The Best Places in the United States

A banana-leaf-wrapped fish fillet steamed with chutney is the kind of dish that tells you this old-school Indian restaurant takes its regional cooking seriously. North Indian classics anchor the menu, from chicken tikka masala to saag paneer, but Goan fish curry and chicken Ceylon give regulars a reason to wander off the familiar path. A daily lunch buffet draws the Richmond Avenue crowd in reliably.

Istmo is a Lakeview Mexican restaurant devoted to the food of the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, a corner of Oaxaca most menus treat as a footnote. It serves breakfast too, which is where the green enchiladas come in, built on the chef's mother's sauce, so there's a family stake in them. Dinner gets tlayudas and baked fish, and the drinks have their own point of view. Eater lists it among Chicago's best Mexican restaurants.

Tucked above B.B. King's Blues Club on Beale Street, this upscale Southern restaurant gets its soundtrack free of charge, bass lines thumping up through the floorboards from the club below. The room runs its own live music most nights anyway, so there's rarely a quiet moment. The menu leans coastal Southern, with she-crab soup, shrimp over smoked gouda grits, and a Cajun crab dip that disappears fast.

This is the dressier, sit-down cousin of the Archer Heights spot that made its name on pozole, and it keeps that dish while wandering off into aguachiles, mole, cochinita pibil, and grilled meats. The sirloin comes with pineapple-habanero sauce and avocado mousse, which is a lot of sauce for one cut and somehow works. Weekend brunch, plus a tequila and mezcal list long enough to need a plan, and sotol and raicilla for the brave.

Izakaya-style dining in Memorial Village means shareable skewers, cold Kirin, and a sushi menu that does most of the heavy lifting. The gyu kushiyaki, beef tenderloin on a stick, and the Cowboy Roll, seared beef with avocado and eel sauce, give you a sense of the register: Japanese comfort food leaning playful. The crowd fills in after work and doesn't rush out. A second location exists in River Oaks, though the menus differ.

The egg tart has a following from Jane Wild's farmers market days, and it followed her here to this brick-and-mortar bakehouse in the Heights. The menu rotates through toasts, sandwiches, and salads built around a no-waste kitchen philosophy, but the sourdough is a constant. It's the kind of neighborhood bakery where the sourcing matters as much as the output, and the regulars already know it.

Staten Island's thin, crackery-crusted pizza has its own grammar, and this old-school pizzeria on Victory Boulevard is where that grammar was written. The vodka pie, draped in a creamy tomato sauce, is the one people make the trek for, though the cheese and pepperoni hold their own just fine. Calamari and clams show up as toppings, which is either ambitious or correct depending on how Staten Island you are.

A West Oakland coffee shop where the jollof rice is serious business: sharply spiced Nigerian rice with heat that keeps building, served with caramelized plantains and your choice of stewed chicken, oxtail, or goat. Okra and egusi soups arrive with fufu. Seating is tight and the wait can stretch, so bring patience and a friend you want to impress with how good Oakland gets. The San Francisco Chronicle put it on their best Oakland restaurants list.

A Lower East Side slice shop open until 3:30 a.m. on weekends, Jonny's turns out thin, bubble-blistered pies that hold up at any hour, which is not something you can say about most places keeping those hours. The chef taught himself the craft through obsessive pizza eating and some deep Reddit rabbit holes, and the fermented dough shows it. The New York Times named it one of the city's 22 best pizza spots.

Joong Boo is a Korean grocery, and the cooking happens at Snack Corner, a few tables tucked in the back of the Kimball Avenue store. You can get bibimbap, soondubu-jjigae, or a bowl of rice cake soup, then do your shopping with a full stomach, which every grocery trip should begin with. A dumpling shop up front is there if lunch doesn't feel complete yet. Cheap, casual, and nobody minds the cart.

A taco spot near NRG where the trompo al pastor, shaved from a vertical spit with pineapple, draws the kind of loyalty that has nothing to do with proximity to a stadium. Weekends bring taquitos de canasta, basket tacos steamed soft under onions until they collapse on contact. There's also a dice roll and a buzzer game at the counter: land right and the meal is free, which keeps things lively in ways most taco spots don't bother with.

Kaito is a small sushi counter on El Camino Real in Encinitas, where the menu is whatever the fish and the chef's standards agree on that day. Some days a favorite is simply absent, and nobody apologizes. Most people hand over the decision and order the omakase, which saves you from pretending you know what you're doing. It's a sit-down, pay-attention kind of meal, so dress like you plan to be watched.

A strip-mall Indian restaurant near Hanes Mall that earns its keep by covering a lot of ground without cutting corners. The menu runs from chicken tikka masala and lamb rogan josh to gobi Manchurian and a generous spread of breads, including puffy bhatura that make a strong case for skipping the naan. Spice levels adjust to order, and the desserts, kulfi and gulab jamun laced with cardamom and rose, are worth saving room for.

