The { Foodie } Life: Our Top 10 Spring NYC Restaurant Picks
This winter delivered one chilly snow day after another, but It’s time to shed those layers and celebrate spring as only New Yorkers can! And what better way to celebrate spring than heading out for a night on the town with friends and loved ones. There’s no shortage of charming restaurants in the city, however we picked the top 10 restaurants we are excited to share with you.
1. Cafe Clover
Nestled on a charming tree-lined street in the West Village, Cafe Clover offers a warm, inviting atmosphere to share great food with friends and family. With a focus on pure, simple ingredients brought together in imaginative and unexpected ways, the menu delivers dishes that are both healthy and delicious.
2. Dirty Candy
One of the only Michelin-recommended vegetarian restaurants in America, Dirt Candy is also the first vegetarian restaurant in 17 years to receive two stars from the New York Times. Named “Best Vegetarian Restaurant in NYC” by amNewYork, L Magazine, and the Village Voice, it was singled out for “Best Grits in NYC” by the Village Voice, and its chef and owner, Amanda Cohen, has been called “brilliant” by Food + Wine Magaine. Chef Cohen was the first vegetarian chef to compete on Iron Chef America, and her cookbook, Dirt Candy: A Cookbook, is the first graphic novel cookbook in North America.
3. Cosme
Cosme is a restaurant in New York City’s Flatiron District serving contemporary Mexican-inspired cuisine. World-renowned Chef Enrique Olvera and his team create dishes rooted in Mexican flavors and traditions, while also celebrating local and seasonal ingredients from the Hudson Valley and surrounding region. Cosme’s beverage program focuses on artisanal spirits and mirrors its cuisine, letting the high quality ingredients shine. NYC has never really gotten props for its Mexican food, but Cosme is said to break the trend. Apparently it’s incredible.
4. Il Buco Alimentari & Vineria
The first offspring of il Buco on Bond Street, the Alimentari & Vineria is as much a production outpost of the original – specializing in house-cured meats and home baked breads – as it is a casual dining experience in its own right. Here at the original site of the Great Jones Lumber Supply, Donna Lennard set out to fulfill a dream of the last 18 years.
5. Shuko
Shuko offers daily tasting menus from Chefs Nick Kim and Jimmy Lau based on traditional Japanese flavors and techniques from the kitchen and sushi bar. Our menu reflects the best fish selections and seasonal ingredients sourced locally and internationally.
6. Bowery Meat Company
A meat-centric restaurant by John Mcdonald with chef/partner Josh Capon. Located just off Bowery and 1st Street, the menu is diverse and market driven, including beef from Diamond Creek Ranch, domestic Colorado lamb, veal, pork, and more. My husband, Mark loved the 40 oz. tomahawk steak he shared with friends.
7. Vic’s
Chef Hillary Sterling presides over Vic’s locally sourced Italian-Mediterranean dishes, including house made pastas and pizzas (made with New York State flour) and market-driven plates cooked in the wood burning oven.
8. Santina
Santina is a costal italian restaurant created by Mario Carbone, Rich Torrisi and Jeff Zalaznick. Situated on what used to be the coast of Manhattan where some of the city’s first farmers markets once stood. Santina’s takes inspiration from the neighborhood’s history with a menu that highlights vegetables and fish. Santina is located underneath the Gansevoort entrance to the High Line Park
9. Upland
Named after the West Coast town that laid the groundwork for chef Justin Smillie’s lifelong love of cooking, STARR Restaurants’ Upland is a beacon of stunning California-inspired cuisine in the bustling heart of New York City.
10. Estela
Estela is a beverage-driven restaurant from former Blue Hill at Stone Barns beverage director Thomas Carter and James Beard Award-nominated chef Ignacio Mattos. Designed as an approachable, easy and fun place to go, Estela serves shareable plates of American food with European influences, features a wine list of over 200 mostly European selections from France (Rhône, Burgundy), Germany and Italy, and offers classically-inspired cocktails. It’s hidden up a tiny flight of stairs on Houston and easily missed, but we hear its superb!
