The start of summer evokes the last day of school: Throwing homework papers into the air and lockers slammed shut on a long year. These new restaurant openings are giving us that same giddy feeling of anticipation, setting the table for a season of dining and returning to a reality chefs, restaurateurs, staff and diners have missed so much.

“Cooking for people brings me the most joy in life and I’ve missed it dearly this past year,” said Chef Ho Chee Boon, who is opening Empress by Boon in San Francisco’s Chinatown. This restaurant is one of summer’s first crop, sprouting up across the country.

The resurgence of new restaurants opening this summer provides a unique chance for reinvention, an aspect we can’t overlook.

In Greenville, S.C., an emerging foodie city, Chef Drew Erickson is returning home after a few years at The French Laundry. His mission? “Take the familiar, and turn it on its head,” Erickson said. His menu at CAMP, a modern American eatery, will feature wagyu beef corndogs, French onion dip with caviar and blue crab beignets.

Check out these new restaurants and premiering menu items (keep clicking through to see biscuits built to cure hangovers at Butter Me Up in Washington, D.C.), along with Bobby Flay’s first Italian restaurant; Richard Sandoval’s dLeña Wood-Fire Mexican Cocina & Mezcaleria in D.C.; Empress by Boon taking over an iconic Chinatown restaurant space in San Francisco; and a couple of brasseries/bistros with fresh takes on French cuisine in Charleston, S.C., and Chicago.

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