Best places for birthday dinner in charlotte

From spicy fried chicken sandwiches to natural wines, here’s what’s hot in Charlotte

by Updated Oct 14, 2022, 8:22am EDT

View as Map

More often than not, tipsters, readers, friends, and family of Eater have one question: Where should I eat right now? What are the new restaurants? What’s everyone talking about? Enter the Eater Heatmap, which will change continually to highlight the spots crowds are flocking to at the moment or generating a big buzz. Folks are asking, “Have you been yet?” Try one of these new spots in Charlotte today.

Read More

The group behind the Vintage Whiskey and Cigar Bar and the Wine Loft brings a new Italian experience to NoDa. Figo36 offers a wide selection of burrata setups, housemade pastas, and pizzas made to order.

• Open in Google Maps

Caviar, potato chips, and a killer natural wine list? What more do you need? Bar à Vins is the hip new NoDa wine bar from sommelier Jeff Kellogg with a little help from Katy Kindred (of Davidson’s Kindred) who designed the interiors. All the cool kids in Charlotte will be there.

• Open in Google Maps

Ever Andalo is pleasing palates with Italian comfort. Owners Jeff Tonidandel and Jamie Brown have spent extensive amounts of time in Italian and wanted to share those experiences with Charlotte. They import many of the ingredients to offer items like Calabrian chilie parpadelle, fresh focaccia, and fettuccine all’Amatriciana.

• Open in Google Maps

Kerrel and Nkem Thompson used their at-home time during the pandemic to perfect the East Coast-style pizzas they ate while living in Chicago. After hosting a series of pizza pop-ups in their home and a residency at Bond Street Wine Company, they opened a permanent location with a pick-up window in December 2021. Crowds now regularly gather on the street in front of Bird Pizzeria, with lines forming even before it opens. 

• Open in Google Maps

Chefs Oscar Johnson and Daryl Cooper opened Jimmy Pearls in 2020, but went on to pursue the food truck life in 2021, but now they are back at Uptown’s Market at 7th Street to bring their famous Uncle Gene’s fish sandwich, shrimp rolls, and other Virginia tidewater cuisine to the masses.

• Open in Google Maps

The Royal Tot is a two-story tropical oasis soaked in beach cocktails. Claiming the largest rum collection in Charlotte, the Royal Tot features over 100 different types of rum with almost two dozen lush creations on the drink menu. Food includes lomi lomi, coffee-rubbed pork shoulder with pineapple salsa, champagne ice cream, and more.

• Open in Google Maps

No need to drive to Davidson for crispy chicken sandwiches, fluffy doughnuts, or crispy rice salads from Milkbread. Davidson duo Joe and Katy Kindred (of acclaimed restaurant Kindred) started making these items during COVID to make takeout easy, and the idea was so popular that the owners decided to make it a permanent restaurant. The second location in Plaza Midwood is adorably housed in a former Dairy Queen.

• Open in Google Maps

Vinyl (as in record; there’s an entire wall of them behind the bar) embodies the notion that music brings the people all together. To be sure, it is the rare bar in South End that attracts more than just the recent college graduate crowd that has come to define the neighborhood, and it has been standing-room only nearly from the moment it opened for business. One might chalk that up to Vinyl’s prime location, nestled between Vana and Wooden Robot Brewery on the corner of Tryon and Summit, but to do so would be to discount entirely the assured hands of the industry veterans who have converged to create something so thoroughly of the moment that connects almost immediately with anyone who visits. (In point of fact, when have banker bros, Tinder dates, influencers, and LGBTQ friends of a certain age ever been able to sit down, have a drink, and acknowledge that they have so much in common?) On the food menu, the garlic fries in particular are delicious, even startlingly so, and no that’s not the “You Only Get One Shot” talking. Served straight from the tap, that drink is Frenet Branca infused with coffee from local favorite Pepperbox Doughnuts, and despite the name, it is perfectly OK to have two.  — Timothy DePeugh

• Open in Google Maps
• Foursquare

Buzzy new restaurant Para sits in the South End neighborhood with a hip dining room and a small plate menu leaning heavily on seafood and Asian influences. Chef Alex Verica, formerly of Dot Dot Dot and the Stanley, says that he wanted the menu to incorporate as many local farmers as possible, while focusing on “a more global approach to the overall menu.” Items range from lobster toast with caviar to wagyu beef tartare with caviar to milk bread with foie gras, peanut butter, and jam. It’s an indulgent menu that’s sure to make a few rounds with the flashy Instagram crowds and folks looking to make it rain for a lobster shooter.

• Open in Google Maps

Yunta offers Nikkei cuisine in a hip, modern setting. Nikkei food is Peruvian ingredients — tropical fish, quinoa, aji amarillo peppers — molded by Japanese techniques. Multiple chefs cite the modern preparation for ceviche as particularly indicative of the Nikkei style. And Yunta offers plenty of ceviche, along with pisco sours, shrimp croquettes, tostones, and more.

• Open in Google Maps

Prime Fish chef Robin Anthony recently added an extension to his sushi business with Omakase Experience, and it’s been booking up nightly. With only six seats in the dining room, reservations go fast. For $300, customers receive 16 courses of Edomae-style omakase — Anthony claims he is perhaps the only chef offering this style in North Carolina. Edomae style involves treating the fish (whether it be brined, cured, or aged) to bring out extra umami flavors.

• Open in Google Maps

The owners of Havana Carolina Restaurant & Bar in Concord have a new fine dining Cuba restaurant in Charlotte named El Puro. The space is fun and energetic with live music and plenty of neon lights. The menu has all the classics, from paella to ropa vieja to croquetas.

