The Best Late-Night Food in Brooklyn Right Now

By Abe Beame

Folks, something any long-tenured New Yorker will tell you is that this city may not sleep, but for the last few years it has practiced intermittent fasting after a certain hour each night. COVID was the dawn of a new era for early bird dining and for NYC restauranteurs and their staff, who looked in the mirror and questioned whether those last couple hours of labor (mostly dealing with drunk shitheads) were worth the occasional late-night revenue pop.

This presents a real challenge for degenerates like me, who once considered a month without stumbling down the steps at Wo Hop to be sacrilege (now closed every evening, Monday through Saturday, at 10 p.m., and a shameful 9 p.m. on Sundays). While I have, for the most part, left my evenings of regrettable meals often eaten on a random stoop behind me, it occurred to my editor and I that perhaps you haven’t. So the following is a partial list of small businesses—all-hours diners, bars with elite food menus, pizza shops that like to party, and a few Kings County staples—keeping the art of late-night service alive in this borough. Our standard was a kitchen keeping the burners running till midnight or later, ideally every day of the week, but I made a few exceptions when the subject in question deserved recognition.

If you want late-night dining in our city to last a while longer, support these spots with the occasional burger before bed, a decent tip, and not being an asshole.

Photo by Scott Lynch

Kellogg’s Diner

518 Metropolitan Ave.
Open 24 hours

Kellogg’s Diner has become an epitome of a certain critique lobbed at New York, popular on Twitter: That the city loves the dive aesthetic without the rundown complications inherent to actual dives. Kellogg’s was a beloved shithole that was taken over by new management, refurnished and reimagined with an elite pastry program and items like loaded cashew queso, braised short rib hash, and a broccoli rabe melt. But the prices haven’t gone crazy, the diner remains a 24-hour operation, and that revamp saved the century-old business at a prime Williamsburg intersection from extinction, so we’ll let it pass.

Courtesy of Google Maps

Neptune Diner II

699 Classon Ave.
Open 24 hours

This whole list could be diners, and we started with an “elevated” one. I limited myself to just one more, the genuine article, my personal favorite, Neptune II.

Courtesy of Late Night Frog

Late Night Frog

5204 8th Ave.
Open till 1 a.m.

This may seem like the product of lazy Google research, or perhaps the owners are formerly savvy editors trained on the best SEO practices of the 2010s, but I actually have it on good authority that this place rocks, which makes sense. There are few things better than a late-night hot pot run, best enjoyed in a harshly lit Chinatown backroom.

Courtesy of Lori Jayne

Lori Jayne (inside Danger Danger)

232 Knickerbocker Ave.
Open till midnight

Everyone loves chef Sam Braverman’s simple affordable steak frites paired with elaborate high-end condiments and his sarcastic, acerbic “Fuck you, no substitutions” online and in-menu persona. Danger Danger is the latest semi-permanent home he’s found for his wandering kitchen, and the cokey Lynchian disco makes for a perfect vibe match.

Courtesy of Clover Club

Clover Club

210 Smith St.
Late-night menu from 11 p.m. to 1 a.m. on Fridays and Saturdays

This is one of the “cheats.” The Brooklyn cocktail culture 1.0 Church of Scientology has bar snacks available through service, but there’s an actual late-night food menu on offer Friday and Saturday from 11 p.m. to 1 a.m., featuring drunk classics like fried chicken, a burger, mac & cheese, and bread pudding.

Photo by Victor J. Blue via Getty Images

The Commodore

366 Metropolitan Ave.
Open till 2 a.m.

The tiki bar with a southern kitchen is a stalwart of its area at the bottom of Havemeyer, partially because it’s been lining hipster stomachs with dredged and fried late-night birds since 2010.

Courtesy of Sisters

Sisters

900 Fulton St.
Kitchen open till “midnight,” last call (for food) at 11:45 p.m.

It’s hard to find a single easy descriptor, besides “wonderful,” for Sisters, the seven-days-a-week, 13-hours-a-day, airy and white-tiled triumph of interior decoration and American comfort food and cocktails and brunch and lattes. But in addition to all the nice things you can say about it, their kitchen’s open relatively late. Consider yourself forewarned, though; last call for food is at 11:45.

Courtesy of Peppa’s

Peppa’s Jerk Chicken

38 Flatbush Ave.
Open 24 hours

It’s important to keep in mind this is specifically for the location on Flatbush, off the southeast corner of Prospect Park. There are no tables or chairs, but if you have cash in your pocket and a song in your heart, you can get an absurdly reasonably priced box of jerk chicken whenever you’d like (If you don’t yet have your personal sauce ratio down, I’d advise 75% BBQ, 25% jerk).

Photo by Scott Lynch

Lucky Charlie

254 Irving Ave.
Pizza served till 3 a.m., Wednesday to Sunday<

Lucky Charlie’s, the home of a 19th-century coal oven and a 21st-century approach to social media, keeps that ancient oven cranking out pies late into the night. But bear in mind, the rest of the menu is only on offer till 11.

Courtesy of No. 7

No. 7

627 Vanderbilt Ave.
Open till midnight, Wednesday to Saturday

We discovered chef and author Tyler Kord’s first iteration of No. 7 in a very different Fort Greene nearly 20 years ago, so it’s not terribly surprising that spirit of aughts Brooklyn kitchens still governs the hours of operation at his somewhat tamer, but still funky, No. 7 2.0 on Vanderbilt.