(MONEY Magazine) – For those travelers who want to follow their palates around the U.S. this summer, the most delectable roads lead to New York City. Says who? None less than the country's leading restaurant critics who participated in MONEY's second ranking of the greatest eating-out cities. San Francisco claims the No. 2 spot and Los Angeles is No. 3.

As a service to both business and pleasure travelers, MONEY decided to update our 1990 rankings of the leading restaurant towns in America and offer a guide to today's top tables. Back then, we saw a surge of cost-be-damned creativity, particularly in the top cities, that seemed too hot not to be cooled by the first ill wind to blow through the economy. Sure enough, the '90s roared in, ravaging the restaurant landscape with a prolonged recession. But lately, after a couple of miserable years, the table trade has begun to revive with more energy and imagination than ever. In the process, the leading food cities were gripped by two related trends. One is value. Customers, whose busy lives constantly sharpen their appetite for restaurant meals, are demanding it. The second trend is what critics call casualization. The setting of the finest food service -- the tradition-steeped formal establishment with headwaiter, captains and extensive menu selection -- finally fell like a gustatory Bastille. And up rose the bistro, with staff in work shirts and butcher's aprons, a tight list of offerings and a far friendlier tab. To see how these trends have altered our list of the 15 best eating-out cities, we ranked them once again. The most telling changes: -- New York (No. 2 last time) has reasserted itself as America's reigning restaurant town, unseating MONEY's previous No. 1 city, Los Angeles. What's more, San Francisco has pushed past its old rival, L.A., to take over the second slot. -- Washington, D.C., while remaining No. 5, has improved so dramatically that it joins the elite circle of top cities -- New York, San Francisco, Los Angeles and Chicago (No. 4 again). -- New Orleans (No. 6, up from No. 8), Miami (No. 7, up from No. 11) and Houston (No. 10, up from No. 13) have taken the biggest leaps forward in MONEY's ranking. Dallas (No. 15, down from No. 10) and Minneapolis (off the list, vs. No. 12 last time) have suffered the steepest drops as they got crowded out by more ambitious competitors. One of the upstarts, Phoenix (No. 12), makes the lineup for the first time. MONEY's ranking of the 15 top cities appears on pages 122 and 123, along with recommended restaurants for a variety of occasions. As in 1990, the selection and order of the 15 cities are based on quality and variety of food available, local standards of service, and price.

To pass responsible judgment on the cities and their restaurants, MONEY turned to the most informed sources available. With the help of Nancy Harmon Jenkins, a respected food writer-editor and a nine-year contributor to the New York Times, we first assembled a roundtable meeting of eight leading restaurant critics. Then we recruited critics in the 15 top cities to pick the best restaurants in their respective towns. Finally, we interviewed 22 experts on the national scene from leading chefs to restaurant consultants who travel and eat out extensively. Then we did some eating of our own. And finally we arrived at our evaluation. The winners:

NO. 1: NEW YORK What always made this city the emperor of eating out was its sheer depth and variety. Among its 12,000 full-service restaurants and 25,000 takeouts, you could find more French, Italian, Chinese, seafood, steak places -- the list never stops -- than anywhere else. What MONEY found in 1990 was the wrong numbers at the bottom of the tabs plus ''rampant mediocrity.'' Not anymore. ''The city was at the cutting edge of the recession,'' recalls Danny Meyer, proprietor of the popular and highly rated Union Square Cafe. Diners began staying home by the thousands. ''Since then we've pulled ourselves up by our collective bootstraps'' -- by working to please all customers, not just the favored few. The latest Zagat survey, which polls diners in 35 cities and publishes the results in its familiar red volumes, chronicles the turnaround. In 1992 the surest sign of restaurant vitality surged in New York: 145 noteworthy openings vs. only 45 closings. A year earlier the score had been 110 openings vs. 57 closings. What's more, the average cost per meal actually fell 2.7% in the year. Tim Zagat, co-publisher of the survey with his wife Nina, found ''higher food quality, friendlier service and even larger portions than in the '80s.'' Best advice for the visitor to this dizzying feast is to savor the variety that no city on earth can match. ''New York's greatest strength is in French cuisine,'' says Vogue's food critic Jeffrey Steingarten. So while such traditional haute cuisine temples as Lutece and La Cote Basque have lost some of their following, they still are worth the trip, and reservations are more accessible than they used to be to last-minute travelers. The top three recommendations of MONEY's New York critic, David Rosengarten, are a fine sample of what real depth has to offer: Vong (East-West trendy: warm sauteed duck fois gras with mango and ginger sauce); Aureole (American/French: scallop sandwich with citrus sauce); and Gotham Bar & Grill (nouvelle American: towering seafood salad).