Kfire is a fast-casual Korean American spot on Milwaukee Ave where you build your own bowl, and nearly everything on the menu bends to your will, including swapping the rice for salad. The galbi gets compared favorably to sit-down barbecue places, and the Impossible crumbles come marinated like galbi and pressed into patties, which is a sentence nobody expected to write. Eater lists it among Chicago's best Korean restaurants.

Pearland is not where most people expect to find a white-tablecloth steakhouse, which may explain the permanent crowd of pickup-order patrons outside. This is the fine dining side of a barbecue heavyweight's empire, so book ahead and dress like you're being seen. Wagyu runs the menu, sourced from three countries, and the beef wellington arrives under shaved black truffle. Creme brulee cheesecake closes things out, as it should.

Kingfisher is a casual, walk-in-only seafood spot on Bainbridge Island, which is a ferry ride away and therefore already a small commitment. It's the looser, cheaper follow-up to Seabird, with the same wood fire, local sourcing, and raw bar, minus the reservations and most of the fuss. Ask for a spoon if the ceviche shows up, since drinking the leftover broth is considered good manners here.

The sweet potato brulée, a potato starch custard torched to a glassy crust, gives you a sense of how this Berkeley izakaya operates: familiar enough to land, unexpected enough to stay with you. The menu shifts constantly around a core of Japanese small plates, with daily specials that swing from nigiri to okonomiyaki depending on the chef's mood. The San Francisco Chronicle named it among the best restaurants in Berkeley.

A katsu shop born from the owners' off-hours obsession with Japanese cutlets, this Redmond spot keeps things focused: pork, chicken, cheese, all fried to a crunch you can hear across the room. The chef pulls from Tokyo tradition and Vancouver's izakaya scene, so the cutlets land in dark chocolate curry, bubbling nabe, or buried under enough grated Parmesan to require a snow shovel. A focused, casual lunch counter doing one thing with real conviction.

Koffeteria is a counter-service bakery and coffee shop on Brittmoore where a kolache can taste like beef pho and the cornbread comes with Cambodian elote ideas. The pastry case wanders freely between Mexico, Brazil, France, and Italy, and nobody there seems worried about passports. The iced coffee arrives salty and sweet, with condensed milk and sourdough butter, which is to say it's a snack with a straw.

Koi is a Montrose sushi restaurant that has settled into a sleek-but-comfortable groove, the kind of room where you can wear a nice shirt without feeling like you've been summoned to a tasting. The menu leans modern while keeping one foot in traditional technique, with fish flown in from Japan and hand rolls wrapped to order. Eat them quickly, since they're built to be unsealed right before the first bite, and finish with a carajillo.

Kokoro is a quiet, minimalist kappo counter tucked into a Serra Mesa shopping plaza, the sort of address where you park between a dry cleaner and a vape shop and then walk into something hushed and serious. The chef works behind the bar in traditional wooden sandals, which tells you how the evening will go. Weekday lunch combos are the easy way in, and the miso soup can be swapped for udon for a couple of bucks.

This is a neighborhood Iranian wine bar in Bernal Heights where the big round tables were clearly built for spreading out. Parents graze through mazze platters with a glass of something cold while kids tally the decorative pots behind the bar, and nobody needs a sitter or a reservation strategy. The sweet and sour chicken stew is soft enough for the teething set, which is more than most wine bars can say.

The design riffs on the 1930s luxury steamship that once ran between the Hawaiian Islands, all sleek curves and amber light, which is a lot of scene-setting for a sushi bar but somehow earns it. Chef Kiyo Ikeda works the counter with fresh-grated wasabi and Hokkaido scallops topped with caviar. Dessert arrives in a Jewel Box, and you leave with a daruma doll for good luck, because of course you do.

Krankies roasts its own coffee in what used to be a fallout shelter, which tells you something about both the building and the clientele. It's a Southern brunch spot with biscuits stacked under fried chicken and a splash of Texas Pete, plus vegan options so nobody has to negotiate. The team closes on the first Monday of each month for a staff mental health day, a detail that tends to make regulars more loyal than any loyalty card ever could.

South Indian cooking is the reason to come to this Westheimer restaurant, even though the menu covers North Indian ground too. Fermented rice batter crepes, peppery tamarind curries, and spiced seafood or goat dishes built on black pepper and sour notes give the kitchen its personality. Finish with an Indian coffee or the sarsaparilla-and-bael-fruit cocktail, which sounds obscure until you try it.

The chef trained under Nobu Matsuhisa, and the menu reflects it: modern Japanese fine dining where sashimi and nigiri share space with contemporary technique and a few ideas that nudge the tradition sideways. The room is polished and the patio offers an escape from it. It's the kind of place where people dress up a little without being told to, which says something about the neighborhood's ambitions.