Every year, right about now, we drop the Hot 10, our rigorously researched list of America’s best new restaurants. This is not that list. Before we could even start scouting last spring, restaurant owners were forced to close their doors, and millions of employees were sent home to ride out the virus—or, in the case of essential workers, face the threat of infection on the job. But since those nerve-racking first months, the industry that is always reinventing itself—with flashy openings, inventive pop-ups, and dishes for us to obsess over and crave—continued to do just that. We heard about how Simileoluwa Adebajo, the chef-owner of Eko Kitchen in San Francisco, began to feed the food insecure—and decided to change her business model permanently. We got schooled in beef noodle soup by co-chefs and friends Eric Sze and Lucas Sin of New York City pop-up Shy*Boyz Club. We talked to restaurant workers across the country, from former bartenders providing for the undocumented to last year’s Hot 10 winners, about how they are fighting to save this industry in big and small ways. This year’s ode to restaurants is not a splashy list but an homage to the industry that never stops, pandemic be damned—an industry that we must support now more than ever.
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