Borgo
Borgo bakes its anelletti into a timballo, a pasta pie of ring noodles under a tomato sauce Willa Moore calls acidic and just a touch sweet.1
Why go
Lee Campbell runs the wine list here, and the James Beard Foundation named her Outstanding Professional in Beverage Service in 2026.5 Matthew Schneier's advice for a table follows from that: order the glazed sweetbreads if you see them, and likewise whatever bottle wine director Lee Campbell recommends.
4 The kitchen shops across Italy rather than settling in one region, so a Milanese vitello tonnato sits beside Roman puntarelle and wood-fired fennel sausage with lentils.4 Tarlow opened Diner by the Williamsburg Bridge in 1998 and wrote a cookbook in 2016 with Anna Dunn and Scarlett Lindeman whose title line was Cook it until you understand
; Ligaya Mishan hears that instruction in the food here.3
Order this / avoid
- Order: the chitarra integrale, clams under a shower of bottarga. Moore calls it
the perfect balance to the timballo, so consider this your official pasta order.
1 - Order: the fried delicata squash, drizzled with honey, calabrian chili oil and pecorino.1
- Order: the veal tonnato, which is Dominique Roy's dish here.2
- Avoid: arriving for a bar seat before the doors open. Walk-ins at the ten-seat bar and the three bar tables start in the early evening.1
What locals & experts say
- Willa Moore, The Infatuation (3 November 2025), rating it 8.6:
This is an elegant restaurant. A grown-up restaurant. A restaurant for which we'd transfer three trains, and where we'd order a whole bottle of wine.
1 - Matthew Schneier, Grub Street (10 December 2025): Tarlow codified Brooklyn cooking at Diner and Marlow & Daughters, and then,
Surprise: His best restaurant is in Manhattan.
4 - Ligaya Mishan, The New York Times (11 May 2026): two stars at the paper's last review, and the warmest line in her hundred.
Nowhere else do I so yearn to be a regular.
3 - Dominique Roy, Eleven Madison Park, in The Relisher (4 August 2026):
the veal tonnato (thin veal with a tuna-aioli style sauce) is one that I love, and after that, everything you order is a great version of it: a delicious chicken, an amazing salad, all the pastas are so, so good.
2 He also named the lasagna as a recent addition and the hanger steak, both in August 2026.
Good to know
- Booking: reservations open online three weeks ahead.1
- Walking in: Roy says it
is always busy, but you can usually still walk in.
2 - The tables: far enough apart to hold a conversation, which is the thing Moore names first about the room.1
Verdict
should-visit — Lee Campbell won Outstanding Professional in Beverage Service at the 2026 James Beard Awards, so order a bottle on her advice rather than a glass. The timballo di anelletti is the plate to build a table on, and the chitarra under bottarga is the pasta to put beside it. I have not found a published price for a meal here.