The Best Places in the United States

Pork skin fried from thick belly cuts until it shatters like glass: that's the whole thesis at this home-based chicharrones shop in San Jose. The team announces pre-order windows each week, and the salsas, red and green and genuinely punishing, are almost as much of a draw as the pork itself. The San Francisco Chronicle named it one of the best Mexican spots in the Bay Area, which for a place you order by the pound feels about right.

Fewer than twenty seats, one chef, seven courses, and a kitchen so quiet you can hear the thinking. Nasime is an intimate Japanese tasting room in Old Town Alexandria where the Ginza-trained team runs a set menu that moves through seasons rather than trends. The pacing is unhurried, the combinations are precise, and the sashimi course arrives with a buzz-button flower that earns its spot on the plate.

A Peruvian restaurant tucked among the taco stands on Oklahoma City's south side, which is either perfect camouflage or a happy accident. The ceviche comes in several varieties and makes a sensible starting point, while the lomo saltado and rotisserie chicken fill out the table nicely. Wash it all down with chicha morada or an Inca Kola straight from the gold can, which is exactly how it should arrive.

Never Coffee is a Belmont cafe and roastery where the lattes read like a dare: one comes with hops and dulce de leche, another with star anise and black licorice, and both somehow behave in the cup. The room is all cutout shapes and a bright green tiled floor, and the picnic tables out front go fast whenever Portland remembers the sun exists. Order at the counter, stay as long as the laptop battery allows.

Dollar bills stapled to the ceiling, beer signs on the wooden walls, and a faded crimson building past West Tuscaloosa that the locals call Nick's in the Sticks. This old-school steakhouse has been serving filets alongside deep-fried classics like onion rings and chicken livers long enough that the prices still seem frozen in a different era. The Nicodemus, a fruit punch and four-spirits situation, arrives while you wait, which is a service to everyone involved.

Norm's is a proper diner, the kind where the patty melt arrives with two smashed patties and a stack of Texas toast, and nobody mentions your cholesterol. The menu runs from blueberry pancakes to club sandwiches built with structural ambition, plus a caesar that somehow wanders in with a crisp chicken cutlet. It suits a solo breakfast with a newspaper, a brunch with friends, or the slow recovery from a late night.

Conchas that are fluffy with just enough density to feel substantial without tipping into sweet are Norte 54's calling card, and they're worth tracking down. This pop-up bakery rotates through Mexican pastries and desserts: buñuelos one week, tres leches cake the next, all rooted in nostalgia and sharpened by pastry technique. Catch it at Mission Mercado, Grand Coffee, or Nopalito, depending on the week.

Meat on a stick is the organizing principle here, and the sticks arrive loaded, ten pieces high, with lamb cubes, duck tongues, and frog legs all in the rotation. This Jilin-style BBQ spot in the Inner Sunset is the kind of place that makes vegetarianism feel like a personal attack, though the potato discs and tofu skins are quietly essential. The San Francisco Chronicle named it among the Bay Area's best Chinese restaurants.

Nossa Familia is a coffee shop in Ladd's Addition that buys its beans straight from family farms in Brazil, which explains the subscription club and the loyal following. The room is bright, the espresso runs smooth and chocolatey, and the menu skips the flashy drinks, with one exception. The Bee Sting latte comes with local honey, cardamom, and a little cayenne, so it's the only thing here that fights back.

Every weekend, a sprawling outdoor food market assembles near the Oakland Flea Market, and the density of good options is almost unfair. A towering al pastor trompo gets shaved to order, while a stand called Las Cazuelas works through a rotation of clay-pot guisados that taste like someone's grandmother is running the operation. Carnitas, chicharron by the pound, stuffed gorditas. Bring cash, bring an appetite, and resist the urge to commit to a plan.

Off The Record is a downtown cocktail bar that passes for a record shop until you step behind the curtain, where stacked vintage speakers and framed gold records set the tone. The music runs loud enough to feel in your sternum, yet nobody has to shout, and even the bartenders sing along to the DJ's Al Green. Grab a couch upstairs and watch the room. The Infatuation lists it among the best bars in Houston.

A Kyoto-born coffee roaster with a downtown Boston outpost, Ogawa treats the morning latte as a quiet art project, right down to the foam. It's a coffee shop in the composed, Japanese sense: calm, precise, and a little more interesting than you expected. The house blend skews rich and fruity, the hojicha latte earthy and caramel-edged, and seasonal drinks like a smoked maple latte suggest the menu takes itself just seriously enough.

Ohlala is a French bistro wedged between a Starbucks and a Bank of America in a Summerlin strip mall, which is about as far from a Strip brunch as you can get. There's no DJ and no smoking cocktails, just a proper French omelette, a croque monsieur with ham and cheese in every bite, and brie turning up on the burger and in croquettes. Even the pain perdu is savory, made with crusty French bread.

OHSO is a brewpub in downtown Gilbert whose backyard doubles as a neighborhood park, with lawn chairs, a dog run, an arcade corner, and a screen the size of a drive-in's, so game day comes with grass underfoot. Groups can claim a shaded cabana with its own TVs, which turns a Sunday into a private viewing party. Expect pints, casual pub food, and flip-flops that nobody questions.

A Lanzhou-style hand-pulled noodle shop in a Fremont strip mall where the broth is somehow both chile-fierce and quietly soothing at the same time. The signature beef noodle soup comes with stretchy flat noodles pulled to your chosen width, tender beef, and floating coins of radish. Start with the pigs ears in chile oil if you know what's good for you. The San Francisco Chronicle named it among the Bay Area's best Chinese restaurants.

The roastery and training lab behind the counter make this Decatur coffee shop feel more like a working operation than a cafe that happens to have good espresso. Drip, nitro, and latte specials share the menu with fresh pastries, and the large back patio has both sun and shade for the laptop-and-novel crowd. Courses in latte art and roasting run out of the on-site lab, if you want to graduate beyond being a customer.

