Best Restaurants For Visiting New Orleans

The places to add to your list of favorites

New Orleans brings out the preservationist in its visitors, and it can be difficult to steer clear of this culturally singular city's institutions. Consider adding these new spots into your itinerary, though. They'll soon be classics in their own right.

Maurepas Foods: An anchor for the development of the Bywater neighborhood, this newcomer frees itself of the shackles of Creole cuisine while still retaining local influences. Enjoy dishes like goat tacos with pickled green tomatoes or fried soft-shell crabs in a curry sauce, alongside excellent cocktails.

Borgne: The latest from the John Besh empire is this airy restaurant, which focuses on a niche: Spanish-influenced, seafood-heavy gulf cuisine. Chef Brian Landry, late of Galatoire's, puts out pitch-perfect deviled crabs, and a fillet of flounder is littered with local, piercingly fresh shellfish.

Root: It's ambitious for a new restaurant located a few blocks from Cochon to launch a complicated charcuterie program. But Root succeeds with aplomb, offering everything from "face" bacon to nearly ten different types of fresh sausage. Follow this cured-meat parade with a series of Latin-kissed dishes, like blanquette de veau made with veal cheeks and huitlacoche (corn fungus).

Killer Poboys: This roving operation is providing thirsty bargoers with reimagined takes on New Orleans's favorite sandwich. The husband-and-wife owners set up each day in Erin Rose, a stellar dive bar in the French Quarter, and build sandwiches stuffed with "dark and stormy" braised pork or curried vegetables.