What followed was an ice-cold martini doused in droplets of lemon oil, crispy Yorkshire pudding with potted beef and bone marrow gravy, and a strip steak with a side of creamed spinach. The whole front bar area is first come, first served, and even though I had booked a 9:15pm table (reservations are hard to come by), I slid up to the bar around 6:45pm without a problem. “While the popular London spot can’t compete with the history of Keens, Peter Luger, and Delmonico’s, Hawksmoor on Park Avenue and 22nd Street is poised to become NYC’s next great steakhouse. Semma serves only three to five crabs a night, and I can’t think of any recent restaurant experiences that made me happier than putting on a bib, getting a little violent with crab joints, and eating the incomparable combination of buttery meat and cardamom-heavy chutney over coconut rice.” If you’re someone who prioritizes seafood and using crustacea to coerce your date into falling in love with you, call ahead and secure a $115 whole Dungeness crab for the night of your dinner. Try the soft snails taken out of their shells and mixed with fiery tamarind and ginger, for instance, or a vat of tender venison drenched in a dark brown sauce that tastes like clove and smoke. Semma focuses on South Indian regional specialties typically found in rural home settings rather than in big city restaurants, and the dishes I’m most jazzed about here are the ones no other NYC places offer. After opening Dhamaka on the LES, they recently unveiled an exceptional new West Village spot in the narrow space where their restaurant Rahi used to be. “Aside from Oscar Isaac and Michelle Zauner from Japanese Breakfast, few of us are having as triumphant a year as the team behind Semma. You get the impression that a chipped piece of wood or a stain on a chair won’t go unaddressed for long.” (Get this torta as soon as you sit down.) The expansive dining room has a live-fire cooking station in the rear with unsubtle flames that reminded me of a recent disaster involving my toaster oven, and the whole space looks like it could be in a modern Italian hotel. I recommend you temporarily suspend any no-carb program you may have joined and order the pizza bianca with anchovies, peppery gnocco fritto stuffed with goat gouda, or the torta with plenty of caramelized onions and pecorino cheese baked into a rich and crumbly crust. Ci Siamo is an Italian restaurant in Manhattan West where the starters and pastas will make you consider ignoring the rest of the menu. (The Knicks may actually be good when you read this, but chances are they’re not.) If so, the latest opening from Union Square Hospitality Group should be welcome news. “You might often find yourself around Penn Station for commuting or sports torture needs. Just make sure to get a couple of pastries on display by the register before you take a seat, and keep an eye out for special Hungarian doughnuts on Sundays.” Agi’s certainly feels like a place for grabbing and going, but there are still plenty of places to sit once you’ve placed your order at the counter. Assuming you aren’t intending to race a Labrador in Prospect Park afterwards, try the cheese-stuffed palacsinta crepes or the towering Leberkase breakfast sandwich with an exploding over-easy egg, thick griddled pork pate, and a sweet pear mostarda to round out all that richness. Much of the salad-and-sandwich-dominant menu here is dedicated to luxurious takes on Jewish-American classics (Agi’s tuna sandwich comes with horseradish and parsley salad, for example), while other dishes feel more like a distinct ode to Hungarian and Austrian food. This new daytime cafe takes inspiration from the owner’s Hungarian-Austrian grandmother - who you’ll see pictured in a very cute frame by the kitchen. “If I lived in Crown Heights and had the metabolic endurance of a college sophomore, you’d find me at Agi’s Counter twice a week picking up pastries and an Alpine cheddar egg sandwich on a buttery Hungarian cheese biscuit.
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