Welcome to Grub Street’s rundown of restaurant recommendations that aims to answer the endlessly recurring question: Where should we go? These are the spots that our food team thinks everyone should visit, for any reason (a new chef, the arrival of an exciting dish, or maybe there’s an opening that’s flown too far under the radar). This month: a London hit’s Pastis takeover, a transportive Greek restaurant in Williamsburg, and a standout slice shop in Crown Heights.
Besa Grill (Morris Park)
The first thing you notice when eating at Besa Grill is that it has some good meat. This is one benefit of grafting a restaurant onto a butcher shop next door. Besa is located on a Bronx block where locals linger on weekday afternoons over espresso and burek at the bakery, adding to the Old World feel. Inside, it’s brightly lit and sparsely decorated, with a few paintings and two miniature boxing gloves (one each for Albania and Kosovo) on the walls. Two employees run the show, and one frowned when sharing the news that there was no fli, the dairy-rich layered crêpe, that day. There are other reasons to smile. Like the mixed grill, which comes with four stubby links of qebaba, two plump patties of qofte, and a piece of fatty, salty suxhuk. The smell of smoke is one sign you’re in good hands. Another is the vibrantly red tomato — not the pale, watery pieces I’ve had at another Albanian grill nearby. All the sausages are very nicely grilled, lightly charred and still very juicy inside, and removed from the flames at just the right time. (Just ask for a side of red-pepper sauce.) Along with the tomato, the plate comes with a few pieces of bread, cucumber, and an excellent shredded cabbage salad (which is worth ordering separately) and lightly vinegared potato salad. —Chris Crowley
Psaraki (Williamsburg)
Hiding in the back of 420 Kent, this two-week-old Greek taverna — with its white stucco walls and bamboo thatch on the ceilings — evokes the architecture of the Cycladic islands. This time of year, however, try to sit in the large outdoor terrace, one of the city’s better outdoor dining options, especially at sunset. Because it’s set off from the waterfront path by landscaping, it has an aura of privacy while maintaining excellent views across the East River. While Psaraki means “little fish,” the menu has plenty of options from both land and sea along with a nice selection of Grecian wines. A “Fisherman’s Table Experience,” for $74 a person, delivers a bounty to the table: a selection of Greek dips — tzatziki, tarama, spicy feta, and humus — and pita, zucchini chips, a horiatiki salad, saganaki, and spanakopita; then fries and horta for the table, along with three mains of octopus, branzino, and squid. Dessert will be baklava and yogurt topped with sour cherries. As if this weren’t enough, the attentive staff checks in often to see if you need any additional helpings of the dishes you liked best. —Edward Hart
Frena (Hell’s Kitchen)
Chef Efi Naon is back in the space that previously housed Taboon, which was destroyed by a fire in 2021. Frena is centered around a large clay oven producing loaves of freshly baked levantine bread, here, generously doused in olive oil and za’atar (the name Frena comes from a Moroccan-Arabic word for oven.) The feta bourekas flambé was a fittingly theatrical appetizer for after a Broadway show, while the braised oxtail tortellini was delightful stab at mixed-region flavors in its lemon-poppy sauce. I’m surprised the latke-crusted sea bass isn’t viral already, but possibly my favorite infusion of Mediterranean flair was the Souk’s Gold cocktail, an olive-oil gin martini scented with saffron, za’atar, maitake, and thyme. —Zach Schiffman
Cafe Kestrel (Red Hook)
Cafe Kestrel has the lived-in feel of a neighborhood institution; it’s been open a month. Maybe it’s the long experience in the trenches of chef-owner Dennis Spina (most recently of the Metrograph Commissary, though long-timers may remember his Greenpoint restaurant River Styx before that or his time at Williamsburg’s Roebling Tea Room), or maybe it’s the way that the tiny, globe-lit, white-tiled space put me in mind of another neighborhood favorite: the late, great Prune. The menu, too, gave me a little of Prune’s old magic with a handful of small dishes, uncomplicated but charming. A slab of pork loin with a peach mustard and a thin tian of summer squash. Marbella-ish chicken in a sticky-sweet date sauce, punched up by curry. A tiny little trio of scallops in a Sicilian-accented cauliflower agrodolce. And for dessert, a “Schwedeneisbecher sundae”: vanilla ice cream, whipped cream, and applesauce, apparently a favorite in East Germany. It sounds a little like baby food, but oh, baby. —Matthew Schneier
Dishoom at Pastis (Meatpacking District)
London’s exceedingly popular chain of Indian cafés will pop up at Stephen Starr’s brasserie for a couple of weeks at the end of the month; think of it as a reward for anyone who’s still in the city during August’s dog days. (It’s every weekday from August 19 to August 30. Reservations — if you can find them — are on Resy, but the group has said they’ll take walks-ins, too.) It’s breakfast only, so New Yorkers miss out on some of Dishoom’s more famous dishes, but the menu nevertheless includes naan rolls with Myers of Keswick sausage, kejriwal, and various morning cocktails. Half your office is on vacation anyway. Go wild and get a Bombay Bellini. —Alan Sytsma
La Flor (Crown Heights)
“Mmm, now I want pizza,” said the leader of a pack of kids trotting down Classon, where I had just sat down at one of La Flor’s two outdoor tables with a duo of slices that I had to agree were really quite stunning. One was pepperoni interspersed with circles of jalapeño and a defined squiggle of ranch; the other was cheese-less, an herby cherry tomato bruschetta on a thick layer of pulpy tomato sauce. Both were $5 and bolstered by a standout crust that gets remarkably thin in the center of the pizza, rendering toppings all the more potent. Be warned, they put honey on the white pie. Garlic knots from the same dough are redolent of olive oil and stay nice and chewy, even after they cool down. The narrow pizzeria offers few frills beyond fountain lemonade and a strawberry-lime drink, though an employee says meatball subs are on the horizon. Considering the plain cheese slice is $3.50, La Flor doesn’t need much else to become a neighborhood favorite. —Tammie Teclemariam
