At the tropically appointed, all-day spot Bayan Ko Diner on Chicago’s North Side, wife-husband owners Raquel Quadreny and chef Lawrence Letrero reimagine diner breakfast through the satiating, sticky-good melding of Filipino and Cuban culture. It helps that they’re already beloved for this brilliant mashup at their Michelin-recognized sibling restaurant, Bayan Ko, about 200 feet away. Expect Cubano breakfast burritos with shaggy ropa vieja; plates of custardy scrambled eggs, black beans, and sweet plantains; and sisig hash. In the hash, tender-crisp cubes of pork belly mingle with shishito peppers and smashed potatoes beneath a sunny egg squiggled with black vinegar aioli. “Garlic rice?” isn’t so much a question as an affirmation that you’ve chosen the correct side for sopping up all that yolk and meaty juice. You’ll want the brioche-like Filipino sweet bread ensaymada for the table, capped with melted cheddar and soused in cinnamon glaze. In typical diner fashion, the coffee will keep coming till you say “enough.” —Maggie Hennessy, contributing writer
Circles, Hudson, New York
Circles is, first and foremost, a bagel shop. Tray Tepper fine-tuned his recipe over years of pop-ups, developing a proudly-sourdough round with a precise balance of crackling crust and just-chewy-enough crumb, before finding a permanent address just off of bustling Warren Street in the town of Hudson. As much as Tepper would like everyone to appreciate the subtle pleasures of a plain bagel shaped by hand, baked each morning, and finished with just a schmear of good cream cheese, Circles is also very much a toppings shop. His signature offerings are as idiosyncratic as they are craveable, and reflect his time working at Diner in Brooklyn and the kaleidoscopic Lil Deb’s Oasis just up the street. Whitefish salad prickling with chile and festooned with great tufts of cilantro. Aioli, avocado, and local bacon under a literal handful of pickled vegetables. Bright, gloriously messy constructions that strike fear into the hearts of napkins everywhere. As much as Circles is a bagel shop and a toppings shop, it also happens to be an unusually lovely place to enjoy those bagels and toppings. Designed in collaboration with the artist Luka Carter, the sunlight-filled space is a riot of textures and color: sculptural tables covered in Dijon tile, amoeba-esque clocks fashioned from painted wood and plexiglass and clay, trippy handmade mugs. Here, the perfunctory “to stay, or to go?” would be more aptly put: “Is there anywhere else you’d rather be?” —Amiel Stanek, contributing editor
