ELEVEN Contemporary Kitchen

ELEVEN opened in 2004 as big Burrito Restaurant Group's eleventh restaurant, which is where the name comes from, and it has been the group's flagship ever since. It sits in a rehabilitated warehouse alongside the old Pennsylvania rail lines on Smallman Street, an expansive room broken into pockets — a see-and-be-seen downstairs, moodier tables upstairs, and a seasonal patio over the street. Pittsburgh Magazine's verdict, putting it among the city's 25 best restaurants for 2026, was that Pittsburgh's dining scene owes it a great deal: for more than two decades this Strip District cornerstone has helped define what modern dining in the city can look like. Eli Wahl has run the kitchen since 2016, only the third executive chef in its history. Crab cake is $21, tuna tartare $19, ricotta cavatelli $28, black cod $42, prime strip steak $58.

The zero-proof list is the work of Rob Hirst, the wine and beverage director, a thirty-year veteran, and his method is worth quoting because it explains why these drinks land: he tries, for better or worse, to take a popular cocktail that he thinks would translate well without alcohol, and re-create it. His reading of why it matters is equally plain — the percentage of people drinking alcohol is down nationally, and people are being more conscious about health, about not drinking as much, and about not drinking and driving. The section is headed Zero Proof / NA Cocktails and runs four deep. The Cosmo-not at $12 rebuilds a Cosmopolitan on Seedlip Grove 42 and Dhos Orange with cranberry and lime. The Pink Flamingo, also $12, uses Dhos gin-free with strawberry-honey, lemon, cucumber, mint and lemon soda. Pimm's Pathfinder is the cleverest of them: Pathfinder amaro with cucumber, lemon and Fever-Tree ginger beer, which is a genuinely faithful Pimm's Cup, cucumber and all. Sunrise Over Smallman at $14 is the local one, built on Ritual non-alcoholic tequila with orange, peach, passionfruit, lime, grenadine and lemon soda. Heineken 0.0 and Sam Adams Just the Haze cover the beer. The list rotates annually or so, so expect the names to move on.