18 Restaurants Across America We Can’t Wait To Try Right Now

Of the many new restaurants opening in New York this autumn, the one that might excite us most comes from the Unapologetic Foods group, whom you might remember from hits like Semma, Dhamaka, and Adda. This time, they’re pushing themselves well out of their comfort zone of Indian cuisine  — venturing into the foods of the Philippines, while giving the spotlight to Dhamaka’s former chef de cuisine Eric Valdez.

Manila-born-and-raised, Valdez is determined to focus on regional Filipino dishes that don’t usually make their way onto restaurant menus: sea cucumber with coconut vinegar, beef-blood soup, and a Filipino take on butter chicken. The front half of the restaurant will offer an à la carte menu, while the back room will be a showcase for kamayan-style feasting, served atop banana leaves that encompass the whole table.

Fittingly, Naks occupies the space that was once home to Jeepney, Nicole Ponseca’s pioneering Filipino American restaurant that helped popularize kamayan-style dining and Filipino food and culture. We’re glad to see the journey at 201 1st Ave. come full circle. 

Naks is set to open in late September. And if you can’t wait until then, do consider making a Resy for Bangkok Supper Club, the latest from the team at Fish Cheeks.

—Deanna Ting

If there’s one restaurant the Bay Area has been eagerly awaiting all year, it’s Burdell, on Telegraph Ave. in Temescal, from the talented chef (and sometimes Resy contributor) Geoff Davis.

Davis has a strong culinary CV, having spent time in fine-dining kitchens like Cyrus in Healdsburg, as well as Mission District favorites like True Laurel and Penny Roma. At Burdell, named after his maternal grandmother, he’ll be celebrating soul food, bringing his chef’s touch to nostalgic dishes he grew up eating, while using the Bay Area’s bounty of pristine produce and products. Just-picked tomatoes with scallion ranch and fried Tomales Bay oysters? Pork collar with ham fat roux and morel mushroom gravy with peppery biscuits? Braised oxtails with beef raised on regenerative ranches care of Cream Co. meats? Yes, please, and thank you.

Also, knowing Davis’s love of good wine, expect some beautiful Burgundies on the list.

—Omar Mamoon

If you loved how the meticulously crafted tasting menu at Indienne shined a completely new spotlight on Indian cooking, wait’ll you hear about the team’s recently opened spot in Lincoln Park, dedicated to reimagining Middle Eastern cuisine in similar ways.

Dishes at Sifr blend the flavors of Tunisia, Morocco, Jordan, and even, yes, India — and most are cooked over a charcoal and wood-fired hearth. Start with creamy hummus amplified with zhug and charred green chickpeas, then move on to dukkah-crusted haloumi that’s served with drops of sweet-and-sour pomegranate molasses. If you’re with a group, dig into shared plates, like a hearth-roasted cauliflower, seabass with fragrant chermoula, and summer pea and fava manti. All familiar flavors, remixed in ways that will keep you on your toes.

While the weather is still nice, grab a seat on the covered patio; as Chicago fall becomes Chicago fall, enjoy the airy indoor space accented with long green velvet banquettes, geometric pendant lights, and an open kitchen where you can see the open flames. We loved how Indienne brought a spotlight to Chicago’s skills with reinvention. Sifr is stepping in to continue the trend.

—Ariel Kanter

We’ve been following Chance Anies since his days in a food cart parked on the Temple Health campus, the same institution where he once was a medical researcher. It’s where he built up a following for Filipino specialties, like tender pork adobo with garlic rice.

Now with a brick-and-mortar home, Tabachoy is rooted in Philly’s emerging Filipino food ecosystem, alongside Perla and Brewerytown’s forthcoming Baby’s. This welcoming 28-seat BYOB in Bella Vista puts out dishes meant for sharing, like a huge shrimp, sweet potato and carrot fritter, fried pompano, unbreaded fried chicken wings with glass-like skin, and ube soft serve.

It’s not only about the food: Anies pays his team a living wage and makes customers feel like friends, through little touches like a community beer fridge. The result not only showcases how Filipino cuisine is having its moment, but how progressive Philly is in how restaurants are run.

—Sarah Maiellano

As Dallas grows weary of outsider restaurant groups trickling in to capitalize on its status as one the of nation’s fastest-growing cities, preservationists needn’t worry about Via Triozzi. On high-spirited Lower Greenville Avenue, long one of the city’s main streets for dining and carousing, chef-owner Leigh Hutchinson (she’s from Coppell) is leading her first restaurant.

