The World’s Best Jewish Food

The pastrami gets brined, pepper-and-coriander rubbed, and smoked before it lands on house-made rye sourdough at this Mueller BBQ shop and deli. Texas Monthly and the New York Times have both taken notice, and the James Beard committee named the team a semifinalist. Concrete floors, wooden-slat booths, and a menu that wanders happily between brisket by the pound and matzoh ball soup. No fuss about it.

1. USA Today Restaurants of the Year
2. Texas Monthly The 50 Best BBQ Joints in Texas
3. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

The name means "to fuss around in the kitchen," which tells you everything about this Jewish deli in Knoxville's Old City. It started as a pop-up and grew into a proper room serving comfort food that bubbe would recognize but maybe not endorse, like matzoh ball soup finished with chili oil. The challah comes out of the oven daily, the babkas rotate flavors, and the sandwiches are large enough to warrant a to-go box. A James Beard semifinalist.

1. USA Today Restaurants of the Year
2. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
3. James Beard Awards 2026 · Semifinalist · Best Chef: Southeast · Laurence Faber

A few steps from the Jardín Japonés, Mishiguene, which is Yiddish for "crazy," fills every night with people eating their way through a contemporary take on Jewish cuisine rooted in chef Tomás Kalika's childhood and the immigrant traditions that shaped it. The pastrón, a prime rib cured, smoked, and steamed over the better part of a day, tells you the kitchen is not in a hurry. A tasting menu runs alongside the à la carte.

1. The 50 #69 · Latin America's 50 Best Restaurants
2. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

The smoked fish counter on Orchard Street has been an institution since forever, and Russ & Daughters is the appetizing shop New York trots out whenever it needs to prove a point. White-jacketed servers, a pristine deli case, egg creams, bagels, and Scottish salmon done multiple ways. The Michelin Bib Gourmand nod keeps it honest: the food is the whole point, and the regulars at the counter have known that for years.

1. The New York Times 2014 · 2 stars · Restaurant Review
2. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand
3. Eater The Best Classic Restaurants in NYC

The queue out front on St. Laurent is part of the deal at this old-school Jewish deli, which has been feeding Montreal on smoked meat since before anyone can remember. Beef brisket marinated in the house spice blend, smoked, steamed, and piled high on rye with yellow mustard is the reason strangers share tables without complaint. Order it medium-fat. Chase it with a cherry soda if you're doing this properly.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
2. Tastet 101 Must-Try Restaurants in Quebec
3. The Infatuation The Best Restaurants In Montreal

Rose's knick-knacks line the shelves, and her coleslaw recipe comes printed on a card clipped to the bill. Maven is a warm, sunlit Polish-Jewish restaurant on Harbord where chef Shauna Godfrey, a Momofuku Kōjin alum, cooks from her grandmother's legacy and her own technique in equal measure. The Pickletini arrives briny and composed, and the chicken schnitzel is brined, fried, and completely serious about itself.

1. Air Canada 2025 · Top 10 · Best New Restaurants

A pastry shop on Gough inspired by Jewish diaspora baking, where every drink arrives with a cube of halva whether you asked for it or not. The team behind it came up through Tartine, and the instincts show: babka with a proper crust, pistachio cream puffs, spiced Turkish coffee cream pie. A James Beard Semifinalist for Outstanding Pastry Chef, and a cozy, specific kind of place that knows exactly what it wants to be.

1. San Francisco Chronicle Best bakeries in San Francisco Bay Area
2. James Beard Awards 2024 · Semifinalist · Outstanding Pastry Chef or Baker · Kristina Costa

1. BagelUp #16 · The Definitive 30 Best Bagel Shops in New York City
2. Eater The Best Bagels in New York City

The corned beef and pastrami sandwiches here are the kind that require a game plan before you pick them up. This old-school Jewish deli in Queen Village has been feeding Philadelphia for as long as anyone can remember, with a menu that runs from Reubens and smoked fish to cheesesteaks and a full breakfast. The Michelin Guide awarded it a Bib Gourmand, which tracks. Come hungry and do not make afternoon plans.

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand

Seafood pulled from the Carmel Market lands in the kitchen of this Jaffa restaurant, where Jewish-Moroccan flavors shape what ends up on the plate. The building is old and atmospheric, tucked into a neighborhood where the stones do half the storytelling. The chef reads his heritage the way some people read a map, using it to figure out where the fish should go. A Discovery by The 50.

1. The 50 The 50 Discovery

Haim Cohen, one of Israel's most recognized chefs, channels his own biography into this restaurant: Tel Aviv modernity, old Jaffa tradition, Ashkenazi roots, and French technique all folded into one another. The cooking lands somewhere between precise and deeply personal, the kind of menu where nostalgia does real work. It earned a spot on The 50 Discovery list, and the room fills accordingly with people who planned ahead.

1. The 50 The 50 Discovery

1. The New York Times 2014 · 1 star · Restaurant Review
2. Eater The Best Steakhouses in New York City
3. Eater The Best Lower East Side Restaurants

The sourdough starter for the bagels here is fed with imported Brooklyn water, a detail that tells you exactly where this deli-bar's loyalties lie. Grossman's is a relaxed Jewish-style deli and cocktail bar in Santa Rosa, turning out knishes, latkes, and chopped liver in a corner of California that doesn't see nearly enough of them. The San Francisco Chronicle named it among the best restaurants in Sonoma County and called its bagels the best in the Bay Area.

1. San Francisco Chronicle Best bagels in the San Francisco Bay Area
2. San Francisco Chronicle Best restaurants in Sonoma County

A Jewish deli in the Bay Area is a rare enough thing that Saul's has been feeding North Berkeley for decades without much competition. The latkes are aggressively crunchy, the pastrami comes fatty and brined on rye with grainy mustard, and raspberry jam sits on every table like a standing invitation. Pancakes are fluffy in the way a diner promises but rarely delivers. Weekend brunch draws a crowd that clearly has nowhere more important to be.

1. San Francisco Chronicle Best brunch restaurants in the Bay Area
2. San Francisco Chronicle Best Berkeley restaurants

1. Tastet 101 Must-Try Restaurants in Quebec

The name translates to "there's pasta, and pasta," which tells you exactly where the menu's priorities lie. This kosher counter spot near Stazione Trastevere does Roman Jewish cooking: fried artichokes, battered cod, that quietly brilliant anchovy and frisée casserole. You order at the counter, eat in or take away, and can pick up fresh pasta to finish at home. It's a neighborhood joint that happens to hold a whole culinary tradition.

1. Eater The 38 Best Restaurants in Rome

El Bagel is a Miami bagel shop that opened a counter in the Fontainebleau food hall, which means your bacon, egg, and cheese now has a casino view. The line forms early with people who have clearly met the night before, and the pastrami gets smoked for 18 hours, a commitment most of us can't make to anything. It's a quick, casual stop, and a beautiful mess to eat. Eater has named it for both bagels and sandwiches.

1. Eater The Best Bagels in Las Vegas
2. Eater The Best Vegas Sandwiches to Bite Into Right Now

1. Phoenix New Times 2025 · Best Jewish Deli · Best of Phoenix

1. Los Angeles Times Fifty Under $50

1. Phoenix New Times 2024 · Best Jewish Deli · Best of Phoenix