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[title]RECOMMENDED: Full list of NYC restaurants opening this fall
With golden oldies like Peter Luger and Keens kicking around for more than 125 years, steakhouses are as iconic to New York as Yankee pinstripes. This year, Gotham’s traditional mold gets busted up, furthering a trend spearheaded in the spring by Michael White’s Costata, where meaty cuts share menu space with elegant add-ons (crudos, seasonal cocktails, high-style desserts). In mid-September, boundary pushers Hugue Dufour and Sarah Obraitis—the husband-and-wife team that redefined museum food with their dinette at MoMA PS1—will turn the form on its head with M. Wells Steakhouse (43-15 Crescent St between 43rd Ave and 44th Dr, Long Island City, Queens; 718-786-9060, magasinwells.com). Tucked inside an old auto-body shop, the 80-seat hybrid venture will be one part meat temple and one part boat-building factory. Dufour will serve whole-animal feasts, wild game and European-style butcher cuts in the restaurant, while full-scale catamarans will be built in the factory operation. And ship construction isn’t the only offbeat feature: The couple will also erect a 24-square-foot concrete trough, on the outdoor patio, brimming with live trout. Also in September, Marc Forgione will bring his updated—albeit less kooky—Atlantic City steakhouse, American Cut, to Tribeca (363 Greenwich St between Franklin and Harrison Sts, 212-226-4736), a bone’s toss from his other two spots (Restaurant Marc Forgione and Khe-Yo). In addition to serving Pat LaFrieda selections, the Next Iron Chef winner will upend the old chophouse wisdom “Don’t order the fish” with souped-up seafood platters like cornflake-crusted crab cakes alongside smoked-onion rémoulade. Suddenly, there’s more than “meats” the eye with New York’s old club of steakhouses.