Mitica is the new restaurant from the owners of Mariscos El Submarino, a popular seafood shop in Jackson Heights, Queens. The menu here is geared toward sit-down service, making Mitica feel like an upscale cantina, or maybe a Mexican steakhouse. On the menu: pork shank with mashed potatoes, a massive tomahawk steak for two, and sliced duck breast served over a bed of risotto. Aguachile, one of the most popular dishes at Mariscos El Submarino, is on the menu, but the portions here are smaller and more expensive than in Queens.

The stretch of Greenpoint, near Transmitter Park, has seen a wave of openings in recent years, including the tapas bar El Pingüino and the Mexican restaurant Panzón. Lingo, which landed on the block this spring, is leading the pack. The restaurant serves comforting Japanese American dishes, like a pot pie filled with beef curry and bone marrow and a whole fried chicken with chili crisp and lemon. The large dining room and back patio make it possible to walk in.

Misipasta is the new restaurant from Missy Robbins and Sean Feeney, the owners of Brooklyn’s popular Italian spots Lilia and Misi. It’s really a pasta shop: Fresh noodles, sauces used at Lilia, and packaged cheeses are sold on shelves to take home. But there are two counters inside and more seating in a shaded backyard for customers to order from a short menu with grilled artichoke sandwiches and spaghetti with breadcrumbs, plus cocktails and wine. Half of the restaurant is set aside for walk-ins.

Beck and Call, a cafe in Williamsburg, closed earlier this year, but the owners held onto the space and opened a new restaurant, which makes perfect smash burgers and serves alcohol starting at 8 a.m. The restaurant’s most popular dish is a $16 breakfast sandwich that riffs on the McGriddle from McDonald’s.

Williamsburg is home to some of the city’s best burritos right now, with help from New Mexican restaurant Santa Fe BK and the popular cafe Ceremonia Bakeshop. Rounding out the scene is the new location of Super Burrito, which started with a stand on the Rockaway Beach boardwalk in 2017. The shop specializes in massive Mission-style burritos filled with rice, beans, cheese, and meats like al pastor or carne asada. Keep an eye on the restaurant’s Instagram for weekly specials, like California burritos and a riff on Taco Bell’s Crunchwrap Supreme.

Lula Mae opened earlier this year in Clinton Hill, giving the neighborhood a dedicated home for Cambodian cooking — still a rarity in most parts of the city. Helmed by Dan San, a chef who used to work at the Manhattan restaurants Chinese Tuxedo and the Tyger, the atmosphere is casual, with a menu that lists oysters with fried shallots and a Chinese kway teow (fried pastry) served warm with tom yum butter and chicken pate.

Ursula is off to a hot start at its new location in Bed-Stuy, a welcome expansion for a restaurant that previously operated out of a small storefront with no indoor seating. The new building has a full dining room and bar: It’s barely enough to contain the many customers who line up here on weekends in search of one of the city’s best breakfast burritos. The vibe is more relaxed at dinner when a separate food menu with enchiladas and lamb carnitas is served.

James, an American restaurant in Prospect Heights, closed after more than a decade last fall. Gertrude’s opened in its place last month, giving the neighborhood a New York bistro with Jewish flair: burgers come on challah rolls, martinis are mixed with pickle brine, and sides of french fries can be swapped out for latkes. The restaurant is run by Nate Adler and Rachel Jackson, the owners of Gertie in Williamsburg, and Eli Sussman, the chef behind Samesa in Rockefeller Center.

Egg anchored Williamsburg’s breakfast scene for more than a decade, serving pancakes and French toast until it closed during the pandemic. The restaurant returned earlier this year at a storefront in Prospect Heights, where Evan Hanczor, its longtime chef, is now running the show. He’s serving several of Egg’s most popular dishes, including its famed eggs “Rothko” with boiled tomatoes, plus new items like an egg katsu breakfast sandwich and seasonal pastries.

Bar Mario is a small Italian spot that’s worth a trip. The restaurant with throwback chandeliers and retro tile floors serves some very good pastas — a creamy rigatoni with bacon, gnocchi with crushed hazelnuts — and tends to be less crowded than other big-name spots in the area, like Hometown Bar-B-Que and Red Hook Tavern. True to its name, the restaurant also serves Italian wines and a perfect Negroni.

During the pandemic, Fatima’s Grill went viral in Los Angeles for its Hot Cheetos burritos. The fame helped it spin-off a few locations on the West Coast — and one in Brooklyn, its first restaurant outside of California. There are around 70 dishes on the menu, and while most of them feel like stunt menu items — burgers with Hot Cheetos dust, Taco Bell “crunch wraps” with shawarma — several are quite good. Burgers, burritos, and quesadillas are priced at around $20.