Via Triozzi is a dream that was 17 years in the making, conceived during Hutchinson’s first visit to Italy, when no place in Dallas offered genuine Italian slow cooking. The result is a spot that both the flavors of Tuscany and beyond with the utmost fidelity, yet feels like only a Dallasite could have opened it.

That begins with fresh pastas made with top-quality Italian flour, including the specialità della casa, a meaty lasagne with all the right textures in all the right spots. Another house special that harmonizes with the Tuscan rustic-chic environs is her bistecca alla Fiorentina, using Chianina beef from a ranch in El Paso when it’s available. Desserts include a deconstructed cannolo with — a perfect accessory to something from the rolling amaro cart. And the low-intervention wine list is also all Italian, and bypasses the city’s big wine distributors to feature predominantly women-owned small producers. To boot, house wines on tap are $32 a liter.

Bring the famiglia, your Italian dictionary, and a Texas-sized appetite.

—Amanda Albee

Want to travel to Mexico City by way of the District? Stephen Starr (known for Le Diplomate and St. Anselm) has just opened his latest restaurant at Signal House in the Union Market neighborhood.

Being a Starr production, El Presidente is theatrical in the design of its multiple spaces, and ventures beyond the scope of many Mexican restaurants, drawing flavors, ingredients, and techniques from across the country. That includes Baja-style coastal oysters, garnished with savory salsa negra and citrus miñoneta, and red chile-marinated al pastor tacos with roasted cauliflower and ancho-pecan pipián (a Mexican red mole).

Of course, the one dish everyone is already talking about is the “Gran Torre de Mariscos,” a showstopping take on the classic seafood tower with ceviche, hamachi aguachile, and king crab, made to order at the elaborate raw bar. And as with Le Dip before it, El Prez will be where D.C. comes to see and be seen this fall.

—Tim Ebner

This fall, Itamae, Miami’s favorite family Nikkei restaurant is evolving into Itamae Ao, the refined omakase counter that the Chang Gang has long aspired for it to be, and we couldn’t be awaiting it any more eagerly.

After all, what started as a simple food-hall sushi counter run by the family team of Nando, Valerie and Fernando Chang five years ago has grown into a standalone — but still small — restaurant often touted as one of Miami’s best, even if its true potential remained somewhat limited by the space. But with the announcement of Itamae’s closure this August, came the exciting promise of a reborn iteration as a 12-seat omakase. Here, the full focus will be on crafting a memorable chef’s counter experience for every guest, inspired by Nikkei flavors.

With chef Nando still at the helm, Itamae Ao will be opening next door to sister restaurant Maty’s, run by literal sister Valerie, giving diners across both restaurants a chance to once again experience the culinary dazzle created by their complementary sibling energy. Meanwhile, Papa Chang will be taking over the former Itamae space to run B-Side, their more casual Nikkei sushi concept, where you’ll still be able to order some of Itamae’s greatest hits à la carte.

Itamae Ao is scheduled to open in October.

—Lyssa Goldberg

—Eric Twardzik

—Mike Jordan

The gleaming downtown dining room is indeed shiny and new, but co-owners Tina and David Schuttenberg aim to cultivate the lived-in and quirky vibe that keeps diners coming back to their first restaurant, Kwei Fei, on James Island.

Where Kwei Fei was all about Sichuan spice, Beautiful South is the Schuttenberg’s rumination on American-style Chinese takeout and Southern Chinese specialties. David, the chef, splits the menu between familiar takeout-style flavors and inspired explorations of Cantonese and nearby cuisines — so that General Tso’s chicken sits alongside a Teochow-style oyster omelet.

Tucked into the ground floor of an apartment building, the decor and bright blue accents serve as references to the waterways of Charleston and southern China. Cocktails and mocktails are as bright and seductive as the colorfully decorated bar, lined with dark wood chairs. Unlike your corner takeout, you’ll find innovations like the Between Two Rivers, reminiscent of a tropical-spiked Negroni. And yes, the fiery Chinese liquor, baijiu, made its way downtown from Kwei Fei.

Pointedly, the Schuttenbergs have found yet another a way to remix diverse Chinese inspirations in a way that feels distinctly Charlestonian. Sweet and sour pork can commingle with Cantonese classics like XO clams and Hong Kong street fare, all housed under one fashionable roof.

