The Best Places in the United States

A white lonchera that parks outside a tire shop on Sundays, selling exactly four cuts of carnitas by the taco or the pound. The chef started making his hometown Michoacán recipe because he missed it, which is the best possible origin story for a food truck. The San Francisco Chronicle named it among the best tacos in the Bay Area. Ask for a little cuero folded in and you'll understand why regulars circle the block.

Castnet is a casual seafood counter in New Orleans East, where the fried shrimp po'boy comes dressed on Leidenheimer bread and the sausage version is made with Patton's. There's also boiled seafood, gumbo, and plate lunches for anyone with a different plan. A snowball stand sits on one side and a barbecue joint on the other, so the parking lot doubles as a very low-stakes tasting menu. The Infatuation lists it among the city's best.

The tangerine walls and shelves stocked with tinned fish, art mags, and turntables tell you this isn't your average pizza shop before you've even ordered. The owner came up through visual merchandising and a stint at Roberta's, and it shows. Wood-fired Neapolitan-ish pies come with combinations that take a beat to process, in a good way. Ohio City's more design-conscious crowd has figured this out, naturally.

The Kill-Bill Pork Tenderloin, a sandwich stacked with crispy tenderloin, ham, bacon, cheese, and a fried egg, tells you everything about the ambition level here. Centro is a lively Italian restaurant that's been around forever in downtown Des Moines, serving lunch and dinner to a neighborhood it arguably helped create. Pizzas, pastas, and a grilled pork chop with Chianti demi-glace round out a menu that doesn't take itself too seriously but knows what it's doing.

Ceremony is a tea-focused cafe near Brown that also pours cocktails and natural wine, which is a lot of hats for one counter. The signature move is a reserved tea ceremony led by an apprentice, a quiet tasting that doubles as an exit from the Thayer Street scrum. Walk-ins can order an iced strawberry matcha latte with a giant gummy bear in it, then fight a student for a table.

The spice level in a given dish can change day to day depending on which batch of Thai chilies came in, and they'll tell you that upfront. This casual Thai restaurant on 900 South regularly has a line out the door, drawn by tom yum, som tum, and curries built on serious heat. The mango with Thai custard and sticky rice is there for anyone whose mouth needs a diplomatic exit.

Chapter IV is a modern Creole restaurant from the family behind Dooky Chase, which means the gumbo arrives with a dark roux and a full cast of sausage, shrimp, chicken, and crab. The menu is long enough to stall a first-timer, though the squid ink linguine is a good place to start. Dress like you might run into someone, because by all accounts your ex, your old coworker, and half your high school class are already inside.

The "clam" dip is made from tofu, the fried fish contains no fish, and somehow none of that feels like a compromise. This vegetarian Vietnamese restaurant in Falls Church is where the chef makes her own faux meats and seafoods from scratch, turning lemongrass noodle soup and papaya salad into fully convincing arguments that the meat was never the point. Devout carnivores tend to figure this out about halfway through the meal.

A cheese bar and small-plates spot on Ingersoll Avenue where the main event is a massive charcuterie board piled with Iowa cheeses and cured meats. The team also does fondue, raclette, grilled cheese with roasted tomato bisque, and a cast-iron skillet mac, so the menu is essentially every dairy dream you've had in one room. Wine, beer, and cocktails round things out. It's the kind of place where you go for a snack and leave having eaten a full meal you didn't plan on.

Closed-circuit Burmese musicals play overhead while you eat, which sets the tone at this no-frills Southport restaurant attached to a Southeast Asian supermarket. The menu leans into the flavors of Myanmar, running through tea leaf salad, Burmese-style samosas, and a hominy soup built around beef offal. The community that built this place, Indianapolis's Chin and broader Burmese diaspora, still fills it, and the food reflects that.

This is an old-school Chinatown bakery on Wentworth where the pastry case does all the talking and the register takes only cash, so bring some. The baked BBQ pork buns are soft and fluffy, the sesame balls and egg tarts are the other usual suspects, and the egg tart crust flakes enough that you should check a mirror before rejoining society. Everything is made fresh daily, and a few dollars buys a bag.

The patio is strung up to feel like a beachside cabana, and on a warm Mission afternoon that illusion mostly holds. Chuy's is a mariscos spot with a burrito worth ordering, specifically the flattop version where the tortilla gets pressed and crisped on the griddle. A frosty mug or a michelada fits the mood exactly. Seats outside go fast at peak hours, so arriving early isn't overthinking it.

Hand-pressed tortillas made with nixtamalized heirloom corn anchor the menu at this contemporary Mexican restaurant in Takoma Park, where vegan-friendly cooking doesn't mean compromising on ambition. Tres moles fill the enchiladas, cashew cheese goes into the quesadillas, and the bar runs inventive mezcal and rum cocktails alongside margaritas. Brunch draws a crowd too. The team recently moved into sleeker new digs up Carroll Ave, and the upgrade shows.

