This week’s issue of New York includes a package on status symbols: ultra-specific things like the coveted ingredient for locavore chefs, the natural wine for young sommeliers, and the restaurant seats for those who want to be seen at Estela and the Polo Bar. For the latter, Grub cast a wide net, asking staffers, high-profile regulars, and restaurant insiders for intel on the most coveted tables at places like Charlie Bird, the Spotted Pig, and Nobu. Here are the findings:
Estela
The Table: No. 61, the one in the far back nook by the kitchen and the wines. It’s where Barack and Michelle Obama sat when they dined here one year ago.
The Spotted Pig
The Table: B3, the first-floor booth between the kitchen and main window. “We also call it the BC booth,” says Pig owner Ken Friedman, “because it’s where Bill Clinton sat in the first week we were open and still requests to sit there 12 years later.” He also points to tables 50 through 54 in the “lounge” on the second floor (around the corner and to the left from the stairs) as status seats, and the not-so-secret third-floor private room is frequented by Beyoncé and Jay Z.
Maison Premiere
The Table: The heart-shaped booth in the rear left corner. “It’s my all-time favorite table in New York City and a very coveted spot,” says food writer and Maison regular Jordana Rothman.
Carbone
The Table: The far back corner booth. “It’s that round table, tucked into the corner to the side of the kitchen doors,” explains Kate Krader, Food & Wine’s restaurant editor. “I feel like it’s always a dolce vita situation there anyway, especially sitting in that corner.”
Nobu
The Table: No. 44. It’s held for co-founder Robert De Niro every day until his office calls and asks the restaurant to release it.
The Polo Bar
The Table: The side nooks off the center of the room. As one well-connected diner explains, there’s a pecking order: “The middle banquettes go to notable guests, but not necessarily A-listers. A-listers sit in one of two side nooks, off the center of the room, where there are good views and a bit more privacy. The far ends of the room are Siberia.”
The Dutch
The Table: The round booths in the dining room to the left of the entrance. “If someone gets seated at one of them that I don’t know, my first move is to the host stand to ask, ‘Who are they?’” says Chad Walsh, the restaurant’s beverage manager. “Beyond the fact that they’re super luxurious, they’re also intimate enough to have a proper conversation. Also, especially when the weather’s nice and all the windows are open, the corner table (right corresponding to the corner of Prince and Sullivan streets) is pretty baller. One of our biggest VIPs doesn’t sit anywhere else.”
The Breslin
The Table: No. 40. “It’s the booth closest to the kitchen, and it’s hands down the VIP table in the house,” says a former staffer from the restaurant. “It’s the most private, particularly because you can close the curtains.”
Seamore’s
The Table: The two- to three-top nook, directly to the left of the entrance. “It’s where regulars and VIPs can usually be found, particularly Chernow’s wife and newborn baby,” says a staffer.
Minetta Tavern
The Table: The booths along the back wall of the second dining room (the one connected to the kitchen). They make the bustling restaurant feel tiny and intimate, and it’s not strange to see many, many celebrities perched there on any given night.
Balthazar
The Table: The three booths against the east wall (in the No. 60s). “These at Balthazar are a classic status perch,” one regular insists. But two other industry insiders say that the power table is the center round baguette, which has a view of the entire room.
Charlie Bird
The Table: The two-top at the top of the stairs, to the right. “It’s so fun and casual, and there’s always a server running up or down the stairs to fill your wine glass and keep going,” Krader says. “Such good energy sitting right there.” Another regular says that this table is held every day for the guests of the owners.
Má Pêche
The Table: The booth by the kitchen, under Miguel Calderón’s Bad Route painting. The tip comes courtesy of a former staffer.
Buvette
The Table: The communal table in the back room. “It’s beneath the Warren Muller light sculpture, and it’s really magical,” Rothman advises.
Keens
The Table: The center table that faces the Alexander Pope oil painting of a tiger in the Lamb’s Room. “With a mutton chop in one hand and filthy dirty martini in the other, that is the ultimate New York City luxury,” says restaurant consultant Eva Karagiorgas.
Barbuto
The Table: The table in the dining room’s southwest corner (where the two garage doors meet). “With its round shape in a sea of sharp corners, its perfect positioning, and a hint of privacy in the midst of all the action, it offers a view of everything — the open kitchen, the graceful flow of service, the high energy of the bar,” says Jen Davidson, the restaurant’s general manager.
Barbuto
The Table: The table in the dining room’s southwest corner (where the two garage doors meet). “With its round shape in a sea of sharp corners, its perfect positioning, and a hint of privacy in the midst of all the action, it offers a view of everything — the open kitchen, the graceful flow of service, the high energy of the bar,” says Jen Davidson, the restaurant’s general manager.
Jean Georges
The Table: Nos. 3 and 5, the two tables in private nooks in the main dining room.
Dirty French
The Table: The booth in the back that’s closest to the sommelier station. A former staffer explains: “The VIP tables for two or more people tend to be in the very back of the room, under the artwork, with the best one near the sommelier station, in an area where the vents do not project air directly on the guests (if you find yourself in that scenario … you have a bad table). For VIP couples having a romantic evening, the prized tables are the two deuces that are partial banquet that begin and end the crescent shape in the middle of the room — these two tables allow the guests to sit side by side rather than across from one another. If you find yourself at a table that has heavy foot traffic from other patrons, you are not in a VIP section.”
The Cecil
The Table: No. 17, the corner table on the left, right above the stairway leading down to the kitchen. “It’s where the celebs usually sit, from Alicia Keys to Cicely Tyson to Chris Rock, and also the neighborhood regulars,” a staffer says. “It has a comfortable wraparound banquette that seats up to six, and you feel like you’re in the middle of the energetic room, yet it’s still intimate.”
