The Top 10 Restaurant Trends That Defined Eating Out in 2024

Mountains of Caviar

From dive bars to Michelin-starred carts, from new-school diners to classy old school oyster bars, caviar was everywhere this year. My colleagues and I have seen caviar on top of chicken nuggets (Coqodaq in New York City), hash browns (Saint Valentine in Dallas), polenta cakes (Gigi’s Italian Kitchen in Atlanta), and even ice cream. You can still find classic presentations, whether with accoutrements (Cullum’s Attaboy in San Antonio) or the caviar sandwich (Obelix in Chicago). 

But anything goes these days, with restaurants serving caviar with Cool Ranch Doritos (Kachka in Portland, Oregon), Funyuns (Otoko in Austin from 2017 F&W Best New Chef Yoshi Okai), or fried salmon skin subbing in for chips (Mr. Tuna in Portland, Maine). Part of the reason is that some caviar has gotten a lot more affordable these days — Chinese producers are flooding the global market — but the other reason is that it’s a delight, either as a luxurious indulgence or simply a fun, high-low juxtaposition. At this point the hand-borne caviar bump just seems so simple and outdated.

A Duckaissance

Over the last year, it seems as though duck has waddled onto menus all over America — whether it’s a duck breast, confit leg, or foie gras — often displacing menu cornerstones like chicken or steak. At restaurants across the country, you’ll find dry-aged duck (Brooklyn brasserie Francie), the old-school canard à la presse (2014 F&W Best New Chef Dave Beran’s Pasjoli in Santa Monica, California), and beautifully cooked duck breasts at spots like 2024 F&W Best New Chef Karyn Tomlinson’s Myriel in St Paul. Duck has, of course, been a part of culinary traditions around the world for centuries, but it’s clear that today we are living in a full-blown duckaissance. 

Seafood Trays

The flip side of the ostentatious display of a towering, multilevel seafood tower is the single-level seafood tray offering the quiet luxury of a high-quality curated platter. A tray brimming with seafood over ice is nothing new, but it is something I can’t help but notice is having a moment. You’ll find a single level platter at the red-hot seafood counter restaurant Penny in New York and the lavishly delightful Seafood Party that serves two to four people at Charlie’s in downtown St. Helena, California. I've been scoping out a minimalist seafood platter from 2013 F&W Best New Chef Alex Stupak at his new restaurant The Otter in New York City that’s “perfect for one,” and a more classic take on the platter at Pêche in New Orleans from chef de cuisine and 2024 F&W Best New Chef Nicole Cabrera Mills.

Jimmy Nardello Peppers

Fried, grilled, or roasted; thinly shaved or stuffed whole; pickled or jammed; Jimmy Nardello has his name dropped all over menus right now. Often affectionately called “Jimmies,” or better yet, “Nards,” chefs across the country have been falling hard for Jimmy Nardello peppers. “Oh my gosh, Jimmies are so hot right now,” 2023 F&W Best New Chef Edgar Rico at Nixta Taqueria in Austin reports. “From last year to this year it exploded.” 

Chefs all over keep digging deeper into the fervor, from 2019 F&W Best New Chef Caroline Glover of Annette in Aurora, Colorado, who’s started growing her own, to 1990 F&W Best New Chef Nancy Silverton who sometimes sprinkles them on pizza with ’nduja at Pizzeria Mozza in Los Angeles.

Fish-Aging Lockers

It seems as though the must-have accessories for restaurant dining rooms these days are fish-aging cabinets. Step into Theodora in Brooklyn, New York, and you’ll immediately come across a locker full of fish suspended upside down and dramatically lit as if they’re in the spotlight. For diners around the country who may be intimidated by dry-aged fish (let alone any seafood), having an aging cabinet in the dining room can help demystify the process. “If the fish in there is looking good, guests can connect value to that display and not feel weirded out,” says 2020 F&W Best New Chef Nick Bognar, who dry-ages fish at his sushi bar, Sado in St. Louis, Missouri. 

You’ll also find fish-aging cabinets at 2017 F&W Best New Chef Peter Cho’s Han Oak in Portland, OR; chef Adam Evans’s Automatic Seafood in Birmingham, Alabama; as well as at 2023 F&W Best New Chef Nando Chang’s Miami omakase bar, Itamae AO. “It's part of the show,” Chang says.

