There’s a New Vanguard Of American Fine Dining This Fall (Without the Coastal Waitlists)

America’s world-class food destinations like San Francisco, Los Angeles, Chicago, and New York have been hogging the spotlight for decades. But some of the country’s most exciting meals are waiting in places that rarely make the top travel lists. This fall, skip the usual culinary capitals and head somewhere unexpected, where seasonal ingredients, local traditions, and a new generation of ambitious chefs are creating memorable dining experiences without the crowds. From cozy neighborhood eateries to Michelin-starred fine dining, these three underrated U.S. food cities are well worth planning a trip around.

Denver

(Courtesy of Lucy Beaugard/Champagne Tiger)

The Mile High City is more than a gateway to the Rocky Mountains and outdoor adventure. In recent years, Denver’s culinary scene has really grown up with sophisticated new restaurants at all price points. Begin your morning with the best croissants and pastéis de nata (Portuguese egg custard tarts) at Reunion Bakery‘s new South Pearl location. Baker Ismael de Sousa teaches baking classes next door at Food Lab for home cooks inspired to perfect their sourdough or learn the art of lamination. For a more savory breakfast, the naturally fermented bagels at Odell’s Bagel are the best in the city, and the space casually transforms into a kaiseki counter in the evening.

Chef and restaurateur Kelly Whitaker of Id Est Hospitality Group won the 2024 James Beard Award for Outstanding Restaurateur and operates six different restaurant concepts in Denver and Boulder, including Dry Storage bakery milling flour for all of Whitaker’s restaurants and supplying locally milled heirloom grains to more than a hundred restaurants in Colorado. Whitaker says he never intended to become a miller, but it was the best way to have the biggest impact and build a supply chain for regionally grown grains.

Whitaker and Mexico-born chef Johnny Curiel are Denver’s biggest culinary stars. The duo teamed up with farmers at the MASA Seed Foundation to plant heirloom varieties of corn including Concha white, Chihuahua blue, and Oaxacan green corn that they are both serving at their respective restaurants, including warm masa blinis with corn crème fraîche, popped sorghum and Tsar Nicoulai caviar at The Wolf’s Tailor.

Curiel’s meteoric rise to stardom is equally attributable to his culinary talents and his wife and business partner Kacie Curiel’s uncanny restaurant operations genius. The husband-and-wife team own two contemporary Mexican Michelin-starred restaurants next door, Alma Fonda Fina and Mezcaleria Alma in Denver’s LoHi (Lower Highland) neighborhood. It’s the perfect one-two punch double dinner for star-chasing gourmands. Their newest Denver restaurant, Milpero, is Curiel’s magnum opus, serving an 18-course menu centered on masa, aguachiles and moles.

(Courtesy of Shawn Campbell/Milpero)

For a lighter dinner, Heretik is my favorite new neighborhood hang in RiNo, a Basque-inspired raw bar and rotisserie that feels very European. If you’re looking for something more lively, Champagne Tiger is the most fun and fabulous mid-century modern American diner-French bistro mash-up, with an epic Sunday drag brunch, great grower champagne, tiny tinis, and the best quiche in Denver. The caviar ashtray is a must, with crème fraîche and chive dipped tater tots, plus a branded ashtray souvenir to take home.

Surprisingly, there’s great Chinese food in Denver too. Both Yuan Wonton and MAKfam are ideal for a quick and casual lunch, with the latter serving scallion pancakes, silken tofu salads and their signature “fancy wun tun” housemade chicken and shrimp dumplings in a creamy chicken broth with XO sauce. For dinner, Pig & Tiger offers Taiwanese cuisine with local Colorado ingredients, and you can buy a jar of chili crisp to take home.

Stay: Limelight Denver is conveniently located downtown right at Union Station next to another favorite restaurant, Tavernetta, for freshly made pasta and the best wine list in Denver. Request a complimentary Theragun Pro for your room upon check-in for self-massage self-care.

Nashville

(Courtesy of Mick Jacob/Noko Yaki)

There’s more than country music and Tennessee whiskey in Music City, although Leiper’s Fork Distillery has the city’s most anticipated restaurant opening slated for January 2027 in the new 19-acre Nashville Yards development. The chef team, led by Nashville native Davis Reese, includes colleagues from recently shuttered Audrey and will serve elevated hyperlocal Appalachian cuisine to pair with Leiper’s Fork’s famously terroir-driven whiskies made entirely with local non-GMO grains. Think Bucksnort Ranch smoked trout dip, spent grain crackers, whiskey-glazed short rib and creative corn dishes like johnny cakes with house-milled cornmeal.

Another exciting upcoming opening is Noko Yaki, an Asian-inspired steakhouse debuting October in West Nashville from the group behind local favorites Noko and Kase x Noko that will be the only place in Tennessee serving Kobe beef.