—Sam Spence

Late last year, after a long series of pop-ups, chef Serigne Mbaye and business partner Effie Richardson opened Dakar NOLA. In keeping with Mbaye’s mission to draw attention to the unacknowledged culinary contributions that enslaved West African people made to New Orleans’ celebrated Creole cuisine, the elegant, moodily-lit restaurant explores the pescetarian foods of Senegambia and their foundational relationship to those of the American South.

Dakar reflects Mbaye’s unique path: Born in New York and raised in his family’s native Senegal, Mbaye spent much of his childhood in a religious boarding school in West Africa, before going to culinary school back in the States. A chance connection and mentorship with Cliff Hall, co-owner of New Orleans Fish House, led Mbaye to Commander’s Palace, then Atelier Crenn in San Francisco and L’Atelier de Joël Robuchon in Paris.

After a year, Dakar NOLA’s format is evolving a bit. The single seating each evening remains, with guests served seven or more courses — along with a lesson about the traditions and the history behind the foods. But a nightly early-bird tasting menu is rolling out in the next few weeks. And the restaurant now has a liquor license, which means both wine by the glass and signature cocktails. All told, it is becoming the quintessence of the personal-narrative restaurant that is coming to define so much great American cooking.

—Jyl Benson

Just across Detroit’s eastern border, Brine Oyster House has made the corner of Kercheval and Maryland look and feel a lot more like Royal and St. Peter — especially on a balmy weekend evening, as a band plays from the second-floor wrought iron balcony that typifies so much of New Orleans’ French Quarter. This is the result of Chamberlain Hospitality’s transformation of the long-vacant Janet’s Lunch space, into a polished, crowd-pleasing neighborhood oyster bar fit to anchor the restaurant row that’s sprung up in Grosse Pointe Park in recent years.

Don’t let the Big Easy-inspired buildout misdirect your tastebuds. You won’t find gumbo, or anything much resembling Creole cooking, on Brine’s menu. Rather, Johannesburg-born executive chef Gavin Russell brings his Euro-Mediterranean prism to bear on a decidedly seafood-focused, Midwest-tailored menu. That translates to dishes like light-as-heaven Parisienne gnocchi with lumps of crab and sweet corn. Fresh oyster varieties number a half-dozen, shucked here with skill and speed. Rolled through the dining room hourly, Brine’s “seacuterie” cart offers a mobile raw bar of interesting goodies like smoked BBQ shrimp and tuna tartare mixed with foie gras finished tableside by the chef. (Don’t skip the cart’s wahoo pastrami with pickled brussels sprouts and reuben sauce.)

If you really need a bite of the bayou while the band plays on? The crispy fried oyster sandwich hits some of the familiar flavor notes of a classic Louisiana po’boy.

—Mark Kurlyandchik

Less than a year after opening his first solo project outside of New York with Luogo, chef Anthony Scotto Jr. has added a second Italian restaurant to his growing empire in his new adopted hometown of Nashville: Pelato, just opened in the burgeoning Germantown neighborhood.

In contrast to Luogo’s menu, which Scotto describes as “lighter Mediterranean-based dishes,” Pelato is an homage to the Brooklyn Italian fare of his youth. “It’s the food we grew up with,” the chef explains, “casual, homey, neighborhood Brooklyn food.”

Scotto and his wife, Theresa, fell in love with Nashville while visiting their daughter who was a student at Belmont University, and is now a songwriter. Together, the family developed a menu of family favorites that chef Vic Casanova executes, dishes ranging from lemony baked ricotta to piquant spaghetti al arrabbiata to a creamy polenta bolognese, perfect for dipping with buttery garlic bread.

With the Scottos still commuting from New York, there’s plenty of opportunity for R&D, as it were, in the old neighborhood. “I saw a need for my type of Italian food that was missing here,” Anthony says. His desire to share a taste of home is Nashville’s gain.

—Chris Chamberlain

Houstonians who’ve already tasted the hand rolls from Norigami — the pop-up project from hotspot Hidden Omakase  — know the kind of decadence that will await when the concept finally opens its first brick-and-mortar location. (Think buttery, fatty tuna; creamy sea urchin; and melt-in-your-mouth wagyu.) After a year of hosting monthly, reservation-only events, Norigami announced last year that it would have a permanent home, to the absolute delight of its growing base of devotees.

