Located between Harvard Square and Porter Square, this French restaurant looked to Cuba to spice up its traditional bistro fare. (Think: a mojito paired with steak frites.) Skip the formal dining room, which can feel like an extension to the Harvard faculty-dining hall—stuffed with tweed jackets, outdated sweater sets, and theoretical conversation. Instead, settle in at one of the few tables in the more relaxed, sometimes boisterous bar area, where the wallet-friendly menu includes a perfectly pressed Cubano and warm spinach salad with duck tamale.

Open daily 6 pm to 10 pm

Put simply, Clio's chef Ken Oringer is one of the best in America. His French-Asian hybrids (heavy on the French) astonish everyone, however jaded. Reading the menus clues you in: cassolette of lobster and sea urchin with yuzu and Japanese pepper; lacquered foie gras with sweet-and-sour lemon and bee pollen; roast suckling pig with fresh bacon-and-endive confit. Consequently, Clio, in the Eliot Hotel, can be one tough table to score, especially on a weekend. Book ahead.

Open daily 5:30 to 10 pm.

Since 1987, Gordon Hamersley has been steadily building a faithful fan club of buttoned-up foodies with his unpretentious, seasonal French cuisine. In a wood-beamed dining room, he serves up the requisite pâtés, cassoulets, and soufflés, and his roasted garlic chicken has achieved cult status. While Hamersley has won countless awards, from James Beard to Food & Wine, perhaps the biggest compliment is the success of the chefs he trained in his South End kitchen. Jody Adams is now the chef-owner of the equally renowned Rialto and Steve Johnson, formerly of the Blue Room (1 Kendall Sq.; 617-494-9034; www.theblueroom.net), resurfaced in November 2005 to great acclaim at the more Mediterranean-influenced Rendezvous in Cambridge's Central Square (502 Massachusetts Ave.; 617-576-1900; www.rendezvouscentralsquare.com).

Open Mondays through Saturday 6 to 10 pm, Sunday 11 am to 2 pm and 5:30 to 9:30 pm. Closed the first week of January.

While its neighborhood has seen better days (it's now blemished with lowbrow shops and shuttered department stores), arriving at Locke-Ober is like stepping into a time warp. This historic restaurant has been serving hearty New England fare to the cream of Boston's crop since 1875. Not much has changed as far as the decor and the menu are concerned—an overly attentive bow-tied staff picks up dishes like clams casino, JFK lobster stew, Boston scrod, and flaming baked Alaska at a polished-wood wraparound bar. What has evolved is the quality of the food. Boston chef Lydia Shire took over the kitchen in 2003 and added artistic presentation to the traditional gentleman's club cuisine. She slow roasts Long Island duck with tarragon and garlic, pairs it with crushed parsnips and brown butter–toasted sage leaves, then garnishes the dish with poached-and-candied Seckel pears and a drizzle of cassis duck sauce. Despite the hefty $62 price tag, everyone from deal-making businessmen to couples celebrating special occasions swear by the Lobster Savannah—two pounds of lobster meat sautéed with red and green peppers, mushrooms, and a sherry sauce before being returned to its shell.

Open Mondays through Fridays 11:30 am to 2 pm and 5:30 to 10 pm, Saturdays 5:30 to 10 pm.

In a small, second-story storefront overlooking bustling Hanover Street, Marco Cucina Romano is a welcome retreat from the kitsch (hanging grapes, carafes of Chianti) prevalent in so many North End Italian restaurants. In a more rustic approach, drippy candles illuminate a fireplace, large potted plants add a touch of country ambiance, and brick walls up the charm—although they can also raise the noise level a few decibels. With his seasonal menus, Marc Orfaly, also the chef-owner of another Boston favorite, Pigalle (75 Charles St.; 617-423-4944; www.pigalleboston.com), pays homage to the simplicity of Roman-style dishes with his clams oreganato, house-cured salumi, veal saltimbocca, and orecchiette with pancetta, peas, fava beans, and ramps. Portions tend toward the small side, but that just means more room for a cappuccino and the obligatory serving of homemade cannolis.

