Viand also has a few locations. It’s got a good greasy spoon type breakfast. I usually get omelettes. Not worth going too far out of your way, but might be handy, and the atmosphere is old NYC. I usually visit the location at 673 Madison.
Some diners are cash only. Viand was cash only last time I was there.
My company’s NY HQ is in Times Square and we are finally re-opening so I’ve been putting together a list for close by coffee, pizza and lunches. I’m originally from Queens but moved to LA/OC 20+ years ago and have maybe been to Time Square 5 times in my entire life. I used to come to NY multiple times per year but its been 3-4 years since my last visit. Many of these recommendations have been previously listed. My selections are all within a reasonable walk from Times Square.
Ramen (not sure why but there are a lot of good choices nearby) - Totto, Ichiran and Ippudo
Pizza (good enough options) - Joe’s Pizza, Don Antonio’s Johns of Times Square
Coffee - Simon Sips, Gumption Coffee, For Five Coffee
Beer - Clinton Gourmet Market has an excellent selection of craft beers
Other Places of Interest
Sullivan St Bakery (has been a decade but they had great bread & sandwiches)
Los Tacos #1 (hear good things, never been but I’m coming from LA/OC so we’ll see)
Ben’s Kosher Deli (growing up Ben’s in Queens was one of the best delis around. It’s been years)
All’antico Vinaio (very famous sandwich shop in Florence new NYC outpost)
Interesting list. Do you know how old it is? I thought Oddfellows was all gone, or I would have recommended it. I have found that when The Infatuation covers places I know, they can be weird and not dependable. Have you been to some of the places reviewed in this article?
Hi, Andy. I went to that defunct Big Gay location quite a while ago and was very unimpressed with their ice cream. I felt like it was really pedestrian and all about the sprinkles, and that mainly, they had a good gimmick. I haven’t tried anything from Shake Shack. It’s been a while since I had Mister Softee; they were always dependable on a hot day but nothing special otherwise.
For the record, my girlfriend and I had some perfectly pleasant Korean food right near the Finsbury Park station when we were on vacation in London in the summer of 2010, but it was a kind of humble home cooking restaurant, not a blowout BBQ place or anything.
I’m mostly low-carb, so I seldom go for ramen (also because ramen is cheap and great in Tokyo and expensive and often mediocre in New York), but I liked Totto Ramen better than Ippudo when I tried both. Ippudo had some nice appetizers, though; I remember really liking some very spicy renkon chips there, for example.
On yakitori, my sister-in-law took me to Torishin once for my birthday, and it was a truly sublime experience in all senses, but it is really high-end, so probably not for KimCardiffian.
It’s been quite a while since I’ve been to Second Avenue Deli, but I would tend to get tongue there. It’s expensive, but they are great at it, and the pastrami in my experience is better at Katz’s.
It’s been a while, but my experience has been that John’s on Times Square is nowhere near as good as John’s on Bleecker St., plus it’s super-crowded and more expensive. Again, all dated information. If Joe’s on Broadway is the same ownership as Joe’s on Carmine St. in the Village, it’s probably fine (their 14th St. near 3rd location is fine), but I’d tend to favor the original location.
OK, there are perfectly good diners in New York, but I don’t know any I’d make a special trip to. I normally get food from a diner when I need something late at night and it’s the place that’s open in a given neighborhood, especially if I know it’s reliable. I’ll give you an example: When I’m hanging out at my girlfriend’s mom’s place on W. 56, I know that The Flame Diner on 9th Avenue is dependable and good, so I may indulge in an omelet or moussaka from them, but if I have a choice, The Greek Kitchen on 10th Ave. is a really good Greek restaurant, not a diner, so I’d prefer them to the Greek diner I mentioned.
When you mention steak, please be aware that steakhouses are very expensive in New York. Burgers are less expensive.
I find your (4) impossible to answer. There are probably thousands of possible answers, depending on everyone’s taste and other preferences and where you want to be.
I haven’t tried any of the soft serves on the list.
