Midtown Sacramento’s 8 best restaurants: Where to eat in the city’s hottest culinary district
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Midtown Sacramento has become the region’s hottest culinary district, a smorgasbord of innovative restaurants and bars from 16th Street to the Alhambra Boulevard border.
That impact is clear in The Sacramento Bee’s 2022 Top 50 Restaurants guide, published Nov. 19, in which midtown places took up eight spots.
While a certain prix-fixe special occasion restaurants lives on the cutting edge, several midtown places gently nudge cultural cuisines such as Persian, Mexican or Italian food into a modern light. All Top 50 restaurants are arranged alphabetically and left unranked; read more about that decision here.
Don’t see your favorite midtown restaurant on this list? Write it in here. We’ll add the five highest vote-getters from across the region to Top 50 guide in early December.
ADAMO’S
$$ — ITALIAN
Brick-walled and cozy, Adamo’s flies more under the radar than most midtown hotspots. Yet Sacramento native Polo Adamo has built his family restaurant into a homey spot that’s both interesting and approachable, lovingly old-school but understatedly modern. Customers understandably seek out Adamo’s housemade pastas (and pasta-making classes) for beauties like the four-cheese ravioli topped with Calabrian chili oil or pappardelle bolognese made with Niman Ranch beef, washed down with a glass of sangiovese from the family’s vineyard in Italy. They may not realize, though, that Adamo’s is one of the few local restaurants to make sturgeon steaks from Sacramento County’s renowned caviar farms, or that the fries that come with each sandwich are insanely good. Deep-fried once for a short time period and then frozen, they head back to the deep fryer upon being ordered and come out perfectly crispy on the outside with a fluffy interior.
2107 P St., Sacramento. (916) 440-9611.
CENTRO COCINA MEXICANA
$$$ — MEXICAN
The legacies of Diana Kennedy and Randy Paragary intertwine and live on at Centro, where pink-blue-orange decor and interesting monthly specials keep an established concept fresh. Chef de cuisine Fidel Lopez continues the blueprint laid out by Paragary Restaurant Group partner/executive chef Kurt Spataro 28 years ago: moderately elevated, well-executed food inspired by all of Mexico. Mole negro fans need to try Centro’s rendition on enchiladas oaxaqueñas, molotes de platano or manchamanteles, a pork shoulder dish with plantains, pineapple and a sweet housemade tamal. Stringy cochinita pibil in banana leaves bring the Yucatán Peninsula to mind, and more contemporary takes like coliflor asada swimming in pipian verde hit the mark as well.
2730 J St., Sacramento. (916) 442-2552.
LOCALIS
$$$$ — CALIFORNIAN
There’s a case to be made for Chris Barnum-Dann as Sacramento’s preeminent modern celebrity chef. Localis’ mohawked chef/owner parlayed victory in Season 1 of the Food Network cooking show “The Globe,” into appearances on nationwide talk shows, and was a James Beard Award semifinalist for “Best Chef: California.” Yet Barnum-Dann brings substance as well as style to Localis’ tasting menus, now a required seven or 12 courses instead of the à la carte options available pre-pandemic. The seven-course menu changes monthly, while the 12-course includes fan favorites such as fire-roasted octopus with caper-lemon polenta. Even drinkers should seriously consider eschewing wine for the city’s most inventive mocktail pairings: grilled peach and celery slushy to go with halibut en papillote, strawberry-rhubarb-red onion seltzer or a lemon-pesto-whey shot aside English pea risotto.
2031 S St., Sacramento. (916) 737-7699.
MAGPIE CAFE
$$$ — CALIFORNIAN
Young enough to not really be considered a farm-to-fork forefather but established enough to have lost some of its shininess, Magpie sometimes gets forgotten among the rest of the flock. Yet Ed Roehr and Janel Inouye’s 17-year-old midtown restaurant keeps quietly turning out seasonal, locally sourced winners, often with a fleck of inspiration from Italy or Japan. Dishes like the lemon chicken salad are as visually stunning as they are tasty, its colorful hunks of sweet beets, Brussels sprouts and thigh meat coming together with watermelon radish slivers and fennel dressing. The double-decker carrot cake cookies are so good that at least one local bride reportedly opted for them in lieu of a wedding cake, and the avocado chocolate mousse’s creaminess wins over even those averse to the large-pitted fruit.
