Five game-changing restaurants of 2013

With their souped-up ode to red-sauce supper clubs where everyone is treated like mob royalty, Italian-American wunderkinder Rich Torrisi and Mario Carbone not only revived the classic New York genre, they reinvented it.

Wise and hungry after an 11-year apprenticeship with Tokyo sushi deity Jiro Ono (of documentary fame), jovial fish whisperer Daisuke Nakazawa brought high-wattage star power to NYC’s sushi scene and threw down with a 21-course omakase that, piece for piece, swims with the city’s best.

Ditching a marathon tasting menu and robotic service for fun-loving à la carte and a charming staff, Eleven Madison Park alums Bryce Shuman and Eamon Rockey gave us a rare treat: an incredibly serious New American restaurant that doesn’t take itself too seriously.

Just when his madcap molecular gastronomy was feeling increasingly exclusive—wd~50 turned tasting-menu-only last year—Wylie Dufresne took a surprisingly democratic turn, thrilling gourmands and barflies alike with a whimsical mash-up of avant-garde cooking and pop-in pub food.

In 2012, high-profile riffs on Thai and Chinese garnered all the hype, but this year Eleven Madison Park vet Jimmy Tu finally pushed Vietnam into the NYC limelight, letting his fine-dining chops loose and dispatching straight-up street food from a middle-of-nowhere shack.