Open Tuesdays through Sundays 5 to 10 pm.

Like any enfant terrible, chef Joanna Chang had her dessert first: At bakery and café Flour, she seduced Boston with sticky buns and homemade "Oreos." Her follow-up is this kitschy Asian diner she opened with fiancé Christopher Myers. Unlike the conventional restaurants of Chinatown, Myers + Chang is pure rock 'n' roll, from its location in the perennially cool South End to its blasting soundtrack to its vest-wearing waiters who are quick to recommend a house-made aloe-yuzu soda. Almost all of the dishes on the Chinese-Thai-Vietnamese menu are served family-style, including spicy dan dan noodles, wok-roasted lemongrass mussels, and tea-smoked pork spare ribs. And most ring in under $15, which makes this place a big draw for the area's last few starving artists and budget-conscious young professionals, which means you'll have time to down a few sake bombs at the bar while you wait for a table.

Open Mondays through Saturdays 11:30 am to 11 pm, Sundays 11:30 am to 10 pm.

To experience what farm-to-table really means, come here during the growing season. Between April and November, almost all the vegetables chef Ana Sortun immaculately prepares in her kitchen are grown on her husband's organic farm in Sudbury, Massachusetts, some 20 miles outside the city. Sortun has also earned a devoted following among the artsy intelligentsia for a liberal use of exotic spices in her Arabic-influenced dishes: A sculpted disc of smoky eggplant purée dotted with pine nuts complements impossibly tender tamarind-glazed beef, and three pieces of spinach falafel sit on top of a flatbread spread thinly with tahini and topped with yogurt, beets, and mâche (cut lengthwise between the fried balls to make individual roll-ups). Like the food, the restaurant blends natural elements, such as wood and stone, with Middle Eastern accents (woven rugs serve as wall hangings). Book ahead when the weather is nice and ask for a table in the blooming garden.

Open daily 5:30 to 10 pm.

Talk about Boston chef success stories, and Jody Adams is bound to come up. With no formal training, she got a job working under the tutelage of Gordon Hamersley before making a name for herself at now-closed Michela's in 1990. Four years later, she became executive chef and co-owner at Rialto, a Mediterranean hot spot in the Charles Hotel, but it wasn't until 2007 that her vision for the restaurant finally took form. She purchased the restaurant outright, shuttered it for six weeks to give the moody space a much-needed facelift, and reworked the menu to focus on her bread-and-butter—intensely flavorful Italian cuisine. Now, single gerber daisies adorn the tables and flowing chiffon curtains lend some intimacy to the large dining room. The menu is equally uplifting: There might be a floppy lasagna dish (wide farro, semolina, buckwheat noodles woven between ricotta and mascarpone cheese, oven-dried tomatoes, and a basil-spinach-arugula pesto purée) or quail stuffed with polenta, currants, and pine nuts. Adams' signature dishes—classic grilled Wolfe's Neck sirloin, and grilled clams with andouille sausage—were spared the chopping block.

Open daily 5 pm to 10 pm.

When most of Boston's restaurants call it a night, this warm Provençal kitchen near the waterfront is just getting started. It's open for lunch, brunch, and dinner, but from 10 p.m. to 12:30 a.m., Wednesday through Saturday, the kitchen churns out smaller, lighter versions of its tried-and-true favorites (saffron butternut squash soup with lobster arancini, crisp rosemary pomme frites), as well as a few additions, such as burgers topped with smoked onions, blue cheese, and spicy aioli. The freshly baked breads—black olive, fig and anise, multigrain—are reason enough to go. Pick up a loaf, some house-made charcuterie, and a few classic French pastries at the restaurant's boulangerie for an impromptu picnic in the park across the street.

Open daily 11 am to 10 pm.