A Gordon Ramsay NYC Favorite Is The Only Restaurant Of Its Kind With A Michelin Star

As an award-winning chef and the owner of dozens of restaurants worldwide, Gordon Ramsay is the ultimate authority on Michelin star-quality food. The vociferous culinary celebrity has tasted foods all over the world — documenting his food exploits on TV shows like Nat Geo's "Gordon Ramsay: Uncharted" — and is not shy about sharing his favorite eats. In High Life's "Gastronomic guide to North America," Ramsay revealed some of his favorite foods and restaurants, including Cote, a Korean barbecue restaurant in New York's Flatiron district. The discerning chef described Cote as one of his favorite spots to visit in NYC, stating, "The service and design is on point, but what stands out is the quality of the meat. I was blown away with my first visit there and always suggest my team stop there if they're in NYC!"

Cote is presently the only Korean tabletop barbecue restaurant in the world with a Michelin star and the only Michelin-starred steakhouse in New York City. The highly-rated Korean steakhouse opened in June 2017 and received a Michelin star less than five months later. Cote's second location in Miami, which opened in 2021, was also awarded a Michelin star. Other locations include Singapore, as well as a Las Vegas location set to open in 2025. A unique feature of this meat lover's paradise is the smokeless tabletop grill that allows your server to cook your dry-aged, prime cuts of beef right in front of your eyes, resulting in the freshest, tastiest steak possible. 

Cote — a reference to a Korean word for flower (and also côte de boeuf, an expensive cut of beef in France) — was founded by Korean-born restaurateur Simon Kim. According to Kim (via Michelin), while American steakhouses specialize in rich, buttery steaks and filling sides, Cote highlights the lighter flavors of a Korean gogijib (steakhouse), serving fermented vegetables alongside the high-quality aged USDA prime beef. 

The carnivorous menu features a "Butcher's Feast" ($74 per person) consisting of four selected cuts of USDA prime and American wagyu beef, and sides including Gogi Cha (beef bone consommé), Ban-Chan (pickled veggies), scallion salad, egg soufflé, spicy kimchi stew, and vanilla soft serve with soy sauce caramel. For a special treat, Kim and executive chef David Shim offer a steak omakase ($225 per person), a curated chef's choice of beef including fresh cuts, prime aged cuts, and reserve cuts that could be aged for over 200 days. The elite cuts of beef are aged to perfection in-house in a 300-square-foot dry aging room. 

Besides the mouthwatering marbled steaks, Cote offers an extensive, James Beard-nominated wine list and a stylish, dimly lit cocktail bar with a speakeasy vibe beneath the restaurant, called Undercote.

Michelin stars are awarded to restaurants that meet specific criteria set by the Michelin Guide, including ingredient quality, balanced flavors, technical skill, consistency, and the chef's expression and creativity. The award is all about the food; the style or decor of the restaurant, as well as the service, is not taken into account. In determining an award, several judges — former restaurant and hospitality experts known as the Michelin Inspectors — eat at a restaurant (at different times to evaluate consistency) and make a decision as a group. 

Michelin stars are reassessed annually. Therefore, they can be taken away if the restaurant fails to meet the criteria the next year — just ask Gordon Ramsay, who once lost Michelin stars. Regardless of this blip, the famous chef's restaurants have received 17 Michelin stars over the course of his career, putting him in the top three for chefs with the most Michelin-starred restaurants. His eponymous London restaurant is often considered Ramsay's best and holds three Michelin stars.