2026's Most Exciting Upper West Side Restaurant Openings
The Upper West Side has a new appetite for dining out. Meet the restaurants making the neighborhood one of New York’s most exciting places to eat
Written by Natasha Wolff
La Pecora Bianca has landed across from Lincoln Center with its biggest New York outpost yet. The two-story, 250-plus-seat restaurant at 61 Columbus Avenue makes a splash with colorful custom interiors and a 50-foot lemon orchard mural stretching across both floors. The menu delivers the Italian-American crowd-pleasers that have made the restaurant a neighborhood staple, including Rigatoni Vodka and Whipped Ricotta Toast, alongside Lincoln Square exclusives. Look for mafaldine with roasted butternut squash, brown butter and crispy sage, trecce with braised short rib ragù and Parmesan and an autumn pizza topped with delicata squash, speck, ricotta, fontina and sage. There's also local burrata with stone fruit agrodolce, toasted pistachios and chestnut honey for a particularly inviting start. lapecorabianca.com