I don’t tend to like soft serve enough to choose it over scooped hard serve, and I’m not a fan of vanilla soft serve, so I don’t seek it out. If you visit Montreal, Kem Coba makes a nice soft serve in Asian-influenced flavours.
i just sent an email to my old salteña connection - it was a family making them from their home/a pop-up restaurant, and I would order and then schedule a pick-up location - usually somewhere South of Market. I’ll report back if i hear from them.
we also had a connection in Redwood City but they closed.
For a quintessential (now old time) food experience, a trip to Zabar’s is still a pretty good eye opening (and waistline too) experience. New York is still highly regarded for its pizza, but NY style is not really the best nyc offers nowadays. I’m a big fan of a traditional pepperoni pie but the square pepperoni slice or pie from Mama’s too (2750 Broadway) goes beyond that- it looks burnt and it probably would be if cooked another 30 seconds. A strange business model too, as not all pies are available at any given time. The pepperoni is from Ezzo, a Columbus Ohio company that puts all others to shame. Be sure to get the pepperoni, if you go there.
Hi @Phoenikia,
We had a great time, thanks for asking ad packed a lot into 3 and a half days, walking around 25k steps a day. All the usual tourist stuff, Top of the Rock, Empire State Building, Grand Central Station, Statue of Liberty, plus 9/11 museum. Also walked across Brooklyn Bridge and spent a day in Brooklyn, Walked the High Line and biked around Central Park.
Not sure if it was you or other posters but several of you mentioned the prices for eating out in NYC and you certainly weren’t wrong!
We knew we wouldn’t be eating in top end restaurants on a budget, but nevertheless we made it to a few memorable places. As our 11 year old is heavily into singing/acting, we had breakfast one morning at Ellens Stardust Diner on Broadway, where the waiters and waitresses are all aspiring Broadway stars. The food was pretty standard fare, but it ticked the box of both the classic diner breakfast experience which we don’t get in the UK, and something a bit different which appealed to the kids - highly recommended!
We also had a classic New York Italian pizza at Don Antonio, tacos from Los Tacos #1 at Chelsea Market, both of which were great recommendations, and a Mexican in Williamsburg (forgotten the name - we were there on a Monday when a lot of the recommended spots were closed), plus a burger at Bronson’s Burgers on Mulberry Street, because we were wandering through and liked the neighbourhood, and a BBQ place which was good value for a relatively cheap eat but instantly forgettable (think it was called Hill Country BBQ).
Overall, had a fantastic few days which we’ll remember for a long time.
Given the $/£ exchange rate we found a lot of things eye-wateringly expensive for a family of four, but you can’t put a price on the memories that we’ll all have!!
Thanks so much to you and all the other posters for you kind advice and recommendations, really appreciated
After traveling my whole life on a weak Canadian dollar, I skimp on other things, and buy what I want to eat, without doing a conversion. That said, I have a personal comfort zone. I usually spend up to around $40 USD on most dinners, might treat myself to one $65 lunch at Bar Room at the Modern, and have an occasional splurge meal with a friend that might cost up to $100 USD including tip. I don’t drink much alcohol so that stretches my budget.
I lived in New York, when the Canadian dollar was worth 65 cents USD. The numbers on the menus looked the same. A pasta at a good midrange Italian NYC restaurant
may have cost $16 USD while pasta at a midrange Italian restaurant in Toronto cost $16 CDN in 1998. My friends who visited would do the conversion, then feel they were being gouged in NYC. Obviously, rent is higher in NYC, so it is naive to think one could find good pasta for the same price in NYC as one would pay in Toronto, where rent is cheaper, and wages are lower in Toronto.
It’s hard to enjoy your vacation if you’re comparing to the prices back home your whole trip.
The food and coffee in larger UK cities costs typically twice as much as I pay in Canadian cities. The UK is an expensive place to live and a lovely place to visit.
NYC restaurant food usually costs 1.5 times what I pay at home in Canada.