Similar to its sister restaurants — Hidden, as well as the 30-minute omakase spot Sushi by Hidden — diners will enter the restaurant through a speakeasy-style door to find an intimate space with a wrap-around counter inside. Chef Jimmy Kieu is overseeing the menu, where bright, refreshing crudos and signature overstuffed hand rolls (served open like tacos in crisp nori, cradled delicately within individual curved wooden serving dishes) remain the focus. As with the pop-up, guests can expect explosively bold takes on hand rolls; think scallop with cucumber, yuzu, and chile garlic aioli; or blow torch-seared foie gras with avocado, microgreens, and fried onions. Much the same with the crudos, as with one combining yellowtail, yuzu ponzu, cilantro, serrano chiles, truffle oil, and fried garlic. The Hidden team has kept Houston in remarkable sushi; now they’re extending that in ways that are even more fun.

Norigami is set to open later in September.

—Vickie An

When Matta first opened in 2018, the menu revolved around “Vietnamese soul food,” the homey, Mom-made dishes co-owner Richard Le grew up eating. In the four-plus years they’ve been open, Matta has transformed from those memory-based meals to a beloved cart serving viet kieu, or foreign-born Vietnamese, dishes and now, a brick-and-mortar space tackling another iteration of Le’s signature viet kieu-style (not to mention, a growing crew of friends and collaborators as part of their All the Homies Network, which won a James Beard award this past spring for a short documentary on the restaurant’s Multnomah Whiskey Library pop-up).

At the new Lil’ Dame space, many of the dishes will be informed by the produce grown at Mora Mora Farm, the cart’s, ahem, restaurant’s de facto farm partnership as Le explores a new realm of Vietnamese-inspired farm-to-table cuisine. To start, the menu will be broken into two sections: “eat for fun” and “eat with rice,” the latter hosting several staples from the past, like thit ko, turmeric fish and an updated take on his mom’s omelet. There’s a handful of salads, of course all scented with fish sauce, and an exciting crudo speckled with Phu Quoc peppercorns and fresh herbs.

Eventually, brunch service may reappear, as will the neon green pandan buns that most often swaddled breakfast sandwiches and fish sauce-flecked burgers. For now, we’re just excited to get a taste of this next version of Matta’s shape-shifting focus — and Le’s unique Northwest-tinged take on Vietnamese cooking.

—Samantha Bakall

There are certain chefs that become synonymous with a place. During the past few years, Daniel del Prado is one name that comes up again and again when talking about the Twin Cities. He’s nonstop, opening restaurant after restaurant with nary a misstep. In mid-August, he added this Argentinian steakhouse to his portfolio, taking over a historic pair of spaces in the hot North Loop area of Minneapolis. It was clear from the moment the doors opened that Porzana and its companion basement bar, Flora Room, are going to be the spots to eat and drink this fall.

Traditional cuts like rib eyes, sirloins, and filets help anchor the menu, but there are a crazy number of other options to try. We’re talking Argentinian cuts such as vacio (from the flank) and entraña (skirt steak), a trio of domestic wagyu offerings plus one from Japan, and splurgy picks including a bone-in rib eye aged for 100 days, a 44-ounce tomahawk, and a double porterhouse. That’s a lot of beef love, but the large menu also encompasses seafood, pork, chicken, lamb, and vegetarian dishes. (Don’t ignore the “garden” selections, aka vegetable sides, a calling card for the chef.)

Pro tip: Try to reserve a table on the patio, which thrums with a romantic vibe in the evening thanks to its European courtyard feel, twinkling strings of lights overhead, and vine-covered brick walls.

—Jennifer Buege

Taking you back to the schoolyard with primary colors, notebook paper menus, and three best friends (the chefs), Elementary elicits major nostalgia — along with playful but upscale food.

The menu rotates with what’s in season, but the early rotations have highlighted some of what makes this modern Austin cooking at its finest. Start with the birria soup dumplings, or the banh mi eclair, which both taste as good as they sound. Other standouts include the seared scallops with hazelnuts, wagyu New York strip steak with burnt carrots, and a classic glass of milk and cookies to top off your meal. Elementary is nothing if not on message.

Mostly. Its cocktails were surely not part of any school curriculum, but we’re partial to the eggo-espresso martini, along with the smoking paper plane — a bourbon drink that comes with a tiny paper plane that, in a move that once would have involved a trip to the principal’s office, is lit on fire. And if that’s not enough adulting for you, next door is Hopscotch, the partners’ small wine bar, with classic cocktails and other small bites.

—Adele Hazan