• Open in Google Maps

Figo36 Modern Italian + Wine Bar

The group behind the Vintage Whiskey and Cigar Bar and the Wine Loft brings a new Italian experience to NoDa. Figo36 offers a wide selection of burrata setups, housemade pastas, and pizzas made to order.

• Open in Google Maps

Bar à Vins

Caviar, potato chips, and a killer natural wine list? What more do you need? Bar à Vins is the hip new NoDa wine bar from sommelier Jeff Kellogg with a little help from Katy Kindred (of Davidson’s Kindred) who designed the interiors. All the cool kids in Charlotte will be there.

• Open in Google Maps

Ever Andalo

Ever Andalo is pleasing palates with Italian comfort. Owners Jeff Tonidandel and Jamie Brown have spent extensive amounts of time in Italian and wanted to share those experiences with Charlotte. They import many of the ingredients to offer items like Calabrian chilie parpadelle, fresh focaccia, and fettuccine all’Amatriciana.

• Open in Google Maps

Bird Pizzeria

Kerrel and Nkem Thompson used their at-home time during the pandemic to perfect the East Coast-style pizzas they ate while living in Chicago. After hosting a series of pizza pop-ups in their home and a residency at Bond Street Wine Company, they opened a permanent location with a pick-up window in December 2021. Crowds now regularly gather on the street in front of Bird Pizzeria, with lines forming even before it opens. 

• Open in Google Maps

Jimmy Pearls

Chefs Oscar Johnson and Daryl Cooper opened Jimmy Pearls in 2020, but went on to pursue the food truck life in 2021, but now they are back at Uptown’s Market at 7th Street to bring their famous Uncle Gene’s fish sandwich, shrimp rolls, and other Virginia tidewater cuisine to the masses.

• Open in Google Maps

The Royal Tot

The Royal Tot is a two-story tropical oasis soaked in beach cocktails. Claiming the largest rum collection in Charlotte, the Royal Tot features over 100 different types of rum with almost two dozen lush creations on the drink menu. Food includes lomi lomi, coffee-rubbed pork shoulder with pineapple salsa, champagne ice cream, and more.

• Open in Google Maps

Milkbread

No need to drive to Davidson for crispy chicken sandwiches, fluffy doughnuts, or crispy rice salads from Milkbread. Davidson duo Joe and Katy Kindred (of acclaimed restaurant Kindred) started making these items during COVID to make takeout easy, and the idea was so popular that the owners decided to make it a permanent restaurant. The second location in Plaza Midwood is adorably housed in a former Dairy Queen.

• Open in Google Maps

Vinyl

Vinyl (as in record; there’s an entire wall of them behind the bar) embodies the notion that music brings the people all together. To be sure, it is the rare bar in South End that attracts more than just the recent college graduate crowd that has come to define the neighborhood, and it has been standing-room only nearly from the moment it opened for business. One might chalk that up to Vinyl’s prime location, nestled between Vana and Wooden Robot Brewery on the corner of Tryon and Summit, but to do so would be to discount entirely the assured hands of the industry veterans who have converged to create something so thoroughly of the moment that connects almost immediately with anyone who visits. (In point of fact, when have banker bros, Tinder dates, influencers, and LGBTQ friends of a certain age ever been able to sit down, have a drink, and acknowledge that they have so much in common?) On the food menu, the garlic fries in particular are delicious, even startlingly so, and no that’s not the “You Only Get One Shot” talking. Served straight from the tap, that drink is Frenet Branca infused with coffee from local favorite Pepperbox Doughnuts, and despite the name, it is perfectly OK to have two.  — Timothy DePeugh

• Open in Google Maps
• Foursquare

Para Charlotte

Buzzy new restaurant Para sits in the South End neighborhood with a hip dining room and a small plate menu leaning heavily on seafood and Asian influences. Chef Alex Verica, formerly of Dot Dot Dot and the Stanley, says that he wanted the menu to incorporate as many local farmers as possible, while focusing on “a more global approach to the overall menu.” Items range from lobster toast with caviar to wagyu beef tartare with caviar to milk bread with foie gras, peanut butter, and jam. It’s an indulgent menu that’s sure to make a few rounds with the flashy Instagram crowds and folks looking to make it rain for a lobster shooter.

• Open in Google Maps

Yunta

Yunta offers Nikkei cuisine in a hip, modern setting. Nikkei food is Peruvian ingredients — tropical fish, quinoa, aji amarillo peppers — molded by Japanese techniques. Multiple chefs cite the modern preparation for ceviche as particularly indicative of the Nikkei style. And Yunta offers plenty of ceviche, along with pisco sours, shrimp croquettes, tostones, and more.

• Open in Google Maps

Omakase by Prime Fish

Prime Fish chef Robin Anthony recently added an extension to his sushi business with Omakase Experience, and it’s been booking up nightly. With only six seats in the dining room, reservations go fast. For $300, customers receive 16 courses of Edomae-style omakase — Anthony claims he is perhaps the only chef offering this style in North Carolina. Edomae style involves treating the fish (whether it be brined, cured, or aged) to bring out extra umami flavors.

• Open in Google Maps

El Puro Cuban Restaurant

The owners of Havana Carolina Restaurant & Bar in Concord have a new fine dining Cuba restaurant in Charlotte named El Puro. The space is fun and energetic with live music and plenty of neon lights. The menu has all the classics, from paella to ropa vieja to croquetas.

• Open in Google Maps

Related Maps

• 8 Spots for Sushi in Charlotte, North Carolina
• 15 Vital Weekday Breakfast Spots To Know in Charleston
• 11 Hottest Restaurants in Asheville Right Now