Leather-bound books line the shelves, curious antiquities fill the corners, and the cocktail menu arrives as a hand-illustrated booklet, which is either delightful or a lot depending on your mood. This vegan cocktail bar in Cleveland's west side pairs its seasonal drinks with bar snacks and full plates, all plant-based, running from masa hushpuppies to artichoke "crab" cakes. A good place to linger over something clever in a glass.

A southside corner bar where the game is always on and the regulars have claimed their stools for life. The tiny flattop behind the bar turns out chicken wings done the Milwaukee way: fried, sauced, then grilled, so you get char and caramelization and a vinegar bite all at once. It's a rougher room than the Bay View scene around it, which is exactly the point.

A seafood raw bar, a caviar cart stocked with Thomas Keller's Regiis Ova, and a steakhouse menu beneath contemporary chandeliers overlooking Bicentennial Unity Plaza: Commission Row is a special-occasion kind of place where everything is just slightly orchestrated. The martini list alone suggests the clientele arrives in blazers on purpose. The chef came up through Cunningham Restaurant Group, and the room reflects that pedigree, polished without being cold.

Community Loaves is a neighborhood bakery and cafe in Murray Hill, run out of a space with creaky hardwood floors and the steady smell of sourdough. Inside seating is limited, so most people end up at the garden tables, where the local cats make their rounds like unpaid hosts. It's a low-key counter-service stop, and the egg sandwich takes honey mustard and pickles if you ask.

Congaree And Penn is a working farm about twelve miles outside Downtown that happens to have a restaurant and a cidery attached, so you may meet a goat before you meet your server. By day it's picnic lunches and U-Pick. After dark it goes adults-only and turns into a proper Southern dinner of duck legs and short ribs, with small-batch cider on tap and a private table out in the grapevines for groups.

A specialty goods shop and sandwich counter in downtown Napa where the house-cured meats do the heavy lifting. The biscuits are a reason to come on their own, crunchy outside and cloud-soft inside, and the country ham and jam version with pimento cheese makes a strong case for eating before noon. Frozen four-packs of biscuits are available to go, for those with the self-awareness to plan ahead.

A fresh pasta shop and lunch counter that quietly changed hands and then quietly changed direction, Corridor now pulls from the wider Mediterranean rather than just Italy. The vegetable-forward midday menu shifts with the seasons, with poultry and seafood making occasional appearances. The market side still stocks house-made pastas, olive oils, and charcuterie for the take-home crowd.

A dessert shop where black sesame Oreo cake and milk bread cinnamon rolls make the case that bakery menus have been missing something for a long time. The chef bought the place after years in recipe development and steered it toward pan-Asian flavors the Des Moines scene had largely overlooked. Friday and Saturday nights flip into Midnight Munchies, with cocktails, '90s music, and customizable Cup Noodles alongside rotating cakes and cheesecakes.

Chickens turning on a spit behind glass, focaccia stacked high, and a counter so narrow that most people take their order to the curb: this is a counter service porchetta shop with Italian instincts and Charleston pork. Everything lands on housemade focaccia, from spiced salmon with whipped ricotta at breakfast to the classic porchetta with crackling, salsa verde, and provolone. A standing bar exists, technically, but the line moves and so do you.

The cracked-laminate menus at this Vietnamese restaurant in a Phoenix strip mall are entirely on purpose. Fourteen kinds of pho anchor the menu, portions are generous enough to require a to-go container, and the hot coffee with sweetened condensed milk is a good reason to linger. Prices hover around $15, the room is multi-roomed and no-frills, and the com tam dac biet piles broken rice with what feels like the entire menu on one plate.

The seeded rye bread is baked on-site, and the corned beef and pastrami get piled onto it over the counter, no table service involved. Davis Bakery is an old-school Jewish deli that has been around forever in Cleveland, still family-owned, still efficient in the way that only counter-service places can be. In a country where Jewish delis keep quietly disappearing, this one draws a line out the door without seeming to notice the trend.

Deanie's on Hayne is a casual, family-run seafood house out in the Lakeview-adjacent stretch, far from any Bourbon Street souvenir shop with a daiquiri machine. The platters arrive heaped with fried shrimp, catfish, stuffed crab, and oyster patties, and they're built for sharing, though nobody will fault you for not. The daily specials run around twenty dollars. On Thursdays, the original owner, Maw Maw Deanie, sometimes stops by your table to chat.

Halal butcher shop by day, charcoal grill operation by the afternoon, Dearborn Meat Market has been doing both long enough that the regulars don't bother with the menu. The move is a tray of kabobs or kafta, roasted over charcoal in the back, with hummus and pita alongside. It's a narrow, welcoming room in the heart of Dearborn's Lebanese corridor, and few places in the area do lamb this well.

Debbie's is a small downtown hot dog counter where the weiners get the kind of toppings you'd expect on a plate with a tasting menu, like creamy leeks, dijon, dill, and a crunch of Potato Stix. The chef came over from a late, lamented barbecue joint, which explains the sandwiches and sides. There are a couple of outdoor seats for people watching, or you can carry your dogs to the river and eat them like a civilized person.

