Here Are NYC’s 2024 James Beard Awards Restaurant and Chef Semifinalists

The James Beard Foundation announced on Wednesday its list of semifinalists for this year’s annual food awards. The awards, sometimes called the Oscars of the food industry, will be held in Chicago this year.

The list announced today will be narrowed down in the coming months. Next up is a shorter list of finalists announced on April 3. The winners in each category will be revealed at a ceremony on June 10. The America’s Classics Award, honoring “locally owned restaurants with timeless appeal,” will be announced in February.

The semifinalists include Superiority Burger, in the category of Outstanding Restaurant, and Double Chicken Please, up for Outstanding Bar. New restaurants, including Foul Witch, from the owners of Roberta’s Pizza, and Foxface Natural, in the East Village, are contenders for the Best New Restaurant award.

This is the Foundation’s third ceremony after an internal audit in 2021, which resulted in new protocols, including different ways of finding talent and new award categories. The awards were back in the spotlight last year, too, after one chef was disqualified from the category they were nominated for and another nominee was investigated for their personal posts on social media.

In 2023, New York chefs did not take home any awards in national categories — the first time that’s happened since the awards were first announced in 1991. New York finalists, including Dept of Culture, a contender for Best New Restaurant, and Cote, nominated for its wine program, were passed over for restaurants in other states. Junghyun Park, the co-owner of the Michelin-starred restaurant Atomix, took home the only recognition: He was named Best Chef, New York.

Here are the semifinalists in New York and New Jersey:

Best New Restaurant

• Foul Witch
• Foxface Natural
• Lita (Aberdeen Township, New Jersey)
• Tatiana by Kwame Onwuachi

Outstanding Chef

• Emma Bengtsson, Aquavit
• Dan Kluger, Loring Place

Outstanding Pastry Chef or Baker

• Eunji Lee, Lysée
• Camari Mick, The Musket Room

Outstanding Restaurateur

• Bryan Chunton and Pei Wei (Zaab Zaab and Zaab Zaab Talay)
• Ravi DeRossi, Overthrow Hospitality (Cadence, Etérea, Avant Garden, and others)

Outstanding Restaurant

• Superiority Burger
• The DeBruce (Livingston Manor, New York)

Outstanding Bakery

• Make My Cake
• Mel the Bakery (Hudson, New York)

Outstanding Bar

• All Night Skate
• Double Chicken Please

Outstanding Wine and Other Beverages Program

• Cote
• Waxlight Bar à Vin (Buffalo, New York)

Outstanding Hospitality

• Melba’s

Emerging Chef

• Fariyal Abdullahi, Hav & Mar
• Ryan Fernandez, Southern Junction (Buffalo, New York)

Best Chef: New York State

• Nasim Alikhani, Sofreh
• Mary Attea, Musket Room
• Ayo Balogun, Dept of Culture
• Clare de Boer, Stissing House (Pine Plains, New York)
• Doris Choi, Good Night (Woodstock, New York)
• Calvin Eng, Bonnie’s
• Aretah Ettarh, Gramercy Tavern
• Charles Gabriel, Charles Pan-Fried Chicken
• Efrén Hernández, Casa Susanna (Leeds, New York)
• Luis Herrera, Ensenada
• JJ Johnson, FieldTrip
• Telly Justice, HAGS
• Atsushi Kono, Kono
• Shaina Loew-Banayan, Cafe Mutton (Hudson, New York)
• Chris Mauricio, Harana Market (Accord, New York)
• Charlie Mitchell, Clover Hill
• Scarr Pimentel, Scarr’s Pizza
• Jeremy Salamon, Agi’s Counter
• Hillary Sterling, Ci Siamo
• Ed Szymanski, Lord’s

Best Chef: Mid-Atlantic

• Dane DeMarco, Gass & Main (Haddonfield, New Jersey)
• Nur-E Gulshan Rahman, Korai Kitchen (Jersey City, New Jersey)

Disclosure: Some Vox Media staff members are part of the voting body for the James Beard Foundation Awards.