The Best Places in the United States

Nobuo Fukuda, a James Beard Award winner, runs this intimate Japanese small-plates bar in Scottsdale, where the menu reads like a quiet argument against doing anything halfway. Most dishes land under twenty dollars, from panko-fried tofu with green papaya curry to sunomono with watermelon radish. The sashimi spoons have their own cult following, and an omakase is available by reservation for when you're feeling like committing to the evening.

Fried chicken and Champagne share a menu at this retro-glam bowling lounge off Roosevelt Row, which tells you most of what you need to know about its vibe. A handful of lanes, a circular bar, pool tables, and DJs make it more of a night out that happens to involve bowling than the other way around. Sushi and nachos cover the snacking spread. Dress accordingly, because the decor is very much meant to be photographed.

The building is an old country store, white clapboard on a rural crossroads, and the back shelves still look the part, stocked now with natural wines, tinned fish, and housemade ferments. Up front, an ambitious farm-to-table restaurant turns out a local menu with sophisticated touches and zero attitude. The New York Times put it on their Restaurant List in 2024, and a James Beard semifinalist nod followed. Brunch is a fine excuse for the Midcoast drive.

The chef at this Brooklyn Vietnamese spot trained at Blue Hill at Stone Barns, and it shows, though not in a pretentious farm-to-table way. Falansai is a tasting-menu restaurant where seasonal thinking meets recipes passed down from Saigon, the two pulling in different directions in ways that tend to be interesting. The New York Times gave it two stars and a Critic's Pick in 2026.

New York style slices done with the obsessive raw-material sourcing you'd expect from somewhere with a much more serious dress code. Pizza Baby is a casual pizza shop with two Charlotte locations, a tight Italian wine list, and bread good enough that they sell it separately. The pies run from a no-apology pineapple to a Sicilian, and the team landed a spot on 50 Top Pizza USA, which is exactly the kind of thing regulars mention while waiting for a table.

A wood-fired pizzeria on Mulberry Street where the margherita is the argument: light, airy dough with a properly blistered crust and ingredients that don't try to do too much. The room runs contemporary and lively, and on mild nights the outdoor patio makes the whole thing feel like a small favor from the city. The wine list is surprisingly deep for a pizza spot. Save room for the montebianco.

A Neapolitan pizza restaurant a few miles from Arlington Cemetery, run by the same Sicilian family for close to half a century. The pies follow STG rules, meaning a pillowy, charred crust, properly melty cheese, and a lot of the ingredients shipped over from Italy. The room skews elegant for a pizza place, and the menu stretches well past pizza into pastas and starters, with a wine list that takes itself seriously.

Wood-fired Neapolitan pizza in the middle of the Alps is a proposition that shouldn't work as well as it does. Acquaefarina is a pizza restaurant in Trento where the dough gets the serious treatment: slow-fermented, light enough to finish without regret, with a char on the crust that earns its place. The wine and beer list goes deeper than the usual pizza-joint afterthought. It ranked 32nd on 50 Top Pizza Italy, if you want a number to trust.

Birch-paneled walls and deep green accents make it feel like the forest wandered indoors, which was clearly the point. Bluebird Cady Hill is a 55-room boutique hotel on Mountain Road, a redesigned riff on Stowe's old roadside lodges with considerably better taste in décor. Mt. Mansfield is minutes away, the Cady Hill trails are practically at the door, and the après-ski mood sticks around even when there's no ski to après.

A seventies ski lodge reborn as a boutique hotel at the base of Hunter Mountain, Bluebird leans into the fantasy of upstate New York without overselling it. The look splits the difference between retro summer camp and crisp contemporary design, with comforts that feel genuinely luxurious without tipping into fussy. Hunter Tavern keeps the hearty modern-rustic food you'd want after a day outside. A Michelin Selected Hotel, and the city crowd has clearly noticed.

The coal-fired oven sits at the center of the room like the point it's trying to make, and the point is a New York-style pie with deep Italian roots cooked the way early immigrants did it, because wood was too expensive. This is a comfortable, full-service pizza spot with appetizers, a solid wine list, and a menu that ranges well past margherita territory. Ranked 31st on 50 Top Pizza USA.

The pizzas are named after Louisville neighborhoods, which tells you something about how this Neapolitan-style pizza spot sees itself. The crust leans more pronounced than a traditional Neapolitan, and everything from the appetizers to desserts is made in-house or sourced from local artisans. No delivery, by design, because the pie doesn't survive the trip. It landed on 50 Top Pizza USA, if you need a reason to go in.

