Sunflower Cuttlefish Rayu

At Matsu in Oceanside, Calif., executive chef and owner William Eick starts with the heart of the sunflower and simmers it. That’s topped with a gel made from akasu (a vinegar made from the lees of sake), the garlic chile paste rayu, which Eick infuses with dried shrimp and cuttlefish, fried cuttlefish tentacles, confit sunflower seeds and sunflower petals. That’s all covered with a “veil” made from a puree of cuttlefish bodies that he steams. The white powder on top is the sunflower seed oil left from confiting the seeds that he turns into a powder by blending it with maltodextrin.

Price: Part of an $85 four-course tasting menu

Hammeredtashen Spritz

This cocktail, whose name is a play on Hamantaschen, a three-cornered cookie eaten during the Jewish holiday of Purim, is part of the new cocktail menu at Kenny & Ziggy’s New York Delicatessen Restaurant in Houston, which recently moved and has a full bar for the first time.

Owner Ziggy Gruber starts by making a syrup of 8 ounces of dried apricots, 4 ounces of prunes, 3 pints of fresh raspberries, 2 sticks of cinnamon and 3 cups of water that are all pureed together, then heated with 2 cups of sugar until the sugar dissolves and then finished with an ounce of vodka and a splash of red food coloring.

He adds an ounce of that to 1.5 ounces of silver tequila, shakes it with ice, strains it over ice into a wine glass, tops it with sparkling wine and garnishes it with raspberries

Price: $12

Grilled Octopus with huancaina sauce

At Union Kitchen & Bar in Fort Lauderdale, Fla., chef and co-owner Christie Tenaud makes this dish for the small-plates section of her menu, starting by simmering a 6-8 pound Spanish octopus in water, red wine, carrots, onion, celery, garlic, bay leaves and black peppercorns for around four hours, until it’s tender. Then she blast-chills it, and once it’s cold she stores it in a marinade of aji panca, garlic, red wine vinegar and oil. At service she chars it on the grill, finishes heating it in the oven and serves it with chorizo, crispy potatoes, baby onion and huancaina sauce, a spiced Peruvian cream sauce that’s especially popular on potatoes. Tenaud makes it with onion, aji amarillo paste, evaporated milk, saltine crackers, queso fresco, salt and pepper.

Price: $18

Fluke Crudo

At Nerai in New York City, the new chef, Aaron Fitterman, thinly slices three ounces of fluke and layers it on a chilled plate and tops it with small segments of grapefruit, little spheres of finger lime and a fine julienne of kaffir lime leaf and mint. He seasons it with Maldon salt and Aleppo pepper and finishes it with Greek olive oil that he first cold-smoked with compressed apple wood.

Price: $21