Blue Hill at Stone Barns has been on our hit list for over 4 years now. Every year, my partner attempted to book the reservation online, but they would always be unsuccessful. This year, I decided to take a shot at it, and I scored a June 19th, Thursday, reservation for 5 PM. This restaurant has 2 Michelin Stars, and it is located near Tarrytown in Westchester County. It’s possible to do a train ride up from the city and take an uber, but we opted to make a weekend trip out of it.

Odo is a Michelin 2-star restaurant located in the Flatiron district of Manhattan. It comes from Chef Hiroki Odo, who moved to New York in 2012 and won a Michelin Star as the head chef at Kajitsu. We looked on the Michelin guide, and we saw this was a 2-star restaurant that we haven’t been to yet. We were able to make a reservation for 2 for 6 PM on a Sunday night without issues.

Bridges opened in the late fall last year, and is headed by chef Sam Lawrence who came from Estela, which is on our list to hit. Lately, this restaurant has been getting some notoriety for having good food and a good ambiance. It’s a bit difficult to get to since you have to walk a bit from the subway entrance. I was able to book a reservation for 2 for the bar about a few days in advance for 5:45 PM.

Matsunori Handroll Bar, not to be confused with Matsunori Sushi Club, originated as a Boston handroll sushi bar. They decided to open an additional location in Long Island City, where there is an influx of Asians moving in. They do not accept reservations, so we decided to try to walk in around 6:30 PM on a Friday evening. Fortunately, we got there just before the lines, and we were able to sit at a table for 2. The counter at the time was completely open.

Hamburger America is a luncheonette-style restaurant with counters for eating a burger. It comes from an American chef George Motz, who is offering an homage to the history of the hamburger. It’s received a number of positive reviews from food critics for some reason, and Yelpers and food bloggers alike rave about this place. I came here as a quick stop around 4:30 PM on a Thursday evening, and I could walk in and sit on the stool without any trouble.

Today was another Broadway showing that we had to attend. Our theater district restaurant pool is thinning a bit, so this one was somewhat difficult to locate. It reminds me of a Midtown staple type of restaurant that is very friendly to the theater crowd, and it’s not hard to get in. We were able to walk in on a Saturday evening around 5 PM without any issues.

Crane Club is located across the street from Chelsea Market. It’s being led by executive chef Melissa Rodriguez, who formerly oversaw Al Coro, which earned 2 Michelin stars at one point. This restaurant is under the Tao Hospitality Group, which oversees some upscale trendy hot spots like Hakkasan, Lava, and TAO Asian Bistro. We were able to make a reservation for the dining room very easily for 5:30 PM on a Friday night. This restaurant’s food was meant to be unapologetically fancy.

Nubiani was a Korean BBQ restaurant that had been on my list for quite some time. I was only reminded of it when my partner wanted to go to it because one of their friends tried to walk-in and instead had to go to Love Korean BBQ. I was easily able to make a reservation for Friday, though they only had early PM openings at 4:30. This is located right across the street from Love, inside a building on the third floor. It’s definitely very inconspicuous, but this is a typical pattern for Koreatown restaurants.

Time and Tide comes from the Kent Hospitality Group, which owns restaurants such as Saga and Crown Shy. The head chef, Top Chef winner Danny Garcia, overhauled the menu recently, and we got a chance to experience it. The restaurant was inspired to be a steakhouse modeled fish restaurant. I was easily able to make a reservation for 5:30 PM on a Friday night because the restaurant snipers have moved onto newer restaurants.

Becco was on our list for a while. This restaurant in the Theater District was always full around theater times, so of course, that’s naturally alluring. It was first opened in 1993 by Lidia Bastianich and her son, Joe, who you might recognize from the U.S. version of the MasterChef series. The Yelp ratings of the food seem surprisingly low compared to the Google counterpart, so that increase our curiosity. We were able to easily make a reservation the earlier in the day for 5:15 PM on a Friday night.