More Maps

Where to Eat on Newbury Street

13 of Boston’s Best Affordable Meals

11 Outstanding Mexican Restaurants Around Boston

More in Boston See more maps

The 38 Essential Boston Restaurants, July 2013

by Rachel Leah Blumenthal@blumie Jul 9, 2013, 9:00am EDT

22 comments / new

View as Map

by Rachel Leah Blumenthal@blumie Jul 9, 2013, 9:00am EDT

22 comments / new

Presenting Boston's updated Eater 38, your answer to any question that begins, "Can you recommend a restaurant?" This highly elite group covers the entire city, spans myriad cuisines, and collectively satisfies all of your restaurant needs, save for those occasions when you absolutely must spend half a paycheck. Every few months, we'll be adding pertinent restaurants that were omitted, have newly become eligible (restaurants must be open at least six months), or have stepped up their game.

Your favorite restaurant isn't on the list? There are certainly more than 38 fantastic restaurants around town — and probably about 38 million different opinions — so don't hesitate to rip this list to shreds and say what you'd do differently in the comment section below.

Added July 2013: Highland Kitchen, Trina's Starlite Lounge, Oishii, Santarpio's, Dali, Rino's Place, Taranta, Troquet

Added April 2013: Sportello, Lincoln Tavern and Restaurant, Puritan & Company, Chez Henri.

Added January 2013: West Bridge, Taberna de Haro, La Morra.

Added October 2012: The Helmand, jm Curley, Estragon, Tu y Yo, Matt Murphy's, Green Street.

Added July 2012: Bergamot, Casa B, Sweet Cheeks Q, Trade, Radius.

Added April 2012: Trina's Starlite Lounge, Catalyst, Salts, Jasmine Bistro, La Verdad, Dumpling Cafe.

Added January 2012: Harvest, Clio, The Butcher Shop, Eastern Standard, Oishii.

Read More

If you buy something or book a reservation from an Eater link, Vox Media may earn a commission. See our ethics policy.

Strip-T's

A local legend of the prodigal son and former chef de cuisine at Momofuku Ssam Bar, who came home to run dad's diner and put lots of octopus on the menu.

93 School St, Watertown, MA 02472

Visit Website

Also featured in:

T.W. Food

One of the intimate, chef-owned restaurants that have defined Cambridge restaurants in recent years and helped the city rival the best of Boston proper. Also, tobacco ice cream.

377 Walden St, Cambridge, MA 02138

Visit Website

Also featured in:

Bergamot

This 69-seat restaurant opened in 2010 and has helped pave the way for a new era of Somerville dining. The critics have praised Bergamot's synthesis of relaxed attitude and serious skill.

118 Beacon St., Somerville, MA 02143

Visit Website

Also featured in:

East by Northeast

An intimate, Chinese-inspired small plates restaurant presided over by chef Phillip Tang, ExNE was named one of the "The Top 6 Places to Taste the New Asian Fusion" by Bon Appetit. In-house noodles, dumplings and bao blow away the competition, of which there is little.

1128 Cambridge St, Cambridge, MA 02139

Visit Website

Also featured in:

Puritan & Company

The single most essential Boston-area restaurant of the moment, in that here chef-owner Will Gilson is more thoroughly tackling a fresh perspective on New England cuisine than anywhere else in the world.

1166 Cambridge St., Cambridge, MA 02139

Visit Website

Also featured in:

Oleana

One of the city's few restaurants with a vegetarian tasting menu, let alone one that diners regularly rave about. Oleana serves omnivores as well, with chef Ana Sortun imparting her well known Mediterranean accents in dishes like octopus with crispy Brussels sprouts.

134 Hampshire St., Cambridge, MA 02139

Visit Website

Also featured in:

Bondir

Bondir has just blown everyone away, most notably by being named one of the ten Best New Restaurants in America in 2011 by Bon Appetit in addition to racking up about as many local accolades as you can get. It took what a lot of restaurants were already doing - the classed up, local, rootsy thing - and managed to tighten the screws, add some flourishes and still make it distinct and feel fresh.

279A Broadway, Cambridge, MA 02139

Visit Website

Also featured in:

Hungry Mother

There are other restaurants that do local ingredients, French technique or Southern recipes, but not under one roof. It's amazing that shrimp and grits can taste this good so far north.

233 Cardinal Medeiros Ave, Cambridge, MA 02141

Visit Website

Also featured in:

West Bridge

Since opening just over a year ago, West Bridge quickly became the darling of Kendall Square, among many existing darlings. The French-inspired menu comes from Aquitane Bistro alumni chef Matthew Gaudet.

1 Kendall Square, Cambridge, MA 02139

Visit Website

Also featured in:

Craigie on Main

Craigie is known for making simple dishes like roasted chicken extraordinary by using advanced techniques and technology, and for serving dishes that are just plain extraordinary, like confit and roasted milk-fed pig’s head with spicy pumpkin sambal and boudin noir-hoisin sauce.

853 Main St, Cambridge, MA 02139

Visit Website

Also featured in:

The Helmand

Warmth exudes from this East Cambridge Afghani restaurant, which serves in-house flatbread baked in a wood-fired oven right in the dining area

143 1st St, Cambridge, MA 02142

Visit Website

Also featured in:

Rendezvous

Western Mediterranean accents appear on chef-owner Steve Johnson's menu, which is enhanced by a rooftop herb garden (in season). Sit at the bar for the full cocktail experience.

502 Massachusetts Ave, Cambridge, MA 02139

Visit Website

Also featured in:

Green Street

People complained when Green Street Grill became Green Street and lost its Caribbean influences, but those people should shut up because this is still a great restaurant. And there's a telephone book for a cocktail menu.

