Kisa

The name is short for kisa sikdang, a Korean drivers’ restaurant. It’s known as one of the first places to sell meat by the single portion. Koreans don’t really go expecting great quality, but in the years before Kisa opened, the real ones started gaining traction again due to mukbangers like Tzuyang (13.5 million subscribers) and Heebab (1.5 million).

A month after Kisa opened, GQ Korea published a map of nine Seoul drivers’ restaurants, and people were posting Kisa under its own Hangul hashtag: #뉴욕기사식당 (New York kisa sikdang). They like that the old CRT TV and wall fans make it look like it’s from the ’80s, and that the team imported a TeaTime vending machine to make coffee and misugaru lattes for free, the same way it was for drivers. When Kisa first opened, some people noted that it was missing donkatsu, a kisa sikdang staple, and four months later it was on the lunch menu.

Kisa made Eater’s best new restaurants in America in 2024 and the Times’ 100 Best two years running.