Chef Zachary Wade said Central Ninth restaurants are bringing “something different to the area.”
(Trent Nelson | The Salt Lake Tribune) Zach Wade at Cosmica in Salt Lake City on Thursday, May 1, 2025.
When Cosmica owner and chef Zachary Wade got the text notifying him that his new Salt Lake City restaurant had been included on The New York Times’ 2025 Restaurant List, he and his team were in the middle of dinner service on a busy Monday night.
Wade was short-staffed at the time, he said, and he was cooking at a couple of different stations in the kitchen.
“I just didn’t really know how to react,” Wade said. “We were so, so busy already, and it was just so overwhelming.”
But as the night slowed down, Wade said they were all able to celebrate with some friends who had seen the news and come into Cosmica.
Since then, “it has been quite the whirlwind,” Wade said. He said business has “tripled” since the article came out, and that Cosmica has reservations booked for the next month.
“This past week has been just a really, really fun time,” he said.
With all the attention the restaurant has been getting, Wade said he and his team are working to make sure they uphold the standards and expectations they have for themselves. That can be a “tough process,” he said.
“We really appreciate the support from the community and all the customers, and we’re just trying to be honest with them. Like, we didn’t really expect this,” Wade said. “So everything is a little hectic right now. … It’s just such a wild feeling.”
‘What Utah really has to offer’
(Trent Nelson | The Salt Lake Tribune) Cosmica in Salt Lake City on Thursday, May 1, 2025.
Wade opened Cosmica in March, at 945 S. 300 West, Suite 102, across the street from TF Brewing.
He had moved to Utah from New York state at the end of the pandemic, and said it was an “easy decision” to make his home in the Beehive State.
“There’s so many great people out here, a really up-and-coming food scene,” he said a couple months after opening Cosmica, his first solo restaurant.
He said this week that getting a Utah restaurant on The New York Times’ list of the best restaurants in America “speaks volumes to what’s to come and what so many people have already been doing here.”
“We love that little Central Ninth community we’re in,” Wade said. “Everyone’s so supportive there, and it seems like there’s more restaurants and people who want to try something different and maybe bring something different to the area.”
He said the food, cocktails, wine list and “vibes” at Cosmica “add a specific something that the customers are looking for, and there’s certainly other restaurants just in that little neighborhood that are doing the same thing.”
He listed the “Korean dining bar” Bar Nohm and cocktail bar Water Witch as two businesses in Central Ninth that are “just doing incredible stuff and deserve all the recognition they can get.”
Water Witch was nationally recognized as a 2025 James Beard Award finalist in the Outstanding Bar category. And David Chon, the chef at Bar Nohm, was included among the 20 regional semifinalists in the Best Chef: Mountain category in 2024.
Dining at Cosmica
(Trent Nelson | The Salt Lake Tribune) Puffy bread at Cosmica in Salt Lake City on Thursday, May 1, 2025.
Wade said he’s been seeing a lot of new diners come through Cosmica, and they often say they heard about the restaurant from The New York Times list.
If you’re thinking about stopping by the “Italian diner” for the first time and need an idea of what to order, Wade said their most popular dishes as of late have been the house puffy bread, the maccheroni alla Genovese, and the tuna carpaccio, which is made with bluefin tuna and “has been a real hit,” Wade said.
The house puffy bread is like a salty and cheesy bread pillow, an addictive starter made with olive oil, herbs and grana padana that comes with a choice of condiments.
And the maccheroni alla Genovese, made with housemade pasta, features slow-braised beef, “tons and tons” of caramelized onions, Wade said, white wine and herbs. “It’s almost like an Italian French onion pasta,” he said. “It’s just so comforting.”
For dessert, try the ricotta cheesecake, which they make from scratch and serve with a blackberry compote.
In the next week, Wade plans to make some changes in the menu as the season turns to fall, while keeping around certain classic dishes, like the puffy bread.
“We’re looking forward to these coming months, and being able to feed everyone that comes in,” he said.
