NYT Food Critic Sam Sifton's Best Meal was at Frankie's

has certainly seen its fair share of (deserved) admiration over the years. So it should come as no huge surprise that in his culminating article as the food critic of The New York Times, Sam Sifton declared his best meal on the job to have taken place at, you guessed it, Frankie's on Court Street.

It was in the garden of Frankies 457, on Court Street in Carroll Gardens, on a summer evening with my wife, my children and my brother. We had what everyone always has at Frankies: crostini and some romaine hearts, beets, cold rib-eye salad, cavatelli and sausage and brown butter, meatballs, braciola marinara. The kids hovered while the adults talked family over cold red wine, and a little breeze moved through the trees, and around us other people did the same.

There was bread as we needed it, water, more wine. The food was simple and elegant. The children behaved as they do when they are starving, and in love with what they are eating. Nothing was wrong. Everything was right. It would have been nice if it could have gone on forever.

Sifton hits Frankie's square on the head by describing the feeling of being there, and what the place does to you, even more so than the food itself.

Frankie's opened in 2004, and while maintaining the Carroll Gardens homebase, the Frankie's empire quickly grew. The two Frank's (Falcinelli and Castronovo) opened more locations and offshoots like and , published a cookbook and began a small food distribution arm. (The olive oil is as good as liquid gold.)

We like the at Frankie's the best. And the cocktails.

What's your favorite dish at Frankie's?