This country has a lot of funny ideas about what to eat and NY seems to be an epicenter for where these obsessive trends start. Here's a guide to avoid burning in the melting pot.
Without a doubt, there is no reason to eat any Southern-inspired food in NY, NY other than Sylvia’s in Harlem on historic Malcolm X Boulevard. Whether your particular soul wants fried chicken with waffles or collard greens, candied yams, baked mac and cheese, or prawns, you will not be anything but elated after eating here. As you would guess, Sundays are an especially busy time during brunch hours and calling ahead is a good precaution to avoid waiting in that long line of post-worshippers. Expect to be greeted and served by a woman that treets you like her own kin, but if that’s not what you want out of your soul food experience, what is?
Years ago it was established as true fact by every single resident that there is only one good Italian place, and that nobody but they and their group of friends and neighbors really know about it. The advice here is this: do not think you can find that particular restaurant without grabbing people on the street, shaking their shoulders, and saying, “Where’s the best Italian place in all of New York?!" before getting your answer. Depending on the particular block they live, this answer will vary so greatly that there is in actual fact no reason to have a preconceived notion of where you’re going to find the best Italian before going there. If anybody were to shake me on the street, though, without hesitation I would say Il Buco for its Italian wine cellar atmosphere, wine list, and unrelenting flavors. I wouldn't make them go alone, though, but would follow them and offer to split one of the ever-changing entree items and the bill, just in case they were looking for a cheaper option than this restaurant can offer.
When New Yorkers eat salads night and day, the big-city folks across the continent pick up on that and do the same. When New Yorkers eat cupcakes, the rest of the country scratches their heads and begins the "awful" and "horrific" act of quadrupaling their cupcake production and consumption rates. Nobody needs to be told how to find a cupcake store; they are everywhere. There are mobile cupcake stands outside of every New York business, home, museum, and school. Nobody wants to be told how to find a salad nor a dime-a-dozen cupcake store, but they should be told about Lauduree on Madison Avenue, a macaroon store to behold not at the end of your life, but at the beginning so as to be able to go back as many times as your human legs can manage.
If you’d rather get a bigger spoonful of sugar, try Levain for their cookie meets scone creations, thick and gooey mounds that are worth their weight in gold. I know nothing about the maker of this place, but I would bet money it's a modern-day Frankenstein that was once a body-builder before finding out he really misconstrued the meaning of "body-building" and, upon exiting that industry, crossed a great water and came to New York to put scones and cookies together, as one. Without much wit, he dubbed his creation "the cookie" and sold it at Levain. The cookies' mass allow them to be slightly under-cooked while crispy, which shouldn't sound like anything but an enjoyable refreshment from the standard cookies sold in stores that are barely comparable to the ones you can get at home. This place doesn't boast, pat its own back, or try petty antics. It is like the genius that asks you questions instead of telling you the all the answers.
If you have any inclanation to curse in the streets during what had before been a nice day, saying "Why am I so hungry? Why is my blood sugar this low? WTF?! Where's the food?" please, go to one of these places. This is where the food is. Here's a twenty. Go, Eat.
©Alexzandra Etherton, 2014
