Where to Eat: New York City
Dinner for all tastes, the perfect brunch and tonkotsu ramen that will blow your friends’ socks off.
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Being the Restaurant Friend™ is a gift and a curse. Yes, I get to dine out to my heart’s content (pro), and I have the privilege of treating my friends and family to dinner on occasion (pro). That I even get to have this job (major pro), but an unfortunate con is the inevitable text, email or a Slack message asking, “Where can I go to dinner with four people with 24 hours’ notice?”
This puts me, and every other Restaurant Friend™, in the unenviable position of having to immediately rule out about half of our favorite, in-demand restaurants. But this is where the Back Pocket Restaurant™ comes in handy: Every Restaurant Friend™ you know keeps three or four options in mind that fit the 24 hours’ notice bill. They recommend those same restaurants over and over. (It’s not lazy, it’s efficient.) These are the restaurants I keep in my back pocket — though I must insist that you give at least two weeks’ notice next time.
Lupetto
One must be extremely strategic in choosing a Back Pocket Restaurant™. Broadly speaking, it should be accessible to all tastes, conveniently located and able to fit large parties. Lupetto in Flatiron, the wood-fired spinoff of La Pecora Bianca, checks all those boxes.
The dining room is tastefully appointed with velvet-lined booths along the walls and large tables in the center. The menu is wide-ranging, with pastas, salads and a bunch of wood-fired mains — the grilled salmon “chop” with tomato butter is one of my favorite salmon dishes in the city. And, most important, there are always reservations available. As in, you could book a table for tonight right now, which is not at all an indictment of the quality of the restaurant. Lupetto is simply generous with their reservations, and unlike many restaurants appears to put the majority of its tables online. Plus it’s in that wide open section of Flatiron across from Madison Square Park that always makes my heart flutter with love for the city.
1123 Broadway (West 25th Street)
Le Crocodile
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