From the team behind Aita in Clinton Hill, Osteria Radisa is louder and darker, relying on tapered candles and tapered candles alone. If Aita is a true neighborhood spot, Osteria Radisa is more suited for a birthday dinner or a sexy little date night at the bar. The entire menu, inspired by the Romagna region of Italy, is rich and interesting. But the pastas, like the cappellacci with rabbit and a mushroom sauce, are always where you should devote the most of your stomach space.

We love everything on the menu at Titi’s in Williamsburg, and now their empanadas are also available in the East Village. On Friday and Saturday nights, join the party outside Titi’s walk-up window on Avenue A/7th Street—it’s hopping until 2am. And make sure you get at least one empanada made with plantain flour dough, like the Irby with jerk shrimp, or the pabellón filled with stewed beef and beans. The caramelized banana-sweetness of the shell is what makes these snacks really stand out.

For far too long, cake was only for birthdays. Maybe a 50th anniversary party. But at Saint Street Cakes in Fort Greene, cake is for whenever you please. The online cake business turned brick-and-mortar makes mini cakes piped with frosting roses, and towering slices of double chocolate berry cake with jam tucked between each layer. You can still order a custom cake online, but visiting the shop and ordering one more treat than you really need is more fun.

Everything at Comal, a Mexico-by-way-of Europe small plates spot on the Lower East Side, is gorgeous—and downright delicious. A sweet, marigold-colored custard of corn and potato gets dolloped on perfectly poached mussels. A stormy grey huitlacoche aioli sits next to a rusty orange pile of chopped beef tossed in smoky chili oil. All these big flavors (and surprisingly big portions) make this spot stand out. Come with a group, order the whole menu, and drink some micheladas.

Rose Marie feels like hanging at a house party you caught glimpses of in an old family photo album, down to the Beatles-heavy soundtrack and throwback dishes like saltine-crusted flounder. This Southern-leaning bar from the Yellow Rose team is great for a cozy, casual dinner date, ideally with someone who’s up for splitting their patty melt with melty caramelized onions. But order your own Sun Green—a cucumber, lime, and tequila cocktail with arugula and black pepper.

Dolores is a fun, funky place that nails the whole we're-a-restaurant-but-also-a-bar thing. You could easily come to this Mexico City-inspired restaurant for just a drink and a snack at the bar. But the food here—like refried beans, or the El Rey taco with short rib asada and guacamole in a flour tortilla—is best enjoyed in a booth in the dining room. Come for a full meal on your first visit, try whatever daily special is available, and then return late-night to play some Mexican bar games.

Classic tapas, vermouth, and lots and lots of wine are on the menu at Bar Baserri. The portions lean small here, so save this spot for a casual date night filled with perfectly toothy arroz caldoso with prawns that have the texture of a hot cherry tomato, bursting with juice. Or, come with a bigger group and split a bottle of vermouth that tastes like Coca Cola’s older, more sophisticated sibling.

There is no over-the-top cinnamon roll at Brooklyn Granary & Mill, a Gowanus bakery run by the former head baker at Blue Hill Stone Barns. There is however, a perfect biscone (a hybrid scone-biscuit), with a browned, toasty exterior, and a moist inside that tastes like straight butter. The rest of the pastries are intricate but not super showy, like a spelt chocolate chip cookie loaded with big chunks of extra dark chocolate, or a broccoli and cultured cream tart.

The city's hottest (or, coldest?) cocktail of the summer isn't a frozen piña colada served on a boat. It's the Michelada de Reversa at Olmo, a Mexico City cantina-inspired corner spot in Bed-Stuy that makes a michelada with a slow-melting clamato paleta floating in it. If you have yet to embrace tomato juice, first of all, grow up, and second of all, there’s a perfect salt-rimmed margarita waiting for you instead.

The giant, bi-level chophouse comes from a Mexican restaurant group, and the shift from steak and potatoes to steak and tortillas is a welcome one. With a well-stocked tequila cart, huge wine glasses, servers doing one-handed arm raises with loaded trays, and a roving tableside taquero, Cuerno has as much Midtown Manhattan in its DNA as it does Mexico City. The complimentary chips come with five excellent salsas.

Saint Urban, a new Flatiron restaurant from Syracuse, flips the typical fine-dining script by building its tasting and prix-fixe menus around wine, not the other way around. Each month highlights a different region, like Tuscany or Southern France, with pairings ranging from $90 to $410. (The $175 Reserva is a sweet spot; pair it with the $188 seven-course tasting.)

Bong is already one of the year’s most exciting new restaurants. Formerly a pop-up, the Cambodian spot in Crown Heights releases limited reservations while they find their footing. That shouldn’t take too long, considering the menu is already stacked with hits. For a big feast in a tiny room, order most of the menu: fried shrimp in tart mango sauce, lightly battered squid in velvety salted egg yolk, a delightfully fatty pork chop soaking in tuk trey ping poh, and a crisp whole fried fish.

Good food and wine aside, the best new wine bars have one thing in common. They’re all Asian-inspired. Sunn’s is Korean, Lai Rai and Ha’s take cues from Vietnam, and the latest one, Lei, does compelling Chinese-American small plates. The 24-seat Chinatown spot isn’t quite a dinner destination, but it is a great place to hang with a date, drink skin-contact chenin blanc, and grab a few snacks, like a short rib in a sticky sauce made with strawberry jam.

From the group behind Hotel Chelsea’s restaurants, the Dynamo Room is already a convenient meeting point with its seafood towers, and chicken kiev exploding with green sauce. Once MSG is back in full season, the steakhouse will be a great pre-game option as well.

Teruko—named for a late artist and hotel resident whose paintings decorate the dark wood walls—used to be a nightclub, and it’s retained a whiff of that sex appeal. Sure, you can come for a splurgy, elegant dinner of superbly crispy red snapper and smoky-sweet head-on prawns straight off the robata grill. But if you just want to wear something shimmery, sip a pickled-ginger martini or some Japanese whiskey, and lounge in a subterranean scene, Teruko works well for that, too.

At this Nolita taco shop from a founder of Cosme, they layer rib eye and strip steak onto the trompo, and season it simply with salt. Sounds simple, but the resulting meat is so soft and slick with fat, it immediately raises the stakes for NYC's taco game. But Santo Taco also makes exceptional carne asada, with smoky, charred steak and tiny chunks of fried potato; and pork carnitas, made with both pork belly and ribs.

After nearly a decade in Noho, Fish Cheeks’ second location in Williamsburg is already making it look easy. That crowd-pleasing coconut crab curry, the dry-spiced zabb wings, and other favorites are just as good in the new space. And there are a couple of new exclusive dishes worth seeking out here: an abundant tom yum seafood hot pot with thick noodles, and a pile of marinated raw blue crabs that come with gloves, but might as well come with a fire extinguisher.

We loved the original Adda in Long Island City, a casual Indian canteen from the restaurant group behind Semma, Dhamaka, and Naks. Now it's reopened in the East Village—in bigger, more glamorous, and more expensive form. Fortunately, the new Adda has at least one thing in common with the old: It’s still delicious. The baby goat biryani in particular is just as good as we remember, even if these days it’s served in a Le Creuset dutch oven.