The name comes from an obscure white Campanian grape variety, which tells you everything about how seriously this Lakeview spot takes its Southern Italian bona fides. It's a Neapolitan pizza restaurant, wood-fired and traditionally minded, with a patio that leans into the convivial-trattoria feeling. The crust has the soft, charred-edge character the style calls for. 50 Top Pizza USA has taken notice, landing it at number 43 on their national list.

Ten luxury tents on a thousand acres of ranchland a few miles west of Vail, open summer through early fall only. Each tent comes with rain showers, wood-burning stoves, and enough plush linens to make you forget you're camping, which is sort of the point. The lodge handles breakfast and dinner, from a self-grilled BBQ setup to a full tasting menu. Horseback rides, fly-fishing, and mountain biking fill the days; actual Vail is thirty minutes if you need it.

Forty-five Craftsman bungalows spread across 1,700 acres in the Santa Cruz Mountain foothills, each with a fireplace and a soaking tub, most looking out over fairways or valley. This is a full-on golf resort with Robert Trent Jones Jr.'s championship course as the centerpiece, though the One Iron Bar and its martini list have a way of making the back nine feel optional. Il Vigneto handles Californian cooking with produce from the surrounding region.

Lark Hotels planted a modernist, color-forward boutique hotel in one of New England's most resolutely traditional ski towns, and somehow it fits. Field Guide reads less like a rebellion against Stowe's cozy-inn heritage than a cheerful argument with it: bright, contemporary design where you'd usually expect exposed beams and plaid. The kind of place that draws guests who came for the mountain but wouldn't be caught dead in a lodge aesthetic.

The open oven sits at the center of the room like a piece of furniture someone actually thought about, which tells you a lot about Grana before the pizza arrives. This is a contemporary Neapolitan pizza restaurant on East Burnside, bright and carefully put together without feeling precious. The dough runs high-hydration and long-fermented, San Marzano tomatoes and buffalo mozzarella alongside whatever's local. It landed at 26 on 50 Top Pizza USA.

Montauk sits at the farthest tip of Long Island, far enough out that locals just call it The End, and Gurney's has been holding down this stretch of Atlantic coastline longer than most of its guests have been alive. It's a full resort, with ocean views, a seawater pool, and the kind of unhurried pace that the rest of the Hamptons keeps promising but rarely delivers. The crowd leans casual and sand-tolerant, which is exactly right.

A pizza shop in Beaverton where the dough is made with a biga starter, splitting the difference between Neapolitan softness and New York chew, then topped with flavors drawn from Asian pantries. The combination landed Hapa on the 50 Top Pizza USA list. The room is warm and the kitchen moves fast, which matters when half of Beaverton decides to show up at once. Original without being weird about it.

A Dutch Colonial mansion on a private lake in Stone Ridge, about two hours from the city, converted into a boutique hotel with the kind of restraint that makes you feel like you discovered it yourself. The carriage house and stables are now guest rooms, the old swimming pool got a quiet refresh, and the ground floor runs a farm-to-table restaurant called Butterfield. Hudson Valley weekenders who want nature without roughing it have found their place.

The wood-fired oven is shaped like an igloo, and someone thought to write "Food is important" across it in Italian, which sets the tone nicely. This wine bar and Neapolitan pizza spot in a small Iowa town keeps the menu short on purpose: a couple of appetizers, classic and meat-topped pies, tiramisu to finish. It landed on the 50 Top Pizza USA list, which feels both surprising and completely logical once you're there.

The sourdough starter has a name, Curtis, and the chef tends to it daily with the seriousness most people reserve for houseplants they actually like. Lucky Dough is an outdoor sourdough pizza spot in downtown Pensacola with a menu so tight it reads like a manifesto: two apps, a salad, ten pizzas. The raw-passed tomato sauce tastes less cooked than conjured. Ranked on 50 Top Pizza USA, and the setting still feels like someone's very well-curated backyard.

Old money meets boutique hotel money at this Lake Montauk resort, where whitewashed timber rooms and two pools sit on a marina that Gilded Age dynasties once claimed as their own. The setting feels genuinely private in a way that most of the Hamptons stopped being long ago. A beach club, tennis, fitness classes, a wood-fired pizzeria, and a seafood fine-dining room round things out. Pack light, but bring something for dinner.

A wooded property off Mountain Road with direct access to Stowe's Recreation Path and one of the larger outdoor pools in the area, Outbound is a boutique hotel that splits the difference between glamping and summer camp for adults who own good fleece. Communal fire pits, Adirondack chairs, and a stylish all-day eatery fill the gaps that Stowe's older, stuffier lodging scene left open. Selected by the Michelin Guide.

