Now open at 247 East 81st Street is Hutch + Waldo, an Australia-inspired coffee shop from professional rugby player Alastair McFarland. Alongside organic coffee, the menu includes sandwiches, salads, avocado toast, a halloumi sandwich with arugula and tomato aioli, and chocolate chip cookies. McFarland started the cafe as something to do in rugby’s off-season, seeing an opportunity in the neighborhood with many evening spots, but not a lot of daytime options. It’s open daily from 6 a.m. to 6 p.m., going until 8 p.m. on weekends.

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Self-anointed “world’s leading plant-based chef” Matthew Kenney is opening two restaurants back to back this fall: He’s following up hard-to-read XYST on November 1, with the more straightforward Bar Verde, a vegan Mexican restaurant in the East Village.

This will be the third restaurant for Kenney, who rose to prominence following Irving Place’s embroiled but now defunct Pure Food + Wine. Bar Verde will debut in the East Village, next door to 00 + Co. with the same address as the vegan pizza shop he opened on Second Avenue at 4th Street last year. His partners there, Raymond Azzi and Kyle Saliba, are also co-owners of Bar Verde.

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Temporarily shuttered Chinatown favorite Lam Zhou Handmade Noodle and Dumpling will bestow the neighborhood with plump dumplings once again in mid-October — this time with an expanded menu and potentially beer and wine.

Mindy Xie, whose uncle owns the restaurant, says that her family closed the original location at 144 East Broadway in August after the lease ended. They snapped up a slightly bigger space at 40 Bowery, south of Canal Street, and will be ready to rock around October 15th, give or take, she says.

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What kind of fare does a crew of nightlife impresarios and restaurateurs serve when it opens a fast-casual restaurant? Apparently, non-dairy, coconut-based yogurt.

Next Thursday, the beach-themed Broken Coconut will open its doors in Noho at 15 East 4th Street near Lafayette Street — serving dishes with a dairy-free coconut yogurt that the team created, as well as light fare like grain bowls and overnight oats. The yogurt comes with toppings such as dragon fruit, chia, and coconut flakes or as a smoothie bowl.

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Tickets are now live for The Aviary’s New York City debut, the highly experimental cocktail bar import from Chicago from three-Michelin-starred Alinea duo chef Grant Achatz and partner Nick Kokonas. The restaurant, located on the top floor of the Mandarin Oriental in Columbus Circle, opens Wednesday evening, making the Alinea Group’s entry into NYC complete.

The food and drink menus — in full below — are equal parts perplexing and fascinating, with some dishes giving enough of a description to suss out, while others are much more cryptic. “Not Ramen” lists mushroom dashi, nori, and a soft-poached egg as the ingredients, while “Pineapple” has mole, passion fruit, and black mint. Then there’s the more straightforward ones like a pork belly curry with banana, cashew, and iceberg.

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You could spend a week eating nothing but kibbeh at Le Sajj. This Brooklyn stalwart — open 11 years — is an anchor of the neighborhood’s Lebanese community, providing a bit of Beirut in Bay Ridge. In the evenings, the front of the restaurant swings open to ocean breezes. Local residents promenade outside or relax on benches provided on every block, as the sun sinks over the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge.

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Although there’s an endless number of desserts to try in New York, not all sweets are created equal. Some of them are worthy of a special trip, and some even define a restaurant. This here is a list of 19 of NYC’s top show-stopping desserts, including every craving from an almost-savory meringue, potato chips with ice cream, and more than one sundae.

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Three of the West Coast’s best restaurants plan NYC dinners

Hot LA Thai restaurant Night + Market, SF’s upscale restaurant with dim sum carts State Bird Provisions, and Portland Russian favorite Kachka will all be serving meals in New York City this fall. Each restaurant will be hosting a one-night-only meal at Reynard in Williamsburg, part of a cookbook release celebration. Tickets cost $75 and include the meal, service, and a welcome beverage.

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Now that David Chang’s delivery-only restaurant Ando has turned into a straight-up fast-casual spot, it’s time to take a look inside. The Momofuku creator hired on a former Pret executive to run operations at the not-yet-profitable brand, and the result is a Pret-like store that offers grab-and-go options alongside made-to-order hot items.

The new space near Union Square at 31 West 14th Street looks like a delivery app come to life, with a lot of clean, white space punctuated by neon signs, bright red splashes, and a few stools. In other words, it’s a pretty typical entry into New York City’s fast-casual scene, with its strong branding and Instagrammable touches.

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Uncle Boons Sister, the latest restaurant from husband-wife chef duo Ann Redding and Matt Danzer, might be a spin-off, but in some ways, the Thai takeout spot is more of a family operation than their flagship Nolita restaurant Uncle Boons.

When they decided to convert Mr. Donahue’s into their long-ruminating idea for Thai takeout, they’d just had their first child, a boy named Leo, now around five months old. Redding’s mother came to town for three weeks after he was born, which meant she helped with the baby — but also doled out her opinion during their testing of dishes for the restaurant, whether Redding or Danzer wanted it or not. (“It was a great help, but a little stressful,” Redding says.)

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