Our selection of Lower East Side private dining

The words “omakase and sake bar” should tell you all you need to know. Located near the corner of Essex and Grand, Rabbit House is a hole-in-the-wall restaurant centered around an L-shaped bar with a few extra tables to spare. A full buyout is available for up to 20 seated guests, making it a cozy, pocket-sized private dining experience.

Enjoy omakase (a chef’s selection of Japanese small plates), dive into the world of sake, and for the love of all things distilled, please drink it chilled like a white wine rather than hot. We highly recommend the six-course omakase selection with the sake pairing – these are what Rabbit House specialize in, but dining à la carte and selecting any of the fine sakes curated by sake sommelier Yoshiko Sakuma will stand you in good stead.

Rabbit House is laidback with a neighborhood spot feel, and we can’t figure out how they tie the napkins so that they have bunny ears but we like it all the same.

Probably our top pick for private dining in the Lower East Side, Pig & Khao is pretty popular, and with good reason. Chef and owner Leah Cohen has created a cool, laidback spot for dinner and weekend brunch that showcases flavors and dishes inspired by her Filipino heritage and travels through Southeast Asia. Reading the menu alone is enough to make your mouth water.

The private dining space is found at the back of the restaurant and is a high-ceilinged space of brightly colored paintings and photographs of Southeast Asia. The private dining area can accommodate up to 38 seated guests for a party-style menu featuring some of Pig & Khao’s most popular dishes like the Thai green papaya salad and the Hainanese duck – writing this description has induced much mouthwatering and hunger pangs.

Say what you will about speakeasies, take ‘em or leave ‘em, what we do know is that beyond Beauty & Essex’s pawn shop front, you can find daily offerings such as $3 oysters, $6 tacos, and $10 specialty cocktails – a bargain in this city. It also happens to be one of the few Lower East Side private dining experiences available.

Beauty & Essex caters for group dining parties and cocktail parties with passed dinners of 10 to 400 guests. You read that correctly. There are four dining rooms available with a range of exclusivity. Chef Chris Santos has curated a chic menu featuring multi-ethnic cuisine and there’s a wealth of cocktails and wine to accompany it.

Contrary to its pawn shop front, on the inside, Beauty & Essex is all mood lighting, dramatic chandeliers, and sophisticated, contemporary decor with a slight touch of the gothic. It looks like the kind of place a cabal of vampires would hold court (until Blade comes in to kick ass).

Dirty French is a bistro-like restaurant with a menu inspired by the French classics, and when you look at the breakfast, brunch, and dinner menus you can see the French techniques on display but with unmissable American touches.

The private dining room is located on the second floor of the hotel and comes with all the bells and whistles like a private entrance, its own bar, coat check, and a view overlooking Ludlow Street. The private dining room can accommodate 50 seated guests or 80 standing guests for a reception.

There’s a rustic Provençal quality to the interior design and decor with whitewashed brick, wooden floors, and exposed wooden beams, but with contemporary touches that place you back in 21st-century New York. With only a handful of places that offer Lower East Side private dining, Dirty French has pitted itself at the top, offering a much sought-after and rarely-found service in its neighborhood.

Bacari are Venetian pubs, little hole-in-the-wall places for food and drink at the end of the working day, and Bacaro is just that, except it’s not on a Venetian canalside street but on a quiet block just off Ludlow.

Other restaurants only play at rustic, where Bacaro has embraced slate floors, exposed brick walls, candlelight, wooden tables and benches – if it wasn’t for the New York accents all around you you’d feel like you were in a Venetian bacari.

The restaurant is small and intimate enough to offer a Lower East Side private dining experience or an entire book out and between the Venetian food, wine, and hard-to-emulate ambiance of the place you’re hardpressed to find a better dining experience in the Lower East Side.