Restaurants are extensions of our offices and refuges from our tiny kitchens, many of which are barely functional. With respect, our best spots are not defined only by their cooks and their hosts and their servers; they are defined by us, the indefatigable regulars. For our tenth “Yesteryear” issue, we dove into the haunts and the joints, choosing the moments when individual scenes flourished. During the entire month of April, we shared nostalgic glimpses at New York’s restaurant scenes to tell the city’s social history. Keep reading for the latest “Who Ate Where” stories.

— By the Editors

Even the menu has not wavered in 40 years: the flavors of Moroccan eggs with spicy tomato sauce and the sides of merguez sausage; the lamb-shank tagine with a sauce of preserved lemon and olives, acidic and tangy. This restaurant is an oasis of memories.

“The rule was that this is where the brunchers and Joe Schmos could sit next to some very famous people and you wouldn’t bother them,” says Kat Robinson, who worked as a host. “The people of New York got it. They knew the rules.”

All month, Grub Street has been documenting New York’s past through its assorted restaurant scenes. The focus has been the people, but this is not to say the food was completely secondary. To cap off the series, we present 14 of the buzziest individual dishes in the city’s history, the culinary innovations that were delicious and sophisticated enough to create little scenes of their own.