Ten Essential Restaurants Across America, Winter 2022 Edition

Just a few years ago, Justin Pichetrungsi sounded like yet another young chef with a quixotic plan. He wanted to fine-tune some of classic Thai dishes he knew. And he’d become entranced by naturally-leaning wines, so why not serve those with his cooking?

A couple of caveats. For one, his restaurant was anything but new. His father Rick and mother Rattikorn had run Anajak since 1981, making it a Thai American staple in the Valley. And Justin wasn’t a chef by nature or training; he’d come to the family business after working as an art director for Disney’s Imagineering team, and after Rick suffered a stroke in 2019.

In his return, Justin saw the seeds of remarkable opportunity. Clearly others agreed: This year alone, Anajak was named the L.A. Times’ Restaurant of the Year and one of the New York Times’ top 50 restaurants, with Justin named a Food & Wine Best New Chef. This  trifecta doesn’t come often in the food world, certainly not for a 40-year-old Thai restaurant in Sherman Oaks. But Anajak has become a living manifestation of curiosity. Hence the no-reservation Thai Taco Tuesdays in the alley astride the restaurant. Then there’s his intimate omakase inside, plus a regular menu with items like a Massaman brisket curry that could be a cult hit all to itself. And always something more, like his current fascination with dry-aged fish. For that matter, Justin’s fascination with wine blossomed enough to hire a wine director, John Cerasulo. Today, Anajak’s list is one of most contemporaneously brilliant in L.A.

In short, Anajak has become an icon of the mashup nature of Angeleno cooking, and of everything great about dining in America today: the old and the new, the familiar and the daring, all wrapped up in a perfect story on Ventura Boulevard.

No sooner had Claud opened in August than it was anointed as one of New York’s great new wine bars. To be a great wine bar is a strange sort of compliment, one that probably had a lot to do with wine bars being on trend in NYC for the umpteenth time. Also, co-owner Chase Sinzer was the wine director at Dave Chang’s Momofuku Ko, which is where he met Joshua Pinsky, Ko’s chef de cuisine at the time, and now the other half of the Claud partnership.

In a way, you could convince yourself that Claud is simply the wine bar of the moment: Sinzer’s list is packed with gems, both the famously rare (Clos Rougeard) and the unheralded (Julien Cecillon’s La Savane gamay from the Rhône). And Pinsky’s food presents as snackable, with its much-lauded snail croquettes and mushroom millefeuille. But there’s substance, too (the half-chicken with foie gras drippings). 

And so, an alternate interpretation: Claud is actually the great French-ish neobistro New Yorkers have been waiting for. When this round of wine-bar hype passes (and it always passes), Pinsky and Sinzer’s deeper accomplishment will still be on display. 

It’s been quite the year for Luciana Giangrandi and Alex Meyer, whose restaurant Boia De was the true surprise in Michelin’s debut Miami guide this year, earning a star for their Little Haiti storefront. (Perhaps not a surprise if you’ve been following Boia De’s remarkable rise.)

How better to follow it than with a sequel, in the same shopping center, no less? Walrus Rodeo similarly leans Italian, perhaps a touch moreso, with chef and partner Jeff Maxfield building a menu around his wood-fired oven. That manifests itself in a mustard-green lasagna and a porchetta with ranch dressing, plus a couple of pizzas — even if the restaurant insists it is “not a pizzeria.” (We’d still commend you to the Corn on the Za, with poblano chiles and lime.)

On that theme, Folk is quite clearly a pizzeria — or at least presents as one, with four naturally leavened pies and a calzone taking prime menu space. (Butternut squash, ‘nduja, and Mimolette cheese isn’t a combo we had on our dance card but we’ll take it.)  It’s also, similarly, a follow-up, namely from Philip Krajeck, whose Rolf & Daughters has become one of Nashville’s most exceptional spots, remixing modern Italian via dishes like a tagliatelle with lamb and horseradish. And Folk similarly excels with market-fresh produce and larger plates, whether kale with sprouted rye or a half-chicken Milanese. (Keep an eye out for the broiled oysters, where ‘nduja appears in the butter.)

As at Rolf, Krajeck offers a beverage list at Folk that’s both deep and thoughtful — wines of the moment, and cocktails that always have a trick or two up their sleeve. In a town that can be distracted by glitz, Folk is as earnest as it gets.

Aaron Bludorn’s arrival in Houston was an official Big Deal — the alum of New York’s Café Boulud brought a big swig of soigné to town with his debut restaurant, Bludorn. But since one cannot live by French food alone (sorry!) there’s now his follow-up, Navy Blue, which frames the bounty of Gulf seafood.

