The most anticipated restaurants of early 2016

What? You haven’t nailed down New Year’s Eve dinner and we’re already talking about 2016 restaurants? Sorry, that’s how the croissant crumbles. The first quarter of 2016 brings too many new restaurants to name – South Lake Union alone will be home to a boatload (pun intended) – but we’ve narrowed it down to our most anticipated, based on chef, cuisine, location, or all of the above.

Enjoy. And don’t stress too much about New Year’s Eve. Champagne drinking is our only dinner plan.

Copine, Ballard

From the dynamo couple behind Book Bindery, chef Shaun McCrain and Jill Kinney, this 60-seat restaurant in the Ballard Public Lofts & Market will celebrate refined American cuisine using French techniques. Architect Tom Kundig is leading the design of Copine, which means pal in French. The airy, light-filled space will include a chef’s table and bar program run by the celebrated Ruven Munoz. Set to open in late spring or early summer.

Sansei, Downtown

We are skeptical of big-name chefs opening up glitzy restaurants in our town. But, Sansei, a seafood and sushi resto opening across from Pike/Pine’s The Carlile Room, just might be a showstopper. It is Hawaiian chef-proprietor DK Kodama’s fifth restaurant (and first on the mainland), and he is no stranger to the Pacific Northwest. After studying engineering in Hawaii, he moved to Puget Sound in the late 1970s to work at Arnie’s and Mukilteo before settling down at Restaurants Unlimited. The menu, which is typically Pacific Rim-esque, will celebrate the vibrancy of the Pacific Northwest. Look for Sansei in the first quarter of 2016.

Cuidad, Georgetown

We like grilled meats and we cannot lie. That’s why this concept developed by buddies Matt Dillon and Marcus Lalario sounds so appealing to us. Imagine a massive charcoal-fired grill churning out kebabs, blackened seafood and vegetables with Middle Eastern, Korean, and Portuguese flavors. We want it to be cheap. We want it to play sinewy sitar music. We want it to be open now, but will have to wait until early spring at 12th Ave S and Bailey.

San Fermo, Ballard

Tim Baker and his son Sam West, both of Percy’s in downtown Ballard, are hard at work on the two-story buildout of this neighborhood-y Italian restaurant with a small menu that will include stuffed pasta, gnocchi, risotto, vegetarian lasagna and a chicken parmesan that we’re pretty excited about. But the most-anticipated part of this anticipated restaurant may be the building: a precious pair of adjoined, century-old Pioneer Houses down the street from Percy’s. They’ll serve dinner seven nights a week and on Sundays will open at noon for a Market Supper extending into the evening. Look for this beauty in early March.

Vestal, South Lake Union

Josh Henderson back in the kitchen? Yes. We don’t know much about the food at his upcoming restaurant at the corner of Westlake and Mercer, but we know Henderson will be cooking it. A recent preview dinner at Quality Athletics featured a first course of pickled goodies, a main course of sprouted lentils with mirepoix, chicken jus, charred carrot, and confited chicken and a dessert of butter-roasted apples and pears with toasted oat ice cream and maldon salt. Nuff said? Henderson is opening a slew of restaurants in 2016, but between the location and coal-fired hearth, we’re most jazzed about this one. Also a March opening.