From the crew behind the recently shuttered Vandaag, Woodland has proven to be a welcome addition to Park Slope’s restaurant scene. The menu is spotted with adventurous dishes like Pig’s Head Croquets, Housemade Bratwurst, and Venison Tartare, while the drink menu is relatively tame with reds, whites, ciders, and beers on tap. But there’s one cocktail, the “Brooklyn Shandy,” that’s exciting and stands up to the hearty menu offerings.
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The Tippler
This bar sits discreetly under Chelsea Market in a reclaimed, century-old basement. The resulting ambiance is elegant with an old-timey vibe, buzzing with the young and hip Meatpacking crowd. The Tippler’s food offerings are basic, with small plates, pickles, and sandwiches, but the extensive cocktail list is reason enough to venture there. It’s edgy and witty, referring to shots as Fast & Furious, mixing chocolate vodka with the juice of a blood orange in the “Weeping Gypsy,” and featuring some frozen slushies. Their “Gin and Chronic” is an innovative take on the classic gin highball. The drink’s ingredients – gin, hops, spiced lime, and tonic – belie how elaborate it is. Garnished with a dried conical hop and a wedge of lime, this drink is complex, full of notes of spices and citrus.
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One Stop Beer Shop
Brooklyn’s One Stop Beer Shop has an impressive beer menu with options like cream ales, porters, and gluten-free brews. But this is not one of those beer bars that just offers beer. Given the fact that it’s called the One Stop Beer Shop, inclusion is key, and they embrace beer cocktails whole-heartedly with the eleven beer cocktails on their menu.
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Death and Company
Death and Company is one of the city’s cult cocktail spots, one of the drinking establishments that helped bring back the world of speakeasies and old school cocktailing. The bar is notorious for its supply of bitters, infused spirits, and sweet syrups. The drink menu is expansive, you might even say it’s encyclopedic, featuring everything from punch to Juleps and tequila-based drinks. They even have a selection of intricate beer cocktails, lovingly referred to as “Noble Hops.”
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The Breslin Bar & Dining Room
This ultra hip bar, tucked into the equally hip Ace Hotel, offers a cool ambience and a drool-worthy menu from the creative mind of April Bloomfield. Pair some of her inventive bar snacks, including the Boiled Peanuts Fried in Pork Fat or the Sea Salt and Pepper Crisps, with one of the Breslin’s outstanding beer cocktails.
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Desnuda
It wouldn’t be right to mention ceviche in Manhattan without a nod to teeny spot in the East Village called Desnuda It is a cevicheria afterall and a fine one at that. Other than wine, they have little else, so settle in for a ceviche tasting. There’s no kitchen, just a sushi fridge and a toaster oven.
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Rouge et Blanc
If you haven’t been to Rouge et Blanc, the Ceviche is a perfect excuse… to start anyway. But there’s a lot to adore about this French-Vietnamese sleeper in Soho. The small plates menu make it ideal for a date or a light dinner where you can share and sample the scope of the menu, which includes Vietnamese Sausage and Hanoi Chicken.
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Agua Fresca
Mexican-born chef Adrian Leon fuses the traditional flavors of his homeland, like chipotle and jalapenos, with the more exotic, like basil, coconut, and ginger at Agua Fresca. A marriage of Latin and Mexican cooking, the menu at this quaint East Harlem eatery ambitiously spans the map featuring everything from grilled flatbreads anointed with chimichurri to chicken milanese.
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La Esquina
This trendy, deli-front restaurant is one part taqueria, one part brasserie, and another part café. With three different restaurants in one, you’ll be able to get your ceviche fix even if you can’t secure a table in the cafe below. La Esquina’s taqueria, open from 8 a.m. to 2 am., features a modest lunch counter and does mostly to-go and delivery orders, but you can get ceviche pretty much anytime you’re craving it.
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Maya
Few chefs manage to maintain tradition while being fiercely innovative as well as Richard Sandoval. He’s got an empire of Mexican restaurants to prove it, including Pampano and Zengo right here in Manhattan. But Maya was his first foray into the restaurant scene back in 1997, helping launch Mexican cuisine into the world of fine dining.
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Surfish Bistro
There are no culinary boundaries at Surfish Bistro, which is exactly what makes this Park Slope spot interesting enough to leave the island of Manhattan. It makes sense that a Lima-born chef would know his way around ceviche, but that’s just the tip of the iceberg.
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