Chaat done properly is tactile work, and this sunny Sunnyvale spot leans into that, handing you puffy bhatura to mop up simmered chickpeas or letting you crack open semolina puri with your fingertips before filling them with tamarind water. It grew out of a popular food truck, and the families who used to find it in parking lots now get a plant-filled patio instead. The San Francisco Chronicle named it among the Bay Area's best South Asian restaurants.

Den Den is a casual Korean cafe on Benefit Street, the kind of place where you order too much and nobody at the table objects. The menu runs from kimchi pancakes to bibimbap to soft tofu stew, plus a chicken karaage that has been known to make first dates feel promising. The brick dining room is cozy, and the RISD students drifting in and out make it feel like the neighborhood's unofficial canteen. It's an easy yes for parents on family weekend.

The injera arrives as the plate, not a side, and the whole table leans in to tear pieces and scoop from communal piles of stew and spiced meat. This Briarcliff Road neighborhood restaurant has been an Atlanta Ethiopian staple for ages, run by two partners who grew up in Ethiopia and cook like it. The meat platter is sized for sharing among several people and covers serious ground. There's also a full vegan menu, Ethiopian tea, and Ethiopian beer.

Dockside is a counter-service seafood joint wedged beside the Jax Beach boat ramp, where you order at the window, eat with plastic forks, and wash it down with cheap bottled beer. Locals come for catches that were recently somewhere else, in combo baskets of shrimp, scallops, or crab cakes, blackened, grilled, or fried. The screened-in patio is the move, mostly because the seagulls out there have notions about your lunch.

The pistachio-green wood-fired oven is the first thing you see, which tells you exactly where the evening is going. Dolomiti is a pizzeria and wine bar that anchors Millwork Commons, a warehouse district that recently decided it wanted nice things. Sourdough-crust pies come out blistered and a little smoky, and the mortadella panino, made from the same dough folded around house-made ricotta and pesto, keeps showing up in people's orders a second time.

Dune Brothers is a counter-service seafood shack in downtown Providence, which is a funny thing to say about a state where nobody is more than a few miles from water. You order at the window, then carry your fried fish and clam cakes across a shell-strewn patio to a picnic table. The Jonah crab roll rotates in as a special, and a cold Narragansett or a local Yacht Club soda goes with it. Dress for a quick lunch.

A pair of food trucks running Tijuana-style tacos around San Jose, with a charcoal grill and a spinning trompo on weekends that explains the line before you even smell the smoke. The chicharron fundido, a giant handmade corn tortilla loaded with crackly pork belly and melted cheese, is the kind of thing that makes "just a quick taco" a laughable plan. The San Francisco Chronicle named it among the best tacos in the Bay Area.

The salted mugs for micheladas arrive frosty enough to fog, which tells you something about the priorities at this Mexican taqueria and seafood spot with a few Milwaukee locations. Shrimp comes in a chalice-sized portion, tacos al carbon carry that backyard-grill smoke, and the housemade chorizo leans hard into its smoke too. The verde salsa is the kind of thing you want to sneak home in a cup.

Porchetta ribs and bucatini all'Amatriciana anchor the menu at this Italian restaurant on Frankford Avenue, where Greg Vernick stepped outside his usual lane to cook regional Italian for the first time. The room runs buzzy and packed, the service is tight, and the wine list leans Italian by the glass. It's a genuinely sexy room to land in Kensington, and the seasonal menu follows Italian tradition closely enough to feel considered without feeling like a museum piece.

Epi's is a family-run Basque restaurant in Meridian, built on one great-grandmother's recipes and handed down through three generations without anyone apparently wanting to change them. Expect a sit-down meal of croquetas, lamb stew with green peppers, and baby squid in broth the color of printer ink. Eater lists it among Boise's essentials, and the gateau Basque at the end is how people keep the family tradition going.

Wings here get sorted by size before brining for a full day, which is the kind of attention you don't expect from a casual wing spot. The sauces are all made in-house, and several are named after regulars, so the menu doubles as a hall of fame for people who've eaten here too many times to count. If there's a wait, the dive bar next door is right there.

Falafel x Bar is a Levantine counter-service spot that doubles as a natural wine shop, so the bottle you grab off the shelf is also your dinner plan. The patio garden is big enough for a group that would rather split snacks than commit to entrees, and the tinned fish board turns up there alongside pickled things and sumac-dusted fries. Eating in gets you the toppings bar. Lunch to-go works too, but it skips the garden.

Tucked inside a working garden nursery, this fine dining room earns its farm-to-table premise rather than just decorating with it. The menu shifts with the season and the region's producers, so what lands on the table reflects what's actually ready, not what reads well on a permanent menu. Surrounded by greenery and open to the California air, the room feels more like a destination than a detour on the way to the coast.