280 Green St., Cambridge, MA 02139

Visit Website

Also featured in:

Shanghai Gate

Superbly executed Shanghai style dishes like lion's head meatball and xiao long bao manage to be just as flavorful as their Sichuan counterparts minus the heat. Considered by many to be the city's best Chinese.

204 Harvard Ave, Allston, MA 02134

Visit Website

Also featured in:

Sweet Cheeks

Since opening in November 2011, Top Chef star Tiffani Faison's barbecue ode has been nothing short of a smash hit. The biscuits are legendary, and there's now an outdoor beer garden to boot.

1381 Boylston St., Boston, MA 02215

Visit Website

Also featured in:

Island Creek Oyster Bar

Island Creek Oyster bar looks more slick than the restaurant you would expect an oyster farm to operate, but it's no less legit. The seafood-centric menu straddles straightforward and fun.

500 Commonwealth Ave, Boston, MA 02215

Visit Website

Also featured in:

Erbaluce

Perhaps the only Boston restaurant to serve elaborately prepared sunflower buds, Erbaluce is no stranger to the title of the city's "best Italian restaurant."

69 Church St, Boston, MA 02116

Visit Website

Also featured in:

Myers + Chang

What's not to like? Some dishes are Chinese, some Thai, some Vietnamese, and some a fantasy amalgam of various nationalities, but no one would dare call Myers+Chang Pan-Asian. One of the city's most vibrant restaurants, the atmosphere seems buoyed by a sense of chef Joanne Chang's other successes with Flour Bakery. The badass dragon on the window doesn't hurt either.

1145 Washington St., Boston, MA 02118

Visit Website

Also featured in:

Coppa

Yes, charcuterie is now everywhere, but for good reason, and Coppa supplies those reasons in the form of salumi like beef heart pastrami. Plus, chef Jamie Bissonnette helped put offal back on the map. Also, pizza!

Open in Google Maps

253 Shawmut Ave, Boston, MA 02118

Visit Website

Picco

A regular on Boston pizza A-lists, Picco boasts some of the best value in the South End. Eat the pizza, salad, and/or in-house ice cream and you'll desire no better.

513 Tremont St., Boston, MA 02118

Visit Website

Also featured in:

Lincoln Tavern & Restaurant

A welcome recent addition to the Southie scene, with what some consider to be the best pizza anywhere in town.

425 West Broadway, South Boston, MA 02127

Visit Website

Also featured in:

The Gallows

Scotch egg, suckling pig tacos and at least three kinds of poutine. The dark humor in the name and decor continues through the menu, where heirloom vegetables appear alongside oysters "Rockafella."

1395 Washington St, Boston, MA 02118

Visit Website

Also featured in:

Hamersley's Bistro

A veteran of the dining scene for over 20 years, this restaurant's reputation is staked partly on its infamous roasted chicken. Over the years it has changed exactly as much as it should.

553 Tremont St, Boston, MA 02116

Visit Website

Also featured in:

Toro

Chef-owner Ken Oringer and chef Jamie Bissonnette team up for one of the city's hardest to get into restaurants. Toro serves modern and traditional tapas ranging from simple grilled corn to elaborate dishes pairing seafood and charcuterie with rich, bold flavors that keep the crowds lining up.

1704 Washington St, Boston, MA 02118

Visit Website

Also featured in:

jm Curley

This instant industry-approved classic has helped revitalize Downtown Crossing dining with its small, meaty menu, adult milkshakes, late-night dining and blunt rules for patrons.

21 Temple Place, Boston, MA 02111

Visit Website

Also featured in:

Neptune Oyster

The North End is generally known for Italian, which makes it all the more impressive that a seafood restaurant has made its name as one of the neighborhood's best places to eat.

63 Salem St., Boston, MA 02113

Visit Website

Also featured in:

Angela's Café

Angela's is often cited by local diehards as Boston's best Mexican and continues to attract a steady flow of appreciative patrons despite its humble appearance and not particularly convenient to anyone outside of East Boston location. Flavors are simple yet deep: get the mole.

131 Lexington St., East Boston, MA 02128

Visit Website

Also featured in:

Matt Murphy's

When you think you want pub food, this is what you really want. Hearty stews, killer fish and chips, in-house ketchup and no white sugar on the premises.

14 Harvard St, Brookline, MA 02445

Visit Website

Also featured in:

The 38 Essential Boston Restaurants, January 2013

Sportello

The most approachable of Barbara Lynch's local empire, where tagliatelle with bolognese rubs elbows with dishes like strozzapreti with braised rabbit. Lunch, dinner and weekend brunch are served on a diner-like counter. Doubles as a bakery with early-morning hours.

348 Congress St, Boston, MA 02210

Visit Website

Also featured in:

Ten Tables

The flagship of an expanding mini-empire now in Cambridge, P-town and the burger biz.

597 Centre St, Jamaica Plain, MA 02130

Visit Website

Also featured in:

Highland Kitchen

A regular haunt of practically everyone who has ever lived in Somerville's Spring Hill or Union Square in the last few years, Highland Kitchen specializes in comfort food, a lively ambiance, and strong cocktails. Try the spicy goat stew and the housemade ginger beer (also spicy).

150 Highland Ave., Somerville, MA 02143

Visit Website

Also featured in:

Trina's Starlite Lounge

This cozy Somerville watering hole pairs hot dogs with classy cocktails in a retro lounge. The Monday "industry brunch" leaves diners happily full of chicken and waffles, homemade pop tarts, and Kool Aid du jour.

Open in Google