A food writer once warned that nostalgia is a risky thing for a restaurant to rely on: “It can get people in the door, but a restaurant has to be good as a restaurant, not just a set piece.” True enough. But in Manhattan, where roughly 6,400 restaurants compete for diners across just 22 square miles, even getting people in the door is no small achievement. If a familiar name can help, why not use it? Lately, several New York eateries have bet that it can. Once-iconic establishments are making headlines again by refurbishing and reopening. No stranger to nostalgia myself, I was curious to see whether the refreshed dining rooms, new kitchen teams and revised menus could match those of the original incarnations.

Babbo
» Batali-influenced Italian in a West Village townhouse

In 1998, Mario Batali’s Babbo opened and quickly became the hottest table in town. But in 2017, allegations of his misconduct cooled its popularity. Now with new ownership, the Greenwich Village restaurant reopened after an eight-month closure for renovations. The central staircase and classic rock soundtrack remain, as does Batali’s culinary imprint. At the helm is his former protégé, Michelin-starred chef Mark Ladner, who nods to the past with a few Batali dishes while introducing many of his own, notably the 100-layer lasagna. We saw it plated at the room’s center service table and delivered by the toque-topped Ladner himself. On the restaurant’s 10th day open, the dining room blasted Lynyrd Skynyrd and buzzed with eager patrons. Service was already a smooth operation. The meal began with rustic bread and a luscious lava-salt-sprinkled dip of mascarpone and Sicilian olive oil. The 49-day Thai-spiced minestrone was delicious. We also fell hard for the crispy-skinned dorade fillet, nearly plate-size and brightened by an herbaceous salsa verde. The “Sicilian lifeguard-style” calamari, pairing squid with similarly shaped calamarata pasta, was a playful Batali throwback. Bathed in a piquant red sauce, it was a reminder of the best of Babbo.

Babbo
110 Waverly Place. Tel. (212) 777-0303

Delmonico’s
» Definitive New York steakhouse where deals are done amid enduring glamour

America’s first fine-dining restaurant, Delmonico’s — not to be confused with the middling Italian-steakhouse chain — opened in 1837, just steps from Wall Street. This Gilded Age favorite, known for hosting Mark Twain and Abraham Lincoln, created the à la carte menu, the private dining room and dishes like eggs Benedict. Luminaries and power brokers are still drawn to the glamorous eatery. From a plush blue-velvet banquette under the restaurant’s historic mural, we surveyed the recently refurbished space: Contemporary bubble chandeliers lit the mahogany-walled dining room, a new spray-painted(!) mural adorned a wall, and Mel Brooks sat just a table away. A Delmonico’s Martini, made with top-shelf gin and vodka, a citron liqueur and white vermouth, was the perfect start. My favorite dishes were the Caesar salad, whose Little Gem leaves cupped loads of Parmesan, salty anchovies and tangy fish roe-based Myung Ran dressing, and the 10-ounce juicy filet mignon, a smaller alternative to the restaurant’s namesake, the classic 18-ounce Delmonico rib-eye. Our food arrived with little fanfare or fussy description, but the dishes spoke for themselves.

Delmonico’s
56 Beaver Street. Tel. (212) 381-1237

Le Veau d’Or
» A proudly anachronistic French restaurant on the Upper East Side

The New York Times gave it four stars in 1968. It later won an America’s Classics Award from James Beard in 2011, and Anthony Bourdain once called it a restaurant “that time forgot.” Le Veau d’Or is New York’s oldest French bistro and a sleeper hit on the Upper East Side — an “if you know, you know” kind of place. If you didn’t know it, you’d likely pass the tiny entrance on 60th Street without a second thought, unless you saw the line of people with hard-won reservations hovering by the door at 5 p.m. Since opening in 1937, it’s had just three owners, but it recently got a fourth: the team behind Le Rock and Frenchette. Thankfully, they’ve embraced its old-fashionedness. Waiters no longer wear tuxedos, but the service remains thoughtful and professional, and the cozy dining room is still full of character, with red-and-white-checked tablecloths over a black-and-red-tiled floor. Our server ran down the one-page prix fixe menu highlighting favorites like the dry-aged duck magret covered in black and green peppercorns and a cherry gastrique, and the calf liver, kidney and sweetbreads cooked in mustard sauce. We should have taken the cue and ordered one of those, because the black bass fillet layered with crispy potato coins in light cream sauce played it too safe. But the rosy leg-of-lamb slices with cannellini beans and a roasted tomato were delectable, as was the buttery chicken in a thick tarragon sauce.

Le Veau d’Or
129 East 60th Street. Tel. (646) 386-7608

Monkey Bar
» Midtown’s clubby art deco den for movers and shakers

Inside Hotel Elysée since 1936, Monkey Bar has weathered plenty of highs and lows over the decades. In its last heyday, Graydon Carter — the longtime Vanity Fair editor turned restaurateur — presided over a nightly party where the rich and famous hobnobbed beneath an art deco mural of Jazz Age icons. Eventually, the party wound down. Today, under new ownership, Monkey Bar has found a new lease on life. Reservations are once again hard to come by, the drinks are stiff, and the food is refreshingly untweezered (think: burgers, steaks, pastas). The mural is still there, as are the gleaming brass accents, mirrored pillars and sunken dining room with red leather booths, all bathed in a sexy amber glow. Over French martinis — the menu offers nine variations — we split a smoked whitefish Caesar salad and embraced the messiness of our subsequent choices: decadent lobster spaghetti drowning in a creamy cognac-infused sauce, followed by a prime beef French dip, a Monkey Bar staple, quartered and gooey with Gruyère and au jus. For my next visit, I already have my eye on the king crab rangoon.

Monkey Bar
60 East 54th Street. Tel. (212) 404-0365