Brooklyn Restos Earn 250 Spots in New Zagat Book

Brooklyn boasts 250 restaurants in the new 2012 Zagat survey book, the most spots ever in the borough that have made it to the guidebook, says the New York Daily News.

Local food lovers may be excited to learn that The Grocery in Carroll Gardens took the number 11 spot—the highest in the borough—for their exceptional service that makes “every diner feel like a VIP,” according to their Zagat rating.

“Brooklyn has more good restaurants than any other borough except Manhattan – and not by a small margin either,” founder Tim Zagat—who started the survey with his wife 32 years ago—told the paper.

According to Zagat, the book listed only 77 Brooklyn restaurants in 1998. He says that gentrification of the borough may be one of the reasons for the foodie renaissance.

“Whenever you have more middle class and upper middle class people living in the area, you have more good restaurants. And sometimes I think it’s the good restaurants that are causing them to come,” Zagat told the paper

Other Carroll Gardens, Cobble Hill and Boerum Hill haunts, including Lucali, Saul, Brooklyn Fare also broke the top 50. 

Of course, the list included perennial mainstays like Peter Luger’s in Williamsburg and DiFara’s in Midwood, but some Brooklyn newcomers, like Am Thai Bistro on Church Ave. in Ditmas Park squeezed in too. It opened in January and made the list for the first time.

And to compare Brooklyn’s foodie might with other outer boroughs: 117 Queens restaurants made this year’s guide, while Bronx had only 33 eateries and Staten Island had just nine restaurants.

Choosing a dinner spot just got harder.