May 2009

Features

• New Zealand

  New Zealand winemakers, already masters of Sauvignon Blanc, are determined to create world-class reds. F&W’s Ray Isle explores their next great red-wine region, the improbably named Gimblett Gravels.

• Go List 2009: 7 Best Bars

  Top mixologists use perfect ice cubes, and even dry ice, to make exceptional classic and creative cocktails.

• Barcelona

  The Spanish city has everything from an avant-garde Asian spot to a Catalan-centric wine center with electronic lists. For more great restaurants, check out our guide to the world’s best places to eat.

• Go List 2009: Best Bites Near Sites

  An insider’s guide to the best places to eat near the world’s most incredible sights: the Eiffel Tower, the Great Pyramids and beyond.

• Go List 2009: Best Hotel Restaurants

  Whether a glittering dining room modeled on Versailles or a hip space in a boutique property, the places here are foodie hangouts.

• Boston

  F&W’s roundup of the best restaurants in Boston, including five restaurants run by our Best New Chefs. For more great restaurants, check out our guide to the best places to eat in the country.

• Copenhagen

  The world’s foodies are fascinated by Copenhagen and its avant-garde chefs, who experiment with unconventional ingredients. For more great restaurants, check out our guide to the world’s best places to eat.

• London

  Terrific restaurants are thriving, even in the touristy theater district, and deceptively simple cafés are using hyperseasonal produce. For more great restaurants, check out our guide to the world’s best places to eat.

• New York

  The city has some of the world's great chefs—and now they're offering deals that make their food taste even better.

• Tokyo

  Japanese chefs are dictating the world’s dining trends with their fierce devotion to seasonality and respect for aesthetics. For more great restaurants, check out our guide to the world’s best places to eat.

• Go List 2009: Twenty Rising Stars

  Our panel of plugged-in judges combed through the dozens and dozens of Go List nominations to single out the 20 places that offer the planet’s most exciting dining experiences of 2009.

• Go List 2009: World’s Best Food Cities

  Five cities, dozens of amazing restaurants around the world. Here is an essential guide to the finest food on the planet.

• Hotel Cooking Schools

  Take amazing cooking lessons all day, then go upstairs, get into bed and dream about the great food yet to come: There’s a reason why cooking schools in hotels are so appealing. Here are five terrific new ones and their tastiest dishes.

• Lesson 5: Tostones

  Lourdes Castro teaches students how to fry plantains for perfect tostones.

• Lessons in Cuban Cooking

  Lourdes Castro taught herself how to cook. Now, she gives cooking classes in New York and Florida and has written a cookbook to help the rest of us. Here, she shares 10 iconic recipes that honor her Cuban heritage.

• Ludacris: Rapper and Restaurateur

  Most of Ludacris’s rap lyrics are unprintable in this magazine. But the recipes from his Asian restaurant, Straits Atlanta, completely belong here—from tamarind beef to chili lobster, they’re spectacular.

• Donald Link’s Tips for Cooking Spicy Food

• Editor’s Letter

• Best Syrian Food Unveiled

  Katherine Zoepf spent two years in Syria reporting for the New York Times. But she knew virtually nothing of the cuisine until she went on a tour with author Anissa Helou.

• The Syrian Pantry

  “Understanding Syrian food requires a willingness to look hard, go deep,” says Anissa Helou, the London-based Syrian-Lebanese cookbook writer. Here, some essential ingredients to Syrian cooking.