Why Burdell in Oakland Is the Best Restaurant in America

To swing through the door of Burdell on a Sunday night feels like walking straight into a grandma’s sitting room from the 1970s. The space has a warm golden glow that radiates lots of ambers and pinks. You’re greeted by a collection of smiling elders, featured in framed family photos of mamas, aunties, and more. 

Take a seat at the avocado green bar, and a bartender rocking a floral apron will offer a cocktail named after one of them. How about the Gussie (a kind of pomegranate highball), or the Gertrude (sherry and spices on the rocks)? 

Welcome to the highly acclaimed Burdell, a restaurant that could only exist in Oakland. It won Food & Wine’s 2024 Restaurant of the Year after impressing our restaurant editor with its big “grandma energy.” 

I’ve swung back in, as the 2025 F&W Global Tastemakers panel of experts agreed. Burdell tops our list of the best restaurants to visit across America right now. More than 400 chefs, sommeliers, writers, and travel pros recommend a trip to Oakland if you love to eat and travel. And your first reservation should be at Burdell. 

Chef Geoff Davis has that quiet intensity from fine dining, having worked across the Bay Area and wine country, from Michelin-starred Cyrus to cool cocktail bar True Laurel. And yet, he’s often remarked on feeling like one of the few Black chefs in those kitchens. 

When Davis went to open his own restaurant, he reconnected with his heritage. He grew up in the center of California, in the agricultural region of the Central Valley, and named the restaurant after his maternal grandmother, Burdell, a lady who loved to have the whole family over for supper. 

While he’s digging into the slow-simmered nostalgia of soul food, Davis is also folding in local and seasonal produce. He’s the kind of chef who religiously shops at the farmers market several days a week. 

From that seat at the bar, you can watch friends and families hug and laugh into the dining room, including a baby who cheerfully kicked while being carried to his seat, on my visit. The fans are back to snack on the boiled peanuts, a labor of love simmered in miso and spices for eight hours. 

The enormous, head-on barbecue shrimp come drowned in an outrageously rich red gravy, with buttery-soft milk bread to chase it all around. Of course, don’t miss a reimagined classic with creamy chicken liver mousse and bits of crispy skin alongside a lacy and crisp cornmeal waffle. 

Especially on Sunday nights, the move might be the Family Dinner, which features four courses dropped down family-style, including fried petrale sole with hush puppies and greens. When the scene starts bumping, Davis himself might run out your plate of brown sugar cookies, still warm from the oven. 

Many dishes come on vintage Corelle plates trimmed in flowers and butterflies, and the check arrives in a mini Pyrex casserole with a couple of pieces of hard candy. One of the servers keeps singing along to Erykah Badu, which rolls on and on through the retro sound system, along with playlists of soul, funk, and hip-hop. 

Burdell has raked in awards and accolades, receiving a rave review from the San Francisco Chronicle, while Eater SF called it the “restaurant where we want to be regulars.” Davis was honored as a 2024 James Beard Award semifinalist for Best Chef: California, and Burdell slid into the Michelin Guide over the summer.

The restaurant is a must-visit in the destination celebrated for its incredibly diverse food scene. Many locals contend that the Bay Area’s best dining is in the East Bay, but this neighborhood of Temescal has seen many exciting flavors come from recent openings, like hand-rolled bagels at Poppy Bagels, natural wine at Snail Bar, and the hot dog and martini scene at Tallboy. 

For his part, Davis has lived in Oakland for more than a dozen years, and says he couldn’t imagine opening his restaurant anywhere else. 

To uncover the best food and drink experiences for travelers, Food & Wine polled over 400 chefs, travel experts, food and travel writers, and wine pros from across the globe for their top culinary travel experiences. We then turned the results over to our Global Advisory Board, who ranked the top nominees in each category. For the full list of all 165 winners, visit foodandwine.com/globaltastemakers.