I’M NOT AFRAID to admit it. Growing up, my favorite restaurant was Planet Hollywood,” says the man who has arguably done more than anyone to shape the tastes and habits of the unruly online age of New York City dining. Ben Leventhal’s ideal dish back then was the chain’s Cap’n Crunch Chicken Fingers. But as we scan the lunchtime menu at Jody Williams and Rita Sodi’s bustling West Village trattoria, Via Carota, he orders like a seasoned regular: a salad, the branzino for two, and (at my not-so-quiet urging) a generous serving of the excellent, but less healthful, fritto misto.
On this sunny, weirdly temperate summer afternoon, Leventhal—a co-founder of Eater, Resy, and, as of three months ago, a still somewhat unformed but closely watched venture called Blackbird—is dressed in…