This of course includes oysters multiple ways and bbq shrimp, but more pointedly has blackened red snapper with an aji amarillo accent, and swordfish au poivre with green peppercorns. But Bludorn and his partners wouldn’t approach this without a few flourishes: The spaghetti alla vongole is studded with sea urchin; a whole lobster can be done Thermidor-style. In other words, you can’t take the French out of the Francophile chef, but you can put him in Rice Village and give him a seafood bounty to make sublime.

Having come to Second City from New York spots like Carbone and Jean Georges, you’d expect Ian Rusnak and Eric Safin to understand a couple things. One, red-sauce Italian is beloved for a reason. And two, classics remain classic by being fine-tuned.

Their menu at Elina’s demonstrates both notions, with tweaks around the edges to remain contemporary but never diverging too far. So yes, rigatoni alla vodka. Yes, clams casino and chicken Parm and meatballs. (Plus a 40-ounce ribeye steak Diane, because sometimes a classic is worth diverging from a theme.) And the duo are too savvy to lean into the pastiche tropes of Italian American. Hard pastas are freshly extruded on the spot; an eggplant Parm is composed of more than a dozen thin layers. As with his work at the short-lived but cherished initial run of Veronika, at New York’s Fotografiska, Safin lets technique creep around the edges; the result never come across as overly cheffy — which make them both sublime and a lot of fun.

A dining rite of passage in Atlanta in recent years goes as follows: You head to Decatur, and talk or elbow your way into a spot at the Kimball House bar. You get the best of their fresh oysters (look for the Divine Pine from North Carolina), since the raw bar occupies a full third of the menu. You order a martini, or perhaps a gin drink like their Satsuma gimlet. And the evening begins, regardless of where it will take you. 

As cherished as it is as a place to start the evening, we humbly suggest you linger. Because, at its heart, it is a damn fine steakhouse, in the vein of New York’s rebooted Gage & Tollner. That includes a stellar shrimp cocktail and French onion soup to start. (Don’t miss the smoked ham with radish gremolata, either.) The kitchen has always been besotted by Georgia farmers and their bounty, which means you should give the “Vegetables” section its due; and Kimball House’s historic train-depot building is one of the classiest locales in town. Seeing as its owners just bought the building outright this month, its future is secure — which is great news, because this is as timeless as Atlanta dining gets.

For a decade now, Matt Accarrino has been keeping the Bay Area in exceptional pasta. SPQR, the follow-up to San Francisco’s A16, was his playground for hearty but intellectual dishes that married Cal-Med bounty to fresh pasta and profound, porky sauces. These days, his talents can primarily be enjoyed in a tasting-menu format, so that rotolo with braised turkey and Savoy cabbage is preceded with a carrot-burrata salad and followed by, say, Berkshire pork two ways. Lest this sound too serious, Accarrino is always having fun — as with his fried-chicken Sundays, and daytime coffee and donuts. (Goodness knows Pacific Heights needed a solid café.) And SPQR’s wine list has been an epic romp through Italy since its inception — although if A16 looked south, there’s more northern Italian fealty here.

Bonus if you hurry: SPQR’s version of the Feast of Seven Fishes arrives Dec. 24.

The elevator story for this hit pizzeria hinges on co-owner Demetri Mechelis and his fixation with sourdough, channeled into pizza form. And its owners have strong D.C. lineage: Mechelis and his partner (and now wife) Tara Smith met while both working at Tail Up Goat, where she was a manager and he was a line cook.

But there’s another layer, too: Mechelis worked as a teen at Alekos Taverna, his father’s restaurant in suburban Maryland. Hence there’s much more going on here than just stellar pizza, as you might surmise from the halloumi on one pie — namely a backbeat of Greek inspiration. It appears, among other things, in dishes like moussaka.

If you’re from New England, the Greek-pizzeria hybrid feels like second nature. But Martha Dear gives birth to it in a completely novel form.

Quite simply, the Tavern room at Gramercy remains one of the coziest places during New York’s cold months, the precise place to luxuriate at the bar through a full afternoon — if you time it just right. (Pro tip: Go toward the end of lunch hour.)  You can of course plumb the depths of Michael Anthony’s current winter menu, but again, classics are classics for a reason: Start with the roasted oysters, move to the burger (although the duck meatloaf is a worthy sub), order your martini or Manhattan as you like it, and be spellbound for a moment at the magic of a quintessential New York room that exudes warmth.