Essential by Christophe began serving dinner on Sunday night a few weeks ago, making it the only restaurant in its high-priced class open seven nights a week.

Demand for seats left chef/owner Christophe Bellanca no other choice.

It’s not only the best restaurant on the Upper West Side — a neighborhood not known as a culinary nirvana — it’s my favorite French restaurant of any kind in New York since Daniel opened in 1999, if not since Le Bernardin opened in 1986. 6

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Less than three years after it opened amidst the pandemic’s lingering gloom, Bellanca has made Essential into one of the city’s premier dining venues — though you might not have heard much about it given how obsessed young foodies are with every eight-seat, no-reservations counter downtown and in Brooklyn.

There’s no

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