ABC Kitchen

Despite the unorthodox, big-city location (the ground floor of the ABC Kitchen and Home department store), the slightly hokey Earth Day theatrics (the menus are made from recycled paper, the dun-colored place mats are compostable) , and the occasional non-locavore shortcuts (the prime beef is flown in from Texas), Jean-Georges Vongerichten’s vaunted farm-to-table restaurant lives up to all of the breathless hype. Pay attention to the elevated country classics (fresh pea soup, fried chicken with mashed potatoes, the pork chop), but real stars of the show are the beautifully sourced and composed seafood dishes, like soft blocks of fresh-caught Chatham cod stacked over chopped asparagus, or the shell-on lobster, which is wood roasted in rusticated, country style, and finished in a big-city way, with a spritzing of lemon vinaigrette.