The Best Restaurants in the West Village

"Sparsely decorated yet warm and inviting, with plenty of wood and exposed brick, Via Carota is the kind of place where you might run into celebrities, but where you’ll feel totally comfortable sitting next to them in jeans and a T-shirt. But they don't take reservations here, so the flip side of all that cool is that waits at peak times can push three hours. The menu is full of supremely delicious creations from Rita Sodi and Jody Williams, who between them run Buvette in NYC and Paris, I Sodi a couple blocks away, and Bar Pisellino across the street. Even the relatively straightforward vegetable dishes, like the carrots with yogurt and pistachios, are remarkable in their fresh simplicity. —John Wogan, contributor"