Veritas Takes the No. 2 Spot

Josh Dalton—the adventurous restaurateur who launched edgy Veritas Tavern in Delaware a decade ago, where he employed a young Avishar Barua (long before Barua became a Top Chef contestant and red-hot restaurateur himself)—is not one to rest on his laurels.

Actually, Dalton—working with his brainy, talented team at the refined Downtown rebirth of modernist Veritas—is more liable to transform his laurels into a tincture emulsified in heritage pork fat that blots a reimagined pozole topped with crispy hominy flakes.

Put another way, even after receiving high praise for stellar dishes from his particular tasting menus, Dalton is inevitably drawn to do something different. In September, this took the form of Veritas’ Spanish Supper Club, featuring an unpublished menu only available to diners after they’d finished its eight courses.

That same month, beneath a spiky canopy of dried herbs and fruits hanging vividly from the ceiling in starkly attractive Veritas, we found Dalton clad in a black T-shirt emblazoned with “Speck”—his forthcoming Downtown Italian restaurant, and one of his multiple projects. The restless chef, who expects to engineer seven to eight Veritas menu overhauls this year, passionately describes his tendency to take risks.