1601 16th St., Sacramento. (916) 452-7594.
MAYDOON
$$$ — AFRICAN/MEDITERRANEAN
Idean Farid learned to cook at his father Mohammad’s since-sold Rancho Cordova restaurant, M. Sharzhad Fine Persian Cuisine. Now Idean runs the show at Maydoon, his new-age Persian restaurant in midtown, with his father as his right-hand man. It’s refreshing as heck to see a center-city restaurant fill its menu with definitively Persian dishes (tadigh! Gyehmeh! Kashkeh bodemjan!), and Maydoon’s bright dining room and dad’s wealth of experience shine through in the restaurant’s tremendous kebabs, while son’s youth and energy can be felt in the Maydoon bowl. Skip past the meaty protein choices for the super-spiced falafel, and enjoy the contrasting tastes and textures with basmati rice, pickled onions, diced cucumber and tomato and a tangy cilantro chutney.
1501 16th St., Suite 111, Sacramento. (916) 382-4309.
MULVANEY’S B&L
$$$$ — CALIFORNIAN
There’s no more Sacramentan restaurant than Bobbin and Patrick Mulvaney’s midtown joint. It’s a step back to the Sacramento of the 1990s and 2000s in some ways, a white-tablecloth institution with a strong wine list and resoundingly American food that gets lots of business from power dinners and private events. Yet as an early adopter and consistent booster of farm-to-fork dining, Mulvaney’s B&L turns over its menu daily to feature seasonal dishes such as a texturally balanced chicory salad with walnuts from Winters’ Sierra Orchards, ruby grapefruit and bleu cheese. Chef de cuisine Robb Venditti keeps that ever-rotating menu both approachable and innovative, making traditional palates happy while letting the region’s bounty shine through. A few dishes are constants, such as the city’s best pork chop, a hulking mass from Yolo County-based Bledsoe Meats with expertly-balanced muscle and fat. Adding in the Mulvaneys’ environmental consciousness and extensive charitable work, which won them the Sacramento Metro Chamber’s Sacramentans of the Year title in 2018, and you’ve got a restaurant worth supporting.
1215 19th St., Sacramento. (916) 441-6022.
PARAGARY’S
$$$ — CALIFORNIAN
It’s always a little hard to nail down what Paragary’s is — a bit French, a bit Italian, but with a longstanding emphasis on fresh produce and ample room for executive chef Kurt Spataro and chef de cuisine Wyatt Dufresne to play off other countries. Founded in 1983 by Randy Paragary, the late “godfather” of Sacramento’s restaurant scene, Paragary’s has avoided stagnation with a fresh approach and a 2015 remodel that gave it one of Sacramento’s best patios. The wood-burning oven fires out pizzas along with meatballs, chicken and mussels, and bright salads like the beet/satsuma/Belgian endive medley hit all the right notes. Try weekend brunch for a more economical option, or splurge on the mouthwatering Wagyu steak with crispy-shelled polenta at dinner.
1401 28th St., Sacramento. (916) 457-5737.
THE WATERBOY
$$$ — FRENCH
A favorite of legendary Sacramento gourmand Darrell Corti, The Waterboy is consistently spectacular and interesting. It’s built for an older generation but far from stuffy, a farm-to-fork originator full of old world French-Italian sensibility, wicker chairs and a charming patio. Veal sweetbreads are chef/owner Rick Mahan’s flagship dish, accompanied by mushrooms and bacon in a marsala sauce that softens the aggressive flavors that turn some off from offal. Pasta made in-house is as inventive as it is comforting, from pillowy gnocchi in a mushroom-eggplant bolognese to woven strozzapreti with sausage, chard and tomatoes. A bittersweet chocolate/olive oil cake topped with toasted oats makes for a nicely balanced dessert.
2000 Capitol Ave., Sacramento. (916) 498-9891.