The Best Places in the United States

Warm tortillas pressed at a kiosk just inside the door set the tone at this San Rafael Mexican restaurant, where the kitchen takes mole seriously enough to run seven housemade versions on the weekend buffet. The mole poblano and a red guajillo version called Mama Luisa are the ones to pace yourself toward. Cabeza de res, menudo, and pozole rojo round things out. Order a michelada; it isn't included, but it's the move.

Los Tios is a sit-down Tex-Mex restaurant that claims it served Houston's first frozen margarita, then took a firm stance on the flavored kind and settled on floaters in coupe glasses. The big indoor patio fills with friend groups and families who are clearly here to stay awhile. The tacos arrive in a C-curved shell built to hold more meat, and everything leans on corn tortillas, which is a bold choice around here.

Lotus is a casual, order-at-the-counter cafe and juice bar on Encinitas' main drag, where the menu runs mostly vegetarian and the salad list reaches ten. Names like Soulful and Spiritual tell you exactly what town you're in. You can add tofu, tempeh, or vegetable "chicken," or blackened chicken if the vegetables have been judging you. Eater has named it among San Diego's best salads.

A short staircase down from a quiet Schuylerville corner takes you into one of those slice shops that seems to exist slightly outside of time. Louie & Ernie's has been around forever, slinging margherita pies and sausage pizzas to a neighborhood that hasn't changed much either. The New York Times put it on their list of the city's 22 best pizza places, which is the kind of recognition that surprises no one who's actually been here.

Loving Hut is a casual, fully vegan counter-service spot on El Cajon Boulevard, with a menu that wanders the globe without ever touching an animal. The Heavenly salad piles shredded cabbage, fried tofu strips, and Vietnamese mint under a sweet-and-sour tamarind dressing, which is how Eater landed it on a list of the best salads in San Diego. The room is mellow and unfussy, and nobody will ask you to explain your lunch.

A strip mall Mexican restaurant where everything, walls, floors, booths, even the plates, is painted black so the food glows against it like a still life. The brothers who run Lujos took over their parents' spot and rebuilt it almost entirely. The regular menu covers tacos, burritos, and quesadillas, but there's a permanent off-menu section worth asking about, including birria enchiladas drowning in red sauce with crema and guacamole. Wash it down with the horchata.

Magnolia's is a Mexican chuchería in the Greater East End, which means ice cream is only the starting point before the chamoy, the Tajín, and the sour worms take over. Gushers can end up on a banana split, and the milkshakes come buried in fruit syrup and candy. It's cheap, loud, and sticky in the best tradition of the genre. Go after school lets out only if you enjoy negotiating with a pack of ten-year-olds.

The move here is to sit down, and keep sitting: every meal arrives thali-style, a platter loaded with a dozen-plus curries, chutneys, and small bites from the vegetarian kitchens of Rajasthan and Gujarat, and it's all unlimited. Flag your waiter when anything runs low. This southwest Houston dining room is the only US outpost of the Indian chain, and it handles vegan and gluten-free without fuss.

Sea turtles surface in the water a few feet from your table while you work through a menu that skews lighter than most oceanfront spots, with vegan and gluten-free options alongside fish sourced close to home. Mala is a Hawaiian seafood restaurant right on the Lahaina waterfront, and brunch draws a loyal crowd for eggs Benedict done several ways, including one with wasabi hollandaise that sounds like a dare and isn't.

Open rafters, pale pink tiles, and bright teal accents set the tone at this casual Chinese spot on Clement Street, where Brandon Jew runs a room that looks like it was designed on purpose, because it was. The sweet-and-sour chicken, rice-battered and stuffed into a homemade pineapple bun, is the kind of thing people come back for. Housemade sodas round out a menu that treats the nonalcoholic drinks as a feature rather than an afterthought.

Downtown Houston tends to roll up the sidewalks after five, which makes a Latin restaurant serving until 2 a.m. on Thursday through Saturday feel like a minor act of defiance. The menu wanders the Caribbean and South America, from stuffed plantains to stewed oxtail to churrasco, and the cocktails run toward a spicy-tequila margarita and a creamy, rum-laced take on a Dominican classic. Expect a mid-priced, dress-up-a-little night out.

Manchamanteles is a Bucktown Mexican restaurant named after a mole, which is a bit like naming your place Birthday Cake. The room is bright and permanently dressed for a party, and the menu is built around those sauces, sampled side by side on sopes and spooned over slow-braised pork ribs. It's sit-down but relaxed, with plenty of vegetarian and gluten-free options. Eater put it on a list of Chicago's best Mexican restaurants.

Mano a Mano is a dimly lit Italian trattoria on Milwaukee Avenue, run by the people behind the neighboring Andros Taverna and Asador Bastian, so the block is basically a family reunion with better lighting. The pastas are made in-house, with seafood-stuffed shapes and a cacio e pepe, and the focaccia arrives with stracchino. Expect a wine list with some ambition and a mid-to-upper bill, so dress like you planned this.

The crebble, a croissant-muffin hybrid dusted in maple sugar, is reason enough to find this bakery cafe in Santa Rosa's Railroad Square. Marla started in San Francisco's Richmond District, and the North Bay got the better end of that move. Sticky buns, bagels, and rotating pastries draw a loyal morning crowd, and the team sources locally throughout. You can also find their goods at Sonoma County farmers' markets if the cafe is too far a detour.

