Mary's Fish Camp Check-In: Lunch (New York, NY)

Sea Scallops With Chickpea Tagine

Mary's Fish Camp is insanely, inexorably popular. The tiny restaurant almost always has a line out the door in the evenings. Patrons are packed in like, ahem, sardines. And it's often no less bustling at lunch. I've had more tourists than I can count stop me in the street to ask directions to the restaurant, so I'm guessing it's been talked up in at least one NYC guidebook.

Some of the appeal I get: The restaurant is cute and casual. The floor and tables are slightly sticky in a possibly nostalgic, childhood fish shack by the sea sort of way. And all of the staff are really, really nice. But the appeal does not extend to the incredibly tight seating and the prices, spendy for the quality of the food.

Lucia (New Milford, CT)

Dining Room, View of the Bar to the Back

Lucia is a nuovo Italian restaurant located in a modest, pleasant space on Bank Street in New Milford. Though chef-owner Antonio Caldareri references both his mother's northern Italian and his father's southern Italian roots as influences for the restaurant, his food isn't shy about straying from both traditions.

Buvette Check-In: Brunch (New York, NY)

View Down the Bar

Gold morning sun streams in through the big picture window overlooking the garden, refracting and reflecting its way through the long, narrow space. Here, it catches a highly polished coffee pot, there, the tin ceiling before coming to rest on the beautiful people working behind the bar and those sitting at it. Good, homey smells of coffee, waffles and butter waft through the air, laced with that distinctive sweet-bitter scent of fresh squeezed orange juice. The only thing marring this idyllic scene is the fact that every nook and cranny of this restaurant is packed, even on a weekday morning.

Buvette is, alas, a bit sceney. But unlike some other sceney places, it has the deliciousness to back it up. Though brief, the breakfast menu covers all the essentials: viennoiseries, crepes, waffles, a few egg preparations, oatmeal and a few basic tartines. This brevity is commendable because it allows the small kitchen to prepare everything with attention.

Jaipore (Brewster, New York)

Jaipore Restaurant on Route 22

Jaipore is far better than it has to be. As the only Indian restaurant in the town of Brewster, New York and surrounds, it could probably get away with serving inauthentic, poorly made food to a captive audience--but it doesn't. Instead, this thirty-year-old restaurant, housed in a Victorian-esque former residence, offers home-style, decently made vegetarian and non-vegetarian fare, mostly from the subcontinent's north, with a few south Indian options thrown in for good measure.

The Main Dining Room