The city that never sleeps is the city that always eats. There are about 25,000 places to dine in New York — meaning you’d need to eat out every day for almost 69 years to try all of them, which is rather longer than the average getaway. There’s a dizzying amount of choice too, so, we’ve done the hard work for you and whittled it down to 12 essential waypoints that not only showcase the city’s culinary heritage but also where it’s going.
We’ve also chosen spots that reflect different moods, budgets, neighbourhoods and occasions, while paying attention to the foods for which the Big Apple is most famous. This, after all, is a city famed as the entry point to America for generations of immigrants and its cultural melting pot is most vividly reflected in a restaurant scene that attracts culinary talent from all over the planet.
While some may look familiar, it’s with good reason: they are the best at what they do and where New Yorkers themselves go when they want to remind themselves that they live in possibly the world’s most exciting city for eating out. Become a subscriber and, along with unlimited digital access to The Times and The Sunday Times, you can enjoy a collection of travel offers and competitions curated by our trusted travel partners, especially for Times+ members This article contains affiliate links, which may earn us revenue £ | Best for Manhattan’s famous pizza pie Some pizza connoisseurs might tell you that the best slices are to be found in Brooklyn, and indeed two of the borough’s icons, Roberta’s and L’Industrie, have crossed the East River to open in Manhattan. But John’s is even more iconic, not only for occupying the same West Village site for almost a century, but for serving the most famous pizza in the most famous city for pizza outside Naples. Founder Giovanni ‘John’ Sasso, learned his trade at New York’s first pizzeria, Lombardi’s in Little Italy. Were he around today, he would still recognise the thin and crispy pizza pies, cooked in a coal-fired brick oven just like they have been since 1929; the classic 14-inch ‘John’s Original’ is the thing to order, simply topped with tomato sauce and mozzarella. Avoid the queues by eating off-peak, and note that all the pizzas are a couple of dollars cheaper if you pay in cash. johnsofbleecker.com ££ | BAR | Best for sparklingly fresh seafood in Manhattan’s most central location The waters surrounding New York once teemed with oysters that ended up as cheap protein for the poor and the city retains a sentimental affinity with the bivalve. Prices at this vast subterranean space beneath Grand Central station aren’t quite bargain basem*nt but the house Grand Central Oyster Bar blue points oysters, farmed in Connecticut, clock in under £3 per oyster. Other top shouts include clam chowder (either a creamy New England version or lightly spiced Manhattan style) and grilled whole Dover sole, which has been on the menu since the vaulted and tiled, Beaux Arts-style dining room opened in 1913. Sit at the bar for preference, rather than at a red-checked table, and note that it’s closed on Saturdays and Sundays. oysterbarny.com EVAN SUNG £££ | BOOK AHEAD | BAR | Best for vegan haute cuisine delivered with fine-dining formality Swiss-born chef Daniel Humm shocked global gastronomy in 2021 when he announced that he was turning Eleven Madison Park — his three-Michelin-starred restaurant that won the title of The World’s Best in 2017 — plant-based. The absence of meat and fish aside, very little has changed: getting a reservation requires flexible advance planning, the bill hovers at a three-figure minimum, staff in bespoke suits soothe diners with formal professionalism and three stars still shine above the high-ceilinged, generously spaced Art Deco dining room on Madison Square Park. But fine dining, whether plant-based or not, rarely comes more accomplished than this, as the ten-course tasting menu unfurls with concentrated flavours extracted from exquisitely plated seasonal ingredients. Advertisem*nt
1. John’s of Bleecker Street, Greenwich Village
2. Grand Central Oyster Bar, Midtown East
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3. Eleven Madison Park, Flatiron District
elevenmadisonpark.com
4. Katz’s Delicatessen, Lower East Side
ALAMY
££ | Best for old-school table manna
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Okay, so Meg Ryan ordered turkey not pastrami in the famous scene of When Harry Met Sally… that was filmed at this stalwart Jewish deli (est. 1888), but Katz’s 30-day-cured beef sandwiches have been known to induce groans of pleasure every bit as intense. The drill is simple: pick up you ticket when you enter (don’t lose it — you’ll need it to settle your bill), line up at the correct counter then watch as your pink ribbons of fatty meat with a frill of char are sliced by hand by a white-uniformed carver and piled high on a plate with squishy Jewish rye bread. There’s soul-soothing chicken soup and matzo balls, nova lox and latkes, too. And the turkey sandwich is almost as good, the moist meat served hot and ideally slathered in a piquant Russian dressing that fussy Sally Albright would almost certainly have requested to be left on the side.
katzsdelicatessen.com
5. Tatiana by Kwame Onwuachi, Upper West Side
MICHELLE GIANG
££ | BOOK AHEAD | BAR | Best for the hottest table in town
Bronx-raised Nigerian-American chef Kwame Onwuachi has reimagined the cooking of New York City’s black Southern, Caribbean and West African communities in a glass-enclosed space in the Lincoln Center, without sacrificing any of the essential spirit of the cuisines. Portions are large and the combinations inspired: the signature dish of short-rib pastrami suya transforms the deli classic into spice-dusted Wagyu with red cabbage and caraway coco bread. Many New Yorkers reckon that Tatiana is the best restaurant in the city, which means that tables are snapped up the moment reservations go live at midday 28 days in advance; get ready to hit that Resy refresh, or arrive early and eat at the no-bookings bar or patio.
