These are the 25 best restaurants in the Boston area right now, according to a new list

BOSTON — The New York Times this week published its list of the 25 best restaurants in Boston and nearby communities.

The Times’ Kevin Pang, Priya Krishna, and Brian Gallagher have been highlighting their favorite restaurants in cities across the United States in their “Where to Eat” series.

They recently named their favorite spots across the Boston area, including seafood, Italian, Vietnamese, and Peruvian eateries, among an array of other cuisines.

Pang, Krishna, and Gallagher noted in their list, “As always, we pay for all of our meals and don’t accept free items.”

The top 25 restaurants were named as follows:

Bagelsaurus, Porter Square, Cambridge: Bagels

“Fresh from the oven, they bear a chewy and crackly crust with an airy, open interior, like a warm circular baguette,” Pang wrote of the bagels.

Bánh Mì Ba Lẹ, Dorchester, Boston: Vietnamese, sandwiches

“At Bánh Mì Ba Lẹ, the sheer quantity of Vietnamese groceries, pastries, dessert drinks, noodle salads, and hot prepared foods is an overwhelming sight,” Pang wrote of the eatery.

Bar Vlaha, Brookline: Greek

“This is Greek cooking with more rustic intentions, with red wine, beef cheeks, and prunes marrying for hours inside clay pots,” Pang wrote of the eatery.

Belle Isle Seafood, Winthrop: Seafood

“Belle Isle Seafood — essentially a waterfront warehouse with views of arriving flights at Logan International Airport — has clearly battered and deep-fried many tons of haddock, scallops and onion rings,” Pang wrote of the eatery.

Celeste, Union Square, Somerville: Peruvian

“They say that first, you eat with your eyes. Even before a single dish hits the table at Celeste, the surrounding visuals prime you with expectations,” Pang wrote of the eatery.

Comfort Kitchen, Dorchester, Boston: African Diaspora

“Here, the owners Biplaw Rai, who is from Nepal, and Kwasi Kwaa, from Ghana, want to illustrate just how connected food traditions are, through ingredients that have traveled across continents, either through forced migration or trade routes,” Krishna wrote of the eatery.

Cutty’s, Brookline Village, Brookline: Sandwiches

“Most sandwiches fall into that midzone of expectations, somewhere between acceptable and halfway decent. To stumble upon a spectacular sandwich is rare, which makes Cutty’s a unicorn,” Pang wrote of the eatery.

Field & Vine, Union Square, Somerville: New American

“Field & Vine reveals itself as a restaurant in an industrial space slowly being reclaimed by nature. Wisteria and grapevines twist into a sculptural bramble that hangs overhead, as if about to swallow the exposed ductwork, and everywhere there is greenery and candlelight,” Pang wrote of the eatery.

Giulia, Porter Square, Cambridge: Italian

“Giulia, known for its exceptional handmade pastas, can claim four dishes beloved by the Boston dining cognoscenti: the wild boar pappardelle, bucatini all’amatriciana, warm semolina cakes, and pistachio gelato,” Pang wrote of the eatery.

Mahaniyom, Brookline Village, Brookline: Thai

“What makes Thai cooking alluring is that its sweet-sour-salty-spicy elements are so often pushed thrillingly up the dial. When those assertive flavors are parceled out onto small plates and spread over many courses — as they are at Mahaniyom — a meal turns Technicolor,” Pang wrote of the eatery.

Mooncusser, Back Bay, Boston: Tasting menu

“How many tasting-menu restaurants would serve a straight-up grilled cheese sandwich? Mooncusser does, and it’s playful, unexpected moves like this that make its multicourse dinners far less daunting,” Pang wrote of the eatery.

Ming Seafood Restaurant, Quincy: Cantonese, dim sum

A rule of thumb for dim sum restaurants: Bigger is often better. For in-the-know customers, crowds waiting for tables in a large banquet hall is a validating sight, and an expansive menu demonstrates a kitchen’s confidence. Ming Seafood Restaurant is big in all those ways,” Pang wrote of the eatery.

Neptune Oyster, North End, Boston: Seafood

“Neptune is among the highest versions of the oyster-bar form — pressed-tin ceilings, a marble bar, iced beds of bivalves and crab claws — but it is also more,” Gallagher wrote of the eatery.

Nightshade Noodle Bar, Lynn: French Vietnamese

“Post-lockdown, the chef Rachel Miller zigged when most others zagged: She guessed that guests yearning for adventurous cooking would be receptive to a French-Vietnamese-Southern tasting menu. Her gamble paid off,” Pang wrote of the eatery.

O Ya, Downtown Boston, Omakase sushi

“Like all great omakases, a night at O Ya is more than the sum of its parts: It’s the crescendos and countermelodies that weave between courses,” Pang wrote of the eatery.

Pammy’s, Central Square, Cambridge: New American

“Pammy’s was misinterpreted as the funky Italian spot between Harvard and Central Squares. But Pammy’s is no one-hit wonder. Here’s a restaurant where a starter plate is bread baked with flour milled in the kitchen each morning,” Pang wrote of the eatery.

Row 34, Fort Point (also other locations), Boston: Seafood

“It smokes, cures and pâtés a variety of seafoods, it makes saltine crackers in-house, and lobsters — caught by the chef Jeremy Sewall’s cousin and his son — land on plates within 48 hours of leaving the ocean,” Pang wrote of the eatery.

Sarma, Winter Hill, Somerville: Mediterranean, Global

“If you’d like to label the chef Cassie Piuma’s cooking as Mediterranean fusion, fine, but it sells short how well her cross-cultural mash-up at Sarma often works,”

Sofra Bakery and Cafe, Cambridge: Turkish, Lebanese and Greek

“Come early and order everything. That’s the appropriate way to experience Sofra, whose menu tours Turkey, Lebanon, and Greece, and whose flavor combinations are singular,” Krishna wrote of the eatery.

Sumiao Hunan Kitchen, Kendall Square, Cambridge: Hunanese

“From the outside looking in, you might think a place with this vibey coastal aesthetic would serve crab cakes and flatbread, but the restaurant’s adherence to traditional Hunanese cooking is without compromise,” Pang wrote of the eatery.

The Eaves, Union Square, Somerville: Vietnamese

“There are several remarkable things about the Eaves, beginning with the location. Shoehorned inside a 550-square-foot storage closet at Bow Market, the space was seductively transformed by the owners, Vincenzo Le and Duong Huynh,” Pang wrote of the eatery.

Tonino, Jamaica Plain, Boston: Italian

“The pasta- and pizza-focused menu put together by the chef and owner, Luke Fetbroth, is taut and efficient. His best trait seems to be taking a handful of ingredients and doing as little to them as possible,” Pang wrote of the eatery.

Toro, South End, Boston: Spanish

“The Ken Oringer restaurant universe stretches from Japanese to Italian to wine bars, but his South End tapas joint Toro — 20 years on — may be the most beloved,” Pang wrote of the eatery.

Via Cannuccia, Dorchester, Boston: Roman

“Named for the street where he grew up, Via Cannuccia might be the closest Boston gets to a true Roman trattoria. The lengths to which Mr. Quaresima goes to showcase his corner of Italy are impressive,” Pang wrote of the eatery.

Yume Ga Arukara, Porter Square, Cambridge: Udon

“Yume Ga Arukara makes just one thing and makes it well: udon, the thick Japanese wheat flour noodles,” Pang wrote of the eatery.

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