In December, a Top Chef winner debuted his second Miami restaurant, and two celebrated Oakland chefs came together to open an Afro-Caribbean-Iranian restaurant. There’s no shortage of reasons to go out to eat right now—a fried chicken and seafood extravaganza in Savannah; a deli case stocked with rotating seasonal kimchi in Seattle.
Many of the most exciting restaurants that opened at the end of 2022 are the second or third projects of well-known restaurateurs—a Japanese-inspired bar from the duo behind Portland’s Crispy Gai, and a kebab-centric restaurant from the team behind D.C.’s Maydan, a Bon Appétit Best New Restaurant in 2018. Operating two restaurants might not quite constitute a restaurant empire, but we love to see tried and true independent restaurateurs expanding, or trying something altogether new.
We’ll be back here next month with an update on the latest round of can’t-miss restaurant openings across the country. We’re already doing the work in preparation for our annual Best New Restaurants list, but even when its release is months away, we want you to know where we’re most excited to go.
This list, organized alphabetically by state, includes both restaurants we’ve tried and ones we’ve added to our bucket lists.
Afro-Caribbean and Iranian flavors meet in Oakland
Calabash
2300 Valdez Street, Suite A, Oakland, CA
Opened December 7
We don’t know of any other restaurant menus where Caribbean roasted duck with grits stands side by side with maast sabzi, a Northern Iranian labneh dip. At chefs Nigel Jones’ and Hanif Sadr’s highly anticipated Calabash in Oakland, the duo is melding Caribbean and Iranian flavors, and seemingly having a lot of fun doing it. The focus here is on all-day dining with two menus for breakfast and mid-day service. The influences of both chefs are clear throughout the menu. Jones’ cooking at Calabash draws from his beloved Jamaican restaurant Kingston 11, resulting in dishes including coconut cornbread with housemade jam, and curried crab and vegetables with jasmine rice. Dishes more heavily influenced by Sadr’s background lean on the Northern Iranian flavors of his San Francisco restaurant Komaaj, with dips like panir khiki, a seeded goat cheese, plus vegetable-heavy mezze platters.
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Top Chef winner Jeremy Ford debuts a meaty affair in South Miami
Beauty and the Butcher
6915 Red Rd, Coral Gables, FL
Opened December 21