Gene Autry and Roy Rogers built Pioneertown as a permanent Old West film set so they wouldn't have to drive to the desert every time Hollywood needed tumbleweeds. The town never quite became the resort they imagined, but it got there eventually. This boutique motel is the lodging that finally fits the moment, sitting in the high desert near Joshua Tree where the line between stage set and actual town has always been pleasantly blurry.

New York-style slices in New Orleans, served at a counter in a room of concrete floors and no-frills tables, with a shaded outdoor bench area that feels like someone's backyard party got very serious about pizza. The crust holds up, the sauce has some tang to it, and whole pies outperform the slices even if most people never find that out. Ranked in the 50 Top Pizza USA, which for a Bywater slice shop is not nothing.

Counter-order pizza in a small, tidy room in East Aurora, about a half-hour outside Buffalo. The menu is deliberately short: a handful of red and white pies, small plates, beer, wine, and a few cocktails. The dough runs soft and cheese-dusted at the crust with a crisp underside, and the kitchen leans seasonal, which is why regulars show up chasing whatever's fleeting. It ranked 40th on 50 Top Pizza USA.

The wood-fired oven sits in plain sight from every table, which is either a promise or a dare depending on how the pizza turns out. This Neapolitan pizza spot in Assembly Row keeps things bright and airy, with big windows and a long bar stocked for cocktails alongside the pies. The team has been sourcing Italian flour, dairy, and tomatoes for years, and the crust shows it: soft, properly blistered, with a little lift to the cornicione.

Neapolitan-inspired pizza shares the menu with pastas and grilled dishes at this North End Italian restaurant, where the neighborhood's old-school density of red sauce joints makes landing here feel like a small victory. The dough holds up under generous toppings, the crust comes out blistered and colorful, and the wine list is worth a look. It landed on 50 Top Pizza USA, which the regulars probably already knew.

You order at the door, grab a table, and the pizza shows up without ceremony, which is exactly the point at this Greenpoint slice shop. The dough is soft and light in the way Neapolitan purists get worked up about, and the toppings stay out of each other's way. The bruschetta with honey and ricotta is a small, sweet detour worth taking. Ranked 32nd on 50 Top Pizza USA, Salsa keeps things casual enough that nobody feels underdressed.

Modular wall-mounted gear storage tells you exactly where Tälta Lodge's priorities lie, and it isn't the pillow menu. The rooms go full minimalist-chic, the furniture leans modernist, and the vibe is a deliberate nod to the ski-boom lodges of the sixties, reconceived for people who actually have taste now. Mountain biking, fly fishing, and serious skiing are all within reach, some rooms are dog-friendly, and the Michelin Guide has it listed among its selected hotels.

Stone pulled from local quarries and timber cut from nearby forests give this ski resort lodge a solidity that most new-builds skip in favor of slope access and a gift shop. Stowe is the kind of mountain that takes itself seriously, and the Lodge at Spruce Peak fits that tone, with construction that reads as considered rather than assembled. A Michelin Selected Hotel, and one that earns the designation on materials alone.

A converted mill complex sitting where Fishkill Creek meets Beacon's main drag, the Roundhouse is a hotel that landed at exactly the right moment in this town's unlikely revival. Dia:Beacon drew the art crowd upstate, and the rest followed. Rooms lean into the industrial bones without overdoing the exposed-brick thing, and the Hudson Valley is right outside whenever the galleries feel like enough.

Wooster Street is New Haven apizza territory, so opening a Neapolitan pizzeria here takes a certain nerve. The family behind Zeneli trained in Naples and planted that tradition right in the middle of the local institution's turf. Wood-fired, soft-crusted pies with San Marzano tomatoes and proper mozzarella sit alongside classic Italian dishes in a room that feels genuinely like someone's people are running it.

The line at this cash-only Mexican bakery in Glendale moves slowly because everyone freezes in front of the cases. Giant pink pig-shaped cochinitos glazed with molasses, chamoy-dipped apples, tamales, fresh tortillas, and trays of pan dulce all compete for your attention at once. Phoenix New Times named it the best Mexican bakery in the city, and the regulars waiting ahead of you look like they already knew that.

Sonny's is a bright counter-service spot in the Highlands where the whole decision tree fits on one hand: pita, salad, or plate, then falafel, chicken, or both. The chef came over from Safta, and the sauces are all made from scratch, so an extra cup of harissa is the move. The zhoug is for people who have lost an argument with their taste buds before and want a rematch.