NO. 2: SAN FRANCISCO Yes, it's the reigning queen of Chinese cookery, more so than ever since a tide of Hong Kong people and money flooded in since the mid-'80s. But San Francisco is so much more -- the home of the Great American Foodie, the customer so demanding that restaurateurs there are a restless lot. ''It's where overeducated, overqualified people go to live well,'' says New York food consultant Clark Wolf. ''It's where I go for ideas.'' While San Francisco's top tier is relatively thin, it offers in abundance what most larger cities lack: a solid-gold center comprising dozens of mid- range restaurants where everything is modest except the luminous, luscious food. Six-month-old LuLu, which our San Francisco critic Patricia Unterman nominates as a best bargain, is a case in point. Try anything from LuLu's wood-fired rotisserie (the rosemary-scented roast chicken with warm potato and - winter lettuce salad, for instance), and you'll get the point. It hardly matters that LuLu's menu -- but not its pulsing, town-meeting atmosphere -- mimicks the Zuni Cafe, a 13-year veteran of the San Francisco scene and perhaps the town's most beloved restaurant. Even when you venture to this city's tonier tables, you're likely to receive a warm and professional welcome. Stars, for instance, gives off some of the most positive vibes of any world-class restaurant. By the way, if you have trouble choosing from Stars' lengthy menu, go for the grilled double pork chop: It raises the category of chop to a new top.

NO. 3: LOS ANGELES What made the City of Angels MONEY's restaurant heaven three years ago was a powerful massing of multicultural talents: energetic young chefs from Europe and New York, who brought a classical order to a roiling ocean of immigration from Latin America and Asia. What precipitated its stumble was the near depression in Southern California's economy, which not only killed some of the area's brightest restaurant start-ups but knocked the daring out of the chefs who remained. The result: Instead of innovation, ''we're getting a lot of copycat restaurants here lately,'' says Ruth Reichl, food editor and chief restaurant critic of the Los Angeles Times and soon-to-be chief restaurant critic at the New York Times. What remains can still easily dazzle an Easterner or Midwesterner who thinks his or her town is a shining redoubt of Asian eateries. ''L.A. is still first in Far Eastern ethnic restaurants,'' says Reichl. That begins with Japanese, where L.A. reigns supreme, and includes Thai, Chinese, Korean and Vietnamese. Where else will you find anything quite like Matsuhisa, a Japanese-Peruvian spot that has drawn top billing in the local Zagat Guide for four years running? Or Ginza Sushi-Ko, perhaps the most expensive restaurant in the U.S., where a sushi feast of the rarest ingredients can run as high as $350 per person? If you dote on French and Italian classics, however, you may not be satisfied eating in the handful of first-rate places in L.A. (''You can hardly get a great European meal there,'' says Jeffrey Steingarten). But who ever said that this city was into tradition anyway? Go instead for Californian/ Mediterranean at Campanile or Californian/French at Rockenwagner's or Patina. In fact, Clark Wolf says that Patina, under Chef Joachim Splichal, is the best restaurant in America. Other critics agree with him. So try the roast - lamb and eggplant sandwich and anything with potatoes; then judge for yourself.

NO. 4: CHICAGO If lithe L.A. ties down the salady end of the U.S. food scene, brawny Chicago speaks up for the steak and the stew. Some of the best such fare is at Euro- ethnic spots: Lutnia (Polish), Bohemian Crystal (Czech) and Kenessey's Wine Cellar (Hungarian). The city is also blessed with dozens of newer and more ambitious places, led impressively by the 31 restaurants owned and run by Richard Melman, who is considered by leading critics as the unrivaled genius among American restaurateurs. His flagship: nouvelle French Ambria, followed by such dizzyingly varied dazzlers as Cafe Ba-Ba-Reeba! (Spanish), Papagus (Greek) and Maggiano's (Italian). Topolobampo serves ''simply the best Mexican food in the U.S.,'' says restaurant consultant Michael Whiteman. And Charlie Trotter's French-accented American cuisine is ''worth getting on a plane for,'' says Whiteman, who lives 800 miles away in New York City.

