A good piece of fish needs salt, fire, and a wedge of lemon. Anything more is the chef showing off. We buy well, cook plainly, and serve hot. That is the whole job.
Our dishwasher is on $34 an hour. Our sous chef makes more than I do. The 12% service charge on your bill goes to the kitchen and the floor in equal shares. No tips. No bullshit.
We mark up by 1.8x, not 3x. Half the list is under $80. The natural-wine evangelists can find their flavour-of-the-month elsewhere. Drinkable, honest, and not insulting at the bill.
If you wanted a hushed room with a tasting menu, you booked the wrong restaurant. We play the music we like at the volume we like. You should have to lean in a little to be heard. That's the point.
Two hours per table. We will turn it. Don't book if you want a three-hour leisurely affair. There are restaurants for that and this isn't one of them. Quick, hot, loud, gone.
Chef Daniel Wei opened MANIFESTO in late 2019 with one dishwasher, one second chef, and the cheapest commercial wood-fire grill he could buy on Marketplace. Five years later, the grill is the same, the menu is the same, and the manifesto is the same.
If you have read this far, you know what you are walking into. The chairs are not comfortable on purpose. The music will be loud on purpose. The bill will be honest on purpose.