One of the nice parts of living and working in Manhattan is that there is so much you can do and improvise after work. We had a show at 8 PM from winning a lottery, so it was easy to meet up after work and look for something to eat. Pre-theater prix fixe menus are a nice thing. They are basically a small tasting menu that won’t fill your belly too much, and the price is reasonable. We ended up at Oceana here since we realized we were within its small pre-theater hours of 5-6 PM on Friday.

Kono has been something on my radar for quite some time. It’s been a bit since we’ve splurged quality yakitori, so I was able to snipe a reservation for a Saturday night out at 5:30 PM fairly quickly on Resy. Chef Atsushi “ATS” Kono was originally at Torishin, and after looking at the menu, I was excited to see what this experience brought. This restaurant focused on kappo-style yakitori omakase featuring organic Amish chicken and seasonable vegetables.

PizzArte is one of those casual Italian pizza-esque restaurants in the Midtown area. Their goal is to deliver the spirit of Naples with affordable costs. We ended up here after looking for a cheaper Italian restaurant in the area that also had lasagna since we had more expensive plans the next day. We were able to walk in without reservations on a Friday evening around 7:30 PM and were seated upstairs.

Chef’s Table at Brooklyn Fare is a renown three Michelin Star restaurant by Chef Cesar Ramirez. It’s inspired by Japanese cuisine with French technique, and the 13 course tasting menu tonight is focused on fish & shellfish with 1 meat course and 4 dessert courses. I was quite excited to come here since moving to NYC. This restaurant was always very difficult to get reservations, so it was great that we were able to when we wanted. This restaurant is currently rated number 61 out of 100 on the The World’s Best 50.

What’s an Italian restaurant in Midtown that didn’t require reservations at 6 PM on a Friday evening after work? This one. It’s very close to the Rockafeller area, right across the street from a food hall. There’s a small car with a ton of flowers coming out of it. You can’t really miss it. We were able to walk in pretty easily, and we were seated towards the front. Because this restaurant is not exactly super popular, the attention and seating was quite comfortable.

Ophelia is a cocktail bar located in Midtown East near 1st Ave and 50th. It’s located at the top of Beekman Tower. This was built in 1928, and it was originally known as the Panhellenic Tower. The bar and hotel originally served as a womens-only club and hotel space for Greek sororities. When you walk into the lobby of the hotel, take the middle elevator to the 26th floor for entrance. We did have to make reservations ahead of time, but they are pretty easy to procure weeks in advance.

We’ve been frequent shoppers at Murray’s Cheese for our normal night in eating cheese and charcuterie. This location in Long Island City also has a restaurant part of it. I’ve taken a few glances at the menu, and there were some individual things that caught my eye. Fortunately, it was a lazy Saturday, and it was raining. This would be the ideal night to try this place out. We were able to walk in without reservations at 4:30 PM on a Saturday afternoon.

We had yet another show to catch, so we decided to look around the Bryant Park area. I stumbled onto Charlie Palmer, and it had been on my list of steak places to try. What was nice about this place specifically is they offered a 2-course pre-theatre menu for $49 which included a starter and entree. If you wanted dessert, you would have to pay an additional $10. Lucky for us, we weren’t that hungry, so a 2-course meal sounded fine for us. The waiter mentioned that the portion size for either course was the same as if you ordered in peak hours.

Now that we’re back from Hawaii, we went to go see Sweeney Todd, a musical that was one of my favorites. Nearby, we decided to eat something quick and light, so we opted for izakaya. Sake Bar Hagi, according to their website, says it’s New York’s first authentic izakaya since 1985. I’m not sure what that really means, but we’ll find out. We arrived around 5:30 PM on a Saturday evening, and we were seated immediately.

Makahiki is a restaurant that is located on the first floor of the Disney Aulani resort. The restaurant actually serves breakfast and dinner at 2 different times, so this review will be for the dinner portion. Unlike breakfast, there was less of a crowd for dinner, so we were able to walk in with our reservations very quickly. We were seated in the outdoor section under the covered patio around 5:00 PM, which was when the sun started setting. Absolutely stunning.