tatiananyc.com
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6. Hometown Bar-B-Que, Red Hook
DANIEL KRIEGER
£ | BAR | Best for ultimate brisket in New York’s most remote-feeling corner
Pitmaster Billy Durney is a Brooklyn native and former bodyguard who has introduced the scent of expertly smoked meat to the sea breezes wafting into Red Hook from New York Harbor. Queue for your ’cue in this warehouse-style homage to central Texas, then head to the bar for a beer while waiting for the meat to arrive. The house speciality brisket turns Iowa Prime or Creekstone Farms beef into a decadent mouthful of sweetly smoky bliss, best chewed slowly between nibbles of cakey cornbread slathered with honey butter. Come on summer weekends and there’s a free ferry from the Financial District to (weirdly) the nearby Brooklyn Ikea, but also way longer queues for Hometown’s food. Still, better that than a Swedish meatball.
hometownbbq.com
7. Los Tacos No. 1, Times Square
£ | Best for cheap thrills and great-value Mexican cooking
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Chelsea Market is what passes for a bargain-hunter’s dream in Manhattan dining and is home to Los Tacos No 1 which was founded by a trio of friends from Mexico and California — the spiritual home of Mexican food in the US. The Times Square outpost, in the former New York Times building, is the more useful location, however, if only because this is not a neighbourhood in which to be hungry and low on funds with no idea of where to eat. Choose between flour and corn tortillas and, once you’ve decided on your filling and toppings, expect to eat quickly and standing up. Pork adobada marinated in pineapple is what the place is most famous for but there are also grilled steak, chicken and cactus alternatives, all sandwiched together with onion, coriander, salsa and guacamole. There are other equally affordable branches at Grand Central and Penn stations, Noho and Tribeca.
lostacos1.com
8. Sylvia’s Restaurant, Harlem
ALAMY
£ | BAR | Best for Southern soul food from the heart
As Aretha Franklin was the Queen of Soul, so Sylvia Woods was the Queen of Soul Food — a sobriquet advertised on the logo of the restaurant she founded in 1962 way before Lenox Avenue was co-named Malcolm X Boulevard. This family-owned restaurant was once the largest minority employer in Harlem and remains an essential stop for every New York mayor, as well as presidents Clinton and Obama. The menu is a reflection of the home-style cooking Woods, who died in 2012, grew up with in her hometown of Hemingway, South Carolina: fried chicken encased in spicy batter (with or without waffles and syrup); macaroni cheese you can stand a spoon up in; creamy banana pudding. Come for the Sunday gospel brunch when singers weave between the tables.
sylviasrestaurant.com
9. Peter Luger Steak House, Williamsburg
LIZ CLAYMAN
£££ | BOOK AHEAD | BAR | Best for epic plates at Brooklyn’s oldest steakhouse
Even diehard Manhattanites who refuse to cross the East River make an exception for this historic steakhouse, founded by a German émigré in the shadow of the Williamsburg Bridge in 1887. Peter Luger does occasionally move with the times — the first new menu item in 20 years, a steak sandwich, landed in 2023 — though the new-fangled technology of credit card payments is still very much refused: be sure to withdraw your daily limit of dollars before turning up. Even with a reservation, expect to wait in the bar with crowds of Wall Street bros (the margaritas are excellent) before sitting down to a USDA Prime bone-in porterhouse, dry-aged in house and thick cut. Sides are classic and the portions are enormous; take anything you can’t eat away and sandwich it into a bagel for breakfast (who needs that £29 steak sandwich).
peterluger.com
10. Saga, Financial District
EVAN SUNG
£££ | BOOK AHEAD | BAR | Best for elevated fine dining and jaw-dropping views
Restaurants in tall buildings do not always have the best reputations for serving food that hits the same highs as the location but New York does everything on a bigger, more impressive scale. The story at Saga begins on a 63rd-floor terrace with helicopter-level views over Lower Manhattan, Brooklyn and the bridges of the East River before diners are taken to the table for a seven-course tasting menu (rest assured that the views from the intimate 56-seat dining room are just as gobsmacking). The contemporary cuisine is creatively conceived and the finely balanced flavours beautifully presented. Prices, alas, are as elevated as the setting and the cooking; co*cktail bar Overstory, one floor up, offers a marginally more affordable way in and snacks such as fried citrus-marinated chicken.
saga-nyc.com
11. Bar Centrale, Theater District
JASON WOODRUFF
£ | BOOK AHEAD | BAR | Best for post-theatre Broadway star-spotting
Like its younger London sibling, the New York Joe Allen has a reputation for attracting Theatreland luvvies, but this unmarked brownstone next door is where the Broadway stars go after the show; we recently saw Marcia Gay Harden on the next table and we’ve clocked Julia Roberts in the past (not that the clientele would ever dream of doing anything as gauche as asking for an autograph, and there’s a strict no-standing rule to prevent rubbernecking). co*cktails are what the place is most famous for — the bubblegum-pink cosmopolitan comes with a carafe on ice for a second glass — but easy-to-eat finger food like crispy lobster quesadillas with avocado salsa and sour cream are done to a far more delicious standard than mere stomach lining. Just the ticket post-theatre.
barcentrale.nyc
12. Old John’s Luncheonette, Upper West Side
££ | BAR | Best for retro family-friendly diner vibes and sugar highs
Diners are brilliant not only for the genuinely young but also the young at heart. After all, who, deep-down, doesn’t wish that every meal could be entirely constructed out of maple syrup-drenched buttermilk pancakes and caramel popcorn-studded ice-cream sundaes, washed down with milkshakes and egg creams? This diner is brilliantly located, too. The Lincoln Center and its programme of free and choose-what-you-pay concerts and dance programmes is around the corner and Central Park is a short stroll away, though the zoo and Met are on the other side — no bad thing when there is this lot to walk off. Teens might prefer a French dip (a beef sandwich dunked in jus); frazzled parents could opt instead for a martini or Negroni.
iloveoldjohns.com
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