NO. 5: WASHINGTON, D.C. Could the Democrats be the party of the foodies? Just as the nation's capital took its first leap to serious eating out during the Kennedy Administration, it is taking another, far more ambitious one under Bill Clinton. The ferment is palpable: At least two dozen major new restaurants made their debut last year. Among the veterans, Jean-Louis' French and Galileo's northern Italian fare inspired Washington Post critic Phyllis Richman to place both on MONEY's top-restaurant list for the second time. The hottest spot: Red Sage, an extravagant outpost of southwestern food where you might have to wait a month for a table. Latest charmer: the French-accented Citronelle, one of three offshoots of Los Angeles' Citrus. Telephone a week ahead, even for a midweek booking. It doesn't help that Attorney General Janet Reno dined at Citronelle with Barbra Streisand recently.

NOS. 6 to 16: THE REIGNING REGIONALS New Orleans (No. 6) is making a heroic comeback, indicated by its rise from No. 8 in 1990. It hasn't yet regained its former glory as one of the country's truly great eating-out towns. However, its Cajun and Creole cuisines are being updated, lightened and opened to Asian and European influences at such standouts as Emeril's, Mike's on the Avenue and Bacco, the latest entry of Ella Brennan's clan, the reigning American restaurant dynasty. Miami (No. 7) has made an even more impressive move from No. 11. In the three years since MONEY's earlier ranking, this city has become a second home to many moneyed young New Yorkers, particularly in the fashion game. Even Madonna has bought a house there. As everywhere, food follows money. Aside from great Cuban fare, fish -- snapper, pompano, wahoo, spiny lobster -- is the local pride. At the top end, Brasserie Le Coze is the Miami outpost of New York City's seafood star, Le Bernardin; at the bargain end, Big Fish, open only for lunch, offers a real Miami scene: dockhands, downtown lawyers, politicos all digging into the sea fare. Seattle (No. 8) and Boston (No. 9) both have dropped two slots since our earlier ranking. Seattle's slippage was a technical one: Miami and New Orleans, both hot, just stormed past it. ''In Seattle,'' says New York Times food critic Bryan Miller, ''the quality of materials is so high -- oysters, salmon, wild mushrooms, berries -- that in minimally competent hands you can have staggeringly good food.'' Boston, however, is suffering the fate of the long recession: notable restaurants closing and nothing coming in to take their place. Among the other cities on our list -- Houston (No. 10), Philadelphia (11), Phoenix (12), Atlanta (13), Santa Fe (14) and Dallas (15) -- a consensus of our food-critic sources nominated Atlanta as the one most likely to advance in the ranking over the coming years. Meanwhile, a few outsiders are panting to get aboard. In the lead: Honolulu. In fact, if we had counted the state as a whole, such leading critics as Suzanne Hamlin, John Mariani and Mimi Sheraton would happily have placed Hawaii well within MONEY's fabulous 15.

BOX: WHERE THE CRITICS LIKE TO EAT

Name 1) the finest restaurant in America and 2) your personal favorite. When asked by MONEY, here's how 19 critics and other food experts answered: -- New York's Le Cirque won, with six votes for best restaurant and three for personal favorite. And the people watching is excellent. Among the regulars: Jacqueline Onassis, Donald Trump and Henry Kissinger. -- Chez Panisse in Berkeley, Calif. came in second: two votes for best, three for favorite. Chef-owner Alice Waters, a founding mother of California cuisine, ranks among the most influential cooks in America today. -- Patina in Los Angeles and Jean-Louis in Washington tied for best with two votes each. One each went to Topolobampo in Chicago, Aureole and Lutece in New York , the Ivy in Los Angeles, Galatoire's in New Orleans, Cafe Annie's in Houston and Matsuhisa in Los Angeles. -- Union Square Cafe in New York, with three votes, tied Le Cirque for the title of favorite (five critics didn't name one). A vote each went to Stars and Zuni in San Francisco, Emeril's in New Orleans, Citrus in L.A. and the Inn at Little Washington in rural Virginia.

CHART: NOT AVAILABLE CREDIT: Compiled by Amanda Walmac CAPTION: WHERE TO EAT IN AMERICA Here is MONEY's ranking of the country's 15 finest eating-out cities, plus restaurants recommended by our food critic in each city.