Dating Tips From Eater Co-Founders Ben Leventhal & Lockhart Steele

Tip 5: Go Somewhere Familiar

Lockhart: Ideally, you’ve been there before. Ben: Pravda is great because there are always tables, but it doesn’t feel empty. John Dory and Breslin, because Ken Friedman is really good at hiding tables in plain sight. Lockhart: BL, new Milk & Honey — or Attaboy — play for you here? Me: Would you agree that there could be some danger to taking a first date to a place where it’s like, your Cheers Bar? (Pravda, Cheers, Potato, Potah-toh.) I mean, don’t you want to be, on some level, on equal footing? Ben: you mean where you’re a regular? Me: Yeah, I dunno. I think there’s a fine line between being impressed when a guy walks in and knows the hostess and can get a table, etc., and being turned off. Lockhart: ah, good point. Ben: ok, so Chiara, that’s a great point. So, we know a gentleman who has a holding in a fair number of West Village restaurants and he used to use them frequently for low numbered dates. It’s sort of a style choice. If you want to be The Restaurant Guy, you could do that. Ben: It’s really how you want to come off. I certainly don’t think it’s a look everyone can pull off. [Photo via]