Cuisine: Chef José Andrés made his name at this Nuevo Latino restaurant, the only spot in his mini-empire that doesn’t focus on small plates. Katsuya Fukushima now mans the open kitchen, but the fanciful deconstructions and playful spins on South American classics are all Andrés-approved.

Mood: Three spiraling levels of color-splashed dining rooms centered around a busy open kitchen and booming with peppy merengue should lift anyone’s spirits. But beware the early-evening traffic jam when the pretheater crowd jostles for tables with after-workers in search of a guacamole fix.

Best for: Festive dinners, working lunches, postshow or postgame drinks and dessert.

Best dishes: Foie-gras soup; conch fritters bursting with liquid at each bite; shrimp with corn purée and corn nuts; seared salmon scented with papaya-vanilla oil; duck confit with pine nuts and pumpkin seeds; deconstructed feijoada with pork belly; a marvelous tres leches cake; a layered “piña colada”; pineapple caipirinha; salt-and-lime-“air”-topped margarita.

Insider tips: The $30.07 three-course menu served nightly between 5 and 6:30 is one of the best pretheater bets around. And the Latino dim-sum weekend brunch, with ideas from the Minibar menu, is one of the area’s best weekend feasts.

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