# Eyal Shani Opens Naked Tomato at Williamsburg Wharf With First-Ever Counter Service > Eyal Shani opened Naked Tomato at Williamsburg Wharf, his second US site, adding a first-ever counter menu of small dishes handed over by the cooks who make them. - Published: 2026-10-15T22:43:04+00:00 - Section: Expansion - Author: News Desk - URL: https://newsforagent.com/news/2026-10-15/naked-tomato-brooklyn-chefs-counter - Source: [Forbes](https://www.forbes.com/sites/rachel-dube/2026/10/15/eyal-shani-debuts-his-first-chefs-counter-at-brooklyns-naked-tomato/) ## Key takeaways - Eyal Shani opened Naked Tomato at Williamsburg Wharf on the Brooklyn waterfront, his second US location after Miami Beach. - The restaurant adds a first for Shani: a separate counter menu of small dishes, with each plate handed over by the cook who made it. - The menu runs across five sections, and the kitchen sources winter tomatoes from growers using glasshouses and hydroponics. Eyal Shani opened [Naked Tomato](https://akta.pro/company-profiles/025gtg6/naked-tomato) at Williamsburg Wharf on the Brooklyn waterfront, his second US site and the first to include a counter-only menu. [Forbes](https://www.forbes.com/sites/rachel-dube/2026/10/15/eyal-shani-debuts-his-first-chefs-counter-at-brooklyns-naked-tomato/) reported the opening on October 15, 2026. ## What Naked Tomato Serves In Brooklyn Naked Tomato is built entirely from Shani's classics, with a menu divided into five sections carrying titles such as Let's Start From Here, Vegetable Creatures We Chose by Hand and Ocean Creatures and Everything From the Deep Sea. Dishes include A Real NAKED TOMATO, a bag of green beans perfumed with lemon garlic vinaigrette, Lokus Chrime drifting through spicy desert tomatoes with tahini and schug, and three chicken skewers billed as the "one last breath of Naked Tomato." The name comes from a gesture Shani learned in southern Italy, where a host peels a tomato for a guest. "It's a big blessing," Shani said in a phone interview. "It says, 'I am paying extra attention to you.'" At the restaurant, the peeled tomato is sliced into rounds and served as is. The biggest departure is the kitchen counter, where guests sit slightly elevated, facing the chefs, and eat from a separate menu of small dishes. Shani calls it "a kind of omakase, with no distance between the chef and the guest." Each plate is handed over by the cook who made it. Counter dishes include a small pot of mussels, baguette bruschetta with anchovies and the North Abraxas burger, imported from his Tel Aviv restaurant of the same name and served as three bites on a house-made bun. Cocktails borrow from the group's restaurants around the world, and the signature, Naked and Tomato, is mezcal-based. Kimmel Eshkolot Architects designed the industrial space, which has original flooring, exposed concrete, high ceilings and big windows, with seating across dining room tables, banquettes and two bars. The restaurant sits on the ground floor along Kent Avenue at 470 Kent, part of the Williamsburg Wharf development, which will eventually include about 950 residences across five towers. ## Naked Tomato's US Footprint Naked Tomato opened its first US location at the Moxy South Beach hotel in Miami Beach, Florida, according to [akta.pro company records](https://akta.pro/company-data), and the Brooklyn site is its second US location. The same records list the Brooklyn address as Williamsburg Wharf, 470 Kent Avenue, and describe the Miami restaurant as a tenant within the Moxy South Beach hotel at 921 Washington Ave. Shani operates over 50 restaurants globally, spanning seven countries including New York, Tel Aviv, Paris, Melbourne, Singapore, Las Vegas and London. ## Other Restaurant Expansions Hawaiian Bros Island Grill signed a development agreement with Southern Rock Restaurants to open 52 units in Florida over six years, [Chain Store Age](https://chainstoreage.com/hawaiian-bros-make-florida-debut-50-plus-locations) reported on October 12, 2026. Bloomin' Brands is accelerating Outback Steakhouse remodels, having completed about 31 refreshes through July and expecting to finish around 85 locations in 2026, [Yahoo](https://finance.yahoo.com/markets/stocks/articles/outback-remodels-accelerate-blmn-unlock-113200613.html) reported on October 5, 2026. Ford's Garage opened in Chattanooga, Tennessee, on October 13, 2026, its first Tennessee location and 36th overall, [PR Newswire](https://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/fords-garage-now-open-in-chattanooga-marking-brands-first-tennessee-location-302907358.html) reported. ## Winter Tomatoes And The Wharf Build-Out Shani said the kitchen has found growers who raise tomatoes in glasshouses through the cold months using hydroponics. "We're getting real, beautiful tomatoes in every season," he said. The Williamsburg Wharf development will eventually include about 950 residences across five towers. ## Companies in this story - [Naked Tomato company profile](https://akta.pro/company-profiles/025gtg6/naked-tomato) · website: https://www.nakedtomatousa.com --- News for Agent · https://newsforagent.com/llms.txt