The newest, and most-talked about restaurant in Kansas City right now is Novel. Chef Ryan Brazeal, an alumnus of David Chang's Momofuku empire in New York City, has returned home to open Novel in a two-story house on the city's west side. Under a month old, the restaurant serves "novel American cuisine."
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It's a bar. It's a restaurant. It's a butcher (with nicely dry-aged meats for sale). It's also a fish farm (there's an indoor aquaponic tilapia farm downstairs in the basement). You've got to see it for yourself to understand how all of this could coexist under one roof. Kansas City's mercenary pastry chef Carter Holton has settled here for the while.
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James Beard Award-winning chef Debbie Gold left the American Restaurant earlier this year to open this casual concept in Leawood, Kansas. Red Door Grill is located just across the intersection from her former restaurant, the wildly popular, but now-closed, 40 Sardines. Serving lunch and dinner, Red Door Grill focuses on open-fire grilling. In its first two months, its menu has steadily expanded.

The second restaurant for James Beard Award-winning chef Colby Garrelts and his wife Megan is just over half a year old, and the crowds have not stopped flocking to it. Rye is located in the Mission Farms development in Leawood, Kansas, and people make the trip for Colby's hearty Midwestern plates of crispy-skinned fried chicken, steaks, and barbecued pork, and Megan's terrific pies.

The cult coffee roastery has arrived in Kansas City on the corner of Main Street and Westport Road. This one doubles as a letterpress print shop. Oddly Correct features seasonal espressos, and offers coffee education classes and tastings.
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Voltaire is a new restaurant in the West Bottoms on Genessee Street. Chef and owner Wes Gartner and his partner Jill Myers (of Moxie Catering) offer a menu that changes often. The long, beautiful bar remains intact, with a drink menu that includes an impressive list of cocktails, whiskeys, and beer.

The self-proclaimed "Sausage King of Kansas City" Dave Derr and his wife Jessica Rush can be found grilling sausages at their fire engine-red "wagon" around town this summer (mostly at the Overland Park Farmer's Market on Saturday mornings). Their artisanal sausages include beef franks, buffalo chicken sausage, spicy Italian, and cauliflower-walnut vegan sausages.