Overwhelmed with NYC's food scene? Here's how to navigate it

Exploring New York City’s food landscape takes a lot of work. My husband and I realized this even before moving here. While living in Chile and preparing for our trip, we created a folder on Instagram where we saved all the information we saw about what, how, and where to eat in the city. From the best supermarkets for our weekly groceries to where the top chefs of NYC ate, the folder gradually started to fill up until it became unmanageable.

Once we were settled in Manhattan, whenever we wanted to look for somewhere to eat, we spent hours scrolling, trying to find the video that recommended that perfect place in the West Village to eat ramen or the five best pasta recommendations from a Michelin-star chef. Keeping a folder was our attempt to avoid ending up at restaurants where the bill was too high, and the food wasn’t even that good.

NYC's endless food options make looking for places overwhelming, especially with the number of websites, influencers, and people willing to recommend anything in exchange for a complimentary meal or dinner.

Random picnic on a sunny day in Central Park.

The newcomers to New York I've talked to have told me how frustrating it is to find a