Until then, dinner at Fancypants followed by a glass of wine and caviar-topped chicken nuggets at Bad Idea is a decidedly good idea. The former is chef Mathew Meeker’s playful twist on fine dining serving sometimes odd but always delicious dishes like BBQ maitake mushrooms with fresh corn “grits,” grilled blueberries and preserved truffle jus in a dining room decorated with streams of red tinsel. The latter is the best wine bar in a whiskey town, with cozy vibes that owner Alex Burch describes as “a cool retired art teacher’s living room.”

(Courtesy of Andrew Cebulka/Fancypants)

Strategic Hospitality swept all of Nashville’s Michelin stars in the region’s inaugural guide last year – with the intimate chef’s counter at The Catbird Seat, 24-seat Southern-inspired tasting menu at Bastion and concise a la carte menu (don’t miss the DIY beef tartare hand rolls) at Locust all receiving stars. The group’s newest restaurant is Sally’s Stay Awhile, an all-day cafe in Wedgewood-Houston, a rapidly growing creative neighborhood that’s also home to the best pasta in the city at iggy’s.

For an agritourism overnight, visit Southall Farm & Inn just 35 minutes south of Nashville in Franklin. The 500-acre working farm includes orchards, gardens, hydroponic greenhouses and an apiary with millions of bees that guests can visit on complimentary daily tours before tasting their sweet honey. The Jammery preservation kitchen is the heart of the resort’s zero-waste philosophy and regularly hosts culinary classes. Almost all the produce for dinner at January is grown on property, along with lots of honey in delectable desserts.

Stay: Thompson Nashville is a stylish stay in the Gulch neighborhood with a buzzy rooftop bar and Four Seasons Nashville hosts a family-style monthly dinner series at the hotel’s new Italian steakhouse Bacco with prominent guest chefs.

Milwaukee

(Courtesy of Kevin J. Miyazaki/Birch)

Always seemingly in Chicago’s shadow, Milwaukee delivers surprising value when it comes to creative culinary offerings. It’s not just beer, bratwurst and cheese curds, folks. Restaurants like Bacchus and Birch serve thoughtful tasting menus for less than $100 and Michelin will finally recognize the city in the forthcoming Great Lakes Michelin guide, with the formal announcement taking place in April.

Chef Kyle Knall may be a relative newcomer to the city, moving to Milwaukee from New York during the pandemic, but he has as good a shot as anyone at receiving a Michelin star for his wood-fired open hearth cooking at Birch. Diners can order a la carte, but the six-course tasting menu, beginning with a round of bite-sized farm snacks, is the way to go. Knall’s cooking is never precious, but always precise with punchy flavors, whether it’s a sweet and smoky melon BBQ glaze on kanpachi collars and tails, or smoky corn broth and sliced avocado squash with barely cooked sablefish. Pastas at Birch are very good, but the Pleasant Ridge Reserve ravioli dauphine at Knall’s new French bistro Cassis, served as a solid rectangle of 24 pillowy pasta pockets, is also worth seeking out.

If Knall is the city’s most promising young chef, then chef and restaurateur Paul Bartolotta is the godfather. Milwaukee’s chef kingpin oversees 19 restaurants and has been instrumental in putting Milwaukee on the map since he opened his first restaurant in 1993. Bartolotta is responsible for nurturing a family tree of hospitality talent, including Adam Siegel, who worked with Bartolotta for two decades before opening his own restaurants, Lupi & Iris and just-opened Il Ponte.

Bartolotta’s newest restaurants High Stakes and Peacock Lounge are Milwaukee’s most glamorous new openings this year, with interiors that feel like London meets Las Vegas, and servers present cuts of steak on a silver platter describing each cut’s marbling and origins. Don’t miss the Australian wagyu-draped gougères to begin and black tie scallops layered with black truffle and baked in a flaky pastry shell. A life-sized stuffed peacock perched on the bar greets guests at Peacock Lounge, and brilliant teal transitions to sultry scarlet in the High Stakes dining room, where curved booths face each other for excellent people watching.

(Courtesy of The Bartolotta Restaurants)

There’s a diverse array of global cuisine throughout the city too. From Cambodian sandwiches on fresh-baked baguettes and Laotian sausage and curry at 3rd Street Market Hall to modern Indian curries dosas and biryani at Saffron and Middle Eastern mezze platters at Aya.

Coffee connoisseurs need to visit Discourse Coffee for inventive coffee drinks that will blow your mind. Autumn specials include a broccoli cheddar soup-inspired latte and sweet corn, butternut squash, saffron and passion fruit delight. Founder Ryan Castelaz takes a mixologist’s approach to coffee (and wrote a book about it) and also operates Agency Cocktail Lounge, where every drink is available with or without alcohol.

Uncle Wolfie’s is the best breakfast in town, with locations downtown and in Brewer’s Hill, serving frequently changing specials and staples like biscuits and gravy, plus addictive fries with more than a dozen homemade sauces.

Stay: The Pfister Hotel is Milwaukee’s Victorian grand dame, and a $20-million multi-phase renovation completed last year includes refreshed historic guest rooms with updated décor. Plus, it’s walkable to most spots mentioned above. 23rd floor lounge Blu has an excellent selection of bourbon and whiskey.