After you’ve chosen your entrees, you can choose your countries in one of the most out-of-left-field trends to hit Manhattan restaurants since blue margaritas. Maps. Restaurants with maps. Lots of maps. So far, there are only two such restaurants, so it might be not so much a trend as a coincidence.

Restaurant’s co-owner Eric Goode {below) also co-owns Area. He has put his knowledge of the club world into his small world of dining (in fact, Restaurant was briefly thought to be named It’s a Small World). Restaurant is very much like one of the displays at Area. The walls are covered with murals of the more bizarre locations of the world, charted in colorful latex by artist-cum-cartographer Serge Becker. Mashhad in Turkmen S.S.R.? Kandangan in Borneo? A city called Mary? If you’re star-struck, the ceiling is a complete astrological menu detailed in stars. The cliched “What’s your sign?” line could get you an exacting answer with visual aids. Which would be your just desserts.

Florent, nestled in the West Village’s picturesque meatpacking district, presents its charts more maphazardly. From my table I could see forty-three framed maps seemingly hung wherever there was a nail above eye level. My dinner companion, complaining of eyesores, said, “The nicest map they could have is one that showed me how to get to another restaurant.”

If the map trend catches on, at least you’ll always know where to go after dinner.