Mart Anthony's is a family-run Italian restaurant on West Hubbard, in its third generation, and it began as a spot for the founder to hang out with friends. The walls are covered in black-and-white photos of regulars, so you're basically dining inside a very long group chat. Expect red-sauce classics from family recipes, a dozen handmade pastas, and a meatball salad credited to Nana. Come as you are, as the place intends.

This is a salad shop on La Jolla's Pearl Street, and the sizes start at 32 ounces, so nobody here is ordering a side. You can build your own bowl or pick from a long house list, with the Chinese chopped salad and its wonton strips doing the heavy lifting for people who need a salad to feel like a dare. There's a second location in Ocean Beach, and Eater has named it among San Diego's best salads. Order at the counter, then eat in the cozy room or take it down to the water.

Mas Allá del Sol is a sit-down Mexican restaurant on North Broadway where a buttered, griddled telera shows up in place of the usual chip basket. The chef once cooked for an archbishop, which sets a high bar for the enchiladas and the chipotle lamb shank. The mezcal list wanders well past Oaxaca, so plan on a slow dinner. Eater has it on its roundup of Chicago's Mexican restaurants.

This is a Korean barbecue spot on West Sahara, part of a small local chain, where a tabletop grill is the main event and you're the line cook. After 10 p.m. there's an all-you-can-eat run until 3 a.m. at a price that feels like a clerical error. The bibimbap tends to arrive as a side and quietly become the meal. It's loud, smoky, and full of people who skipped the casino buffet on purpose.

Matilda is a River North restaurant that puts Mexican and Peruvian cooking in one kitchen and lets them argue it out on the plate. The guacamole arrives as a roasted avocado you mash yourself at the table, which feels like homework you'd happily do. The wine list is entirely Mexican, tequila and mezcal run the cocktails, and a hidden door leads to a speakeasy, because of course it does. Eater lists it among Chicago's best Mexican restaurants.

High ceilings, views straight up to Vail Mountain, and a patio when the weather cooperates, this is the Colorado outpost of Nobu Matsuhisa's Japanese restaurant empire. The menu runs from composed à la carte to omakase, and on the occasional nights when Matsuhisa himself is behind the bar, regulars tend to notice. Takeout is also an option, which feels slightly surreal given the room.

A working farm in Kula's upcountry where the bees, the goats, and the kitchen are all part of the same operation. Friday evenings turn into long, unhurried tasting dinners, seven vegetable-forward courses built around whatever the farm is growing that week, mulberries, honeycomb, asparagus cut that morning. A tour of the bee museum comes with the meal, which tells you something about the pace of the whole thing.

The on-site cooking school with a loyal crowd of repeat students tells you something about how seriously this Italian restaurant takes the whole project. Pasta is made daily, the menu moves between classics and more inventive mains, and a separate casual cafe handles lunches and happy hours next door. It's a family-run operation that has quietly become a fixture on the island, without making a big deal about it.

Milk + Sugar is an ice cream shop built on the premise that your favorite desserts would be even better frozen, which is how strawberry almond cheesecake and a dulce de horchata end up in the same case. There are sixteen flavors, a quarter of them seasonal, plus a pandan-and-chrysanthemum swirl the owner added nervously and now can't keep stocked. Order it in the brown sugar waffle cone and expect a short line.

Milk + Sugar is an ice cream shop built on a simple premise: take desserts people already love and turn them into scoops. The case holds sixteen flavors, twelve permanent and four that rotate, with cheesecake and horchata among them. There's also a pandan-and-chrysanthemum swirl the owner added nervously and then couldn't keep stocked. Order it in a brown sugar waffle cone. Houstonia put it on its list of the city's best ice cream shops.

This is a sit-down Indian restaurant that happens to share a block with the Atomic Testing Museum, so you can study nuclear history and then eat something that will test your own tolerance. The menu covers north and south, with chaat, dosas, and lamb lollipops, plus a lunch buffet with a salad and chaat bar. The inferno menu ends in a curry challenge, and finishing it earns a $50 gift card. Reservations are required.

Mister Tiger is a family-run Korean restaurant on West Grand, the sort of place where the free banchan arrives before you've decided anything, including whether you like fermented fish cakes. Eater has listed it among Chicago's Korean restaurants. The galbi jjim, braised short rib with carefully carved vegetables in a broth that's sweet with a bitter edge, is the dish to order. The fried chicken and bulgogi hold their own around it.

The bubble-ring shape of a mochi doughnut, six or eight chewy spheres connected in a loop, is practically engineered for the "just one more piece" problem. MochiDot is a local dessert shop making them with rice flour for that signature springy chew, with flavors that rotate by season, running from Oreo to vivid purple ube to Lotus Biscoff. Bring someone to share with, or don't and pretend you did.

Murals that eat up the walls set the tone at this Cuban restaurant, a food truck that eventually needed more room. The Cuban sandwich comes deluxe with slow-cooked pork, sweet ham, extra Swiss, pickles, and two ham croquettes tucked inside, which sounds excessive until you're halfway through it. Seasonal mojito cocktails and a Delta 9 mocktail they've dubbed the "mo-wee-to" keep things lively. Save room for flan or tres leches.