Counter Service

Over the last few years, counter service restaurants — where customers order and pay at a counter instead of being seated and served by waitstaff at a table — have been proliferating. It’s thanks in part to a tight labor market, surging food and labor costs, and an increasing consumer preference for convenience. And there’s no end in sight. 

The best example of this trend might be Food & Wine’s 2023 Restaurant of the Year Birdie’s — a restaurant and wine bar that marries more ambitious food with a counter service model, and it hints at a possible future for hospitality. The concept has been spreading across the country, including spots like Fiore in Philadelphia; Madein in Reno, Nevada; Grassa in Portland; and John's Food and Wine in Chicago.

Grandma Plates

There’s big grandma energy at chef/owner Geoff Davis’ Burdell in Oakland, which Food & Wine named as the 2024 Restaurant of the Year. The nostalgia factor here is strong, with old-school stereo equipment bringing a warm, fuzzy sound, and faded family photos hanging on the walls. Food arrives on vintage Pyrex plates from the 1950s and 1960s, some bearing the exact same pattern his grandmother owned. 

You’ll find similar vibes at 2024 F&W Best New Chef Karyn Tomlinson’s restaurant Myriel in St. Paul, where most of the food gets served on special-occasion vintage china, evoking an Old World charm and ceremony. The plates at Myriel are sourced from Goodwill and antique stores, but recently, neighbors have been reaching out to offer their sets. Similarly, 2018 F&W Best New Chef Kate Williams in Detroit put out a call asking for “pre-loved china” for the reopening of her restaurant Lady of the House in October (the original location closed after the building was sold during the pandemic in 2021).

Martinis and Fries

The “Adult Happy Meal” — a stiff Martini served alongside a bowl of fries — may have originated in New York City, but the combo’s accessible opulence has been taking over happy hour menus all over the world. From Amsterdam to San Diego, from Toronto to Houston, the Martini and fries combo has started to trend worldwide, as it’s a little hedonistic, but not entirely budget-destroying. 

At Denver’s Point Easy, the happy hour menu has the combination for $14: classic fries (with a chicken-umami mayo) and a savory Vesper Martini meant to complement the saltiness of the fries. “We love it as a high-low sort of thing for guests, which I imagine is why it's so popular everywhere,” says owner Andy Bruch. “It feels decadent and even a little naughty, doesn't it?”

Mashup Pastas

Call it modern-day fusion, call it a multi-national mishmash, call it cross-cultural cavatelli collisions — but restaurants across America are using classic Italian pastas to showcase decidedly non-Italian flavors, ingredients, and dishes. Over the past year, I’ve seen more and more chefs lean on the diverse influences of their upbringing and surroundings in order to create entirely original mashup pastas. Take, for example, the elote pasta at Valentine in Phoenix, Arizona; the chopped cheese raviolo at Marie’s in Brooklyn; and the Mexican-Italian fusion pasta dishes at the self-described “Mexitalian” restaurant Amiga Amore in Los Angeles. 

My favorite just might be the yellow curry rigatoni at 2024 F&W Best New Chef Wedchayan "Deau" Arpapornnopparat’s L.A. restaurant Holy Basil. The warm Kaeng Kari yellow curry, which has Indian, Thai, and Chinese influences, is built with a scratch-made curry paste, and topped with Szechuan peppercorns for some extra pop.

Kakigori

There are versions of shaved ice from around the world, from piragua in Puerto Rico to sno-balls in New Orleans, but there’s nothing quite like Japanese kakigori. Fluffy, light, and soft as snow, kakigori can come in many flavors and forms, and it’s a blank canvas for chefs around the world. You can find a green tea kakigori made with red bean ice cream, white chocolate cream, and condensed milk at Katami in Houston, or then there’s 2020 F&W Best New Chef Tavel Bristol-Joseph’s kakigori with apple, roasted white chocolate, and burnt cinnamon ice cream at Hestia. The flavors of the kakigori at Bar Futo in Portland, Maine, rotate often; the most recent version was a “blueberry breakfast” that combined cinnamon toast crunch milk, blueberry compote, and an oat crumble. Chef Ian Driscoll says, “You can make anything — any flavor profile you want.”