Headliner
Bungalow
The chef and cookbook author Vikas Khanna, whose New York debut many years ago was at the Michelin-starred Junoon, now has a place to call his own here. He and his business partner, Jimmy Rizvi, who owns GupShup and other restaurants, settled on the East Village. “The space is so unassuming but unforgettable when you walk in,” Mr. Khanna said. He could not resist the flight of steps going down from the street level, which reminded him of the entrance to the famous Golden Temple in Amritsar in his native Punjab in the north of India. “It makes the entrance surprisingly majestic,” he said. Then why call it Bungalow? In the India of the Raj, bungalows were aristocratic dwellings. First there is a bar area with tables, then a semi-open kitchen and beyond that a spacious dining room, the rear portion of which has greenery and a skylight. The menu trawls Indian cooking from Kashmir south to Kerala, with dahi puri stuffed with lentils from Varanasi, a Kashmiri dish made with lotus roots, a tart Jewish-Indian chicken curry Chitranee, malai chicken with cheese, Muslim saffron bread called sheermal, Rajasthani pulled lamb, and spicy shrimp balchão, which has Portuguese roots. Classics like chicken biryani are also on the menu. Mr. Khanna, who lives in New York, plans to spend most of his time on the premises. “It’s my dream,” he said.
(Opens Saturday) 24 First Avenue (East Second Street), 212-500-1740, bungalowny.com.
Opening
Sempre Oggi
For many years this space was ’Cesca with the chef Tom Valenti at the helm, one of the rare destinations on the Upper West Side. The prolific restaurateurs Simon Oren and Robert Guarino are running this show; Philip Basone, formerly an executive chef at Barbuto, leads the kitchen. Italian dishes place an emphasis on vegetables: Badger Flame beets with pistachio salsa and blood orange, braised chicories with anchovies, and orecchiette with braised greens. But there are also the inevitable fluke crudo and crispy calamari, along with grilled heritage chicken and porcelet porchetta. Pastas are made in-house and breads depend on local grains. Eamon Roche, the designer, has given the bar gilded touches and done the modern dining room in three sections. It seats 130.
164 West 75th Street, 212-377-7150, semprenyc.com.
Café Joyeux
In 2017, in Paris, Yann Bucaille-Lanrezac opened the first of what would become a chain of nonprofit cafes and restaurants that employ people with intellectual and developmental disabilities. The 21st outlet is about to open in New York, the first outside Europe. They’re all simply decorated modern restaurants serving from breakfast through late afternoon. Thierry Marx, a prominent chef whose Paris restaurant Onor just received a Michelin star, is the consultant for the menus that feature quiches, croque monsieur, salads, soups, pastries and the company’s own coffee. Items like Waldorf salad, bacon-egg-and-cheese and cheesecake were added for the American branch. All profits go to the Joyeux Foundation for opening new locations and employing more people. (Friday)
599 Lexington Avenue (52nd Street), us.cafejoyeux.com.
Gurumé Korean Tapas Bar
The chef Joon Ryu, a New Yorker who has dabbled in various cuisines but is now concentrating on seasonal Korean recipes often with contemporary twists, has opened this restaurant with Kevin Chand, also from New York. Oyster mushroom tacos, Korean whelks with escargot butter, birria mandu, fried chicken wings, pork and radish bo ssam, and Berkshire kimchi fried rice populate the menu in a spare brick-walled setting.
313 West 46th Street, 917-388-2017, gurumerestaurant.com.