Turquoise booths and a menu that hasn't needed rethinking in decades: this Scottsdale franchise of the national pancake-house chain has been the neighborhood's default breakfast spot for a long time. The Dutch Baby, finished with lemon and whipped butter, is the order that regulars treat as non-negotiable. Griddle-focused, diner-priced, and reliably packed on weekend mornings with people who had the good sense to arrive early.

Oscars is a counter-service taqueria whose deep sea mural doubles as a landmark, which helps when you're trying to explain to someone where to meet you. Sandy regulars hunch over red plastic trays while one cashier calls out names and scoops ceviche into cups. The fish tacos are the draw, and the tuna cooked al pastor style with pineapple is the one that tends to get ordered twice. The Infatuation put it on a San Diego top 25.

Tucked into a historic greystone next door to Moreno's Liquors, a southside family institution, Osito's Tap is a neighborhood cocktail bar where the drinks lean hard into Latin American classics, agave spirits, and Micheladas done right. The connection to the liquor store isn't just sentimental; the spirits selection reflects it. Low-key enough that you might walk past it, specific enough that regulars don't want you to find it.

Floor-to-ceiling windows face the marina, and the room leans into it with a chandelier big enough to mean business. This is a dim sum hall in Alameda, the check-box slip-and-tray kind, with a menu that mixes traditional and modern. The baked pork puffs, shiny and sesame-flecked, are the thing to track down when the cart comes by. The San Francisco Chronicle named it among the Bay Area's best dim sum.

Padre's is a wine shop and bar on White Oak where you can grab a bottle for home or settle in with a glass, and the by-the-glass list is long enough to need its own reading time. Chilled reds get unusual respect here, along with mostly European and West Coast bottles and the odd orange wine from the country of Georgia. It's usually packed and loud, so conversation tends to be limited to nodding at your pour.

Pal's Lounge is a neighborhood bar on North Rendon, and the front door comes with a small welcoming committee of smokers, vapers, and dogs you'll have to politely wade through. Beer-and-shot specials and cocktails stay cheap, so the Selfish Lover, a floral vodka sipper, won't drain your wallet. There's no kitchen to speak of, but food pop-ups drift through serving sandwiches and stir-fried noodles. The Infatuation lists it among New Orleans' best bars.

The breakfast burrito, Santa Fe will tell you, was invented here. Palacio is a casual adobe cafe where the signature move is ordering "Christmas-style," meaning both red and green chile sauces blanketing your burrito at once. The room feels like someone's well-loved dining room, which is more or less the point. The paninis pull a surprising crowd too, the Cuban Reuben among them, but the chile sauces are what keeps regulars from ever really leaving.

Pool tables in the main room set the tone, but the kitchen is doing more than bar food should. Palo Santo is a casual bar and grill where the team brought a Los Angeles sensibility to Oklahoma City, with katsu chicken sandwiches and tacos sharing the menu with serious cocktails. The warm mezcal and Oaxacan hot chocolate drink is the kind of thing that makes you rethink leaving before one more round.

A Guatemalan street food stand on International Boulevard in Fruitvale, where thin-coated fried chicken goes into the fryer after you order it, and the fries come out zigzagged with mayo, ketchup, and Picamas, a tangy green salsa. The crowd reflects the neighborhood's Guatemalan community, and the San Francisco Chronicle named it among the Bay Area's top fried chicken spots. Bring cash.

Layered fries stacked into tidy golden blocks are the surprising star of a menu that otherwise runs toward caviar service and bourbon-smoked elk loin. Parc is Aspen's classic white-tablecloth French-American restaurant, the one locals book when something is worth celebrating, which in Aspen is apparently always. The lounge and bar take walk-ins on a shorter, friendlier menu if you didn't plan ahead, which in Aspen is apparently also always.

The doors close at 11 a.m. and the croissants are often gone well before that, which means showing up to this small French patisserie in Albany is a bit like gambling, but with better odds if you arrive early. The plain croissant is the one people reorganize their mornings for, thin-layered and butter-crisp. Canelés, kouign amann, and egg custard tarts fill out the short menu until they don't.

Pavon Coffee Den is a coffee shop that looks like someone's well-traveled aunt decorated it, all snug leather couches and Moroccan-style rugs, with laptop people nested in every corner. The lattes come in flavors like Fruity Pebbles and vanilla rose, so serious coffee heads should order the basics. After dark it turns into a moody lounge with espresso martinis, wine, and charcuterie boards, open until 10pm nightly.

Lazy Susans on every large table and clubby blue ceiling lights give this San Leandro dim sum house more party energy than you'd expect from a shopping plaza. The menu runs through the classics: taro cakes, pork siu mai, rice rolls stuffed with shrimp and yellow chives. The shrimp balls arrive so crunchy that staff split them tableside with scissors, which is a small performance worth witnessing. The San Francisco Chronicle named it among the Bay Area's top dim sum spots.

This is a no-frills bagel counter in Jackson that serves its bagels untoasted on principle, and the staff holds that line even when a customer shows up with a personal toaster. The huckleberry cream cheese is the local move, and a mocha-style frozen drink with an espresso shot covers the caffeine. Breakfast and lunch still come in under $10, so there's a line of rafters and park-bound early risers.

Peg's is a casual breakfast diner on West Sahara where pajama pants raise no eyebrows. The menu wanders from American to Hawaiian to Mexican, but the name tells you what the kitchen takes seriously: ham and eggs, sold by the half pound or the full pound, with unlimited toast on the side. Fried spam and loco moco plates are there for anyone who'd rather have mac salad with their eggs. It's cheap, filling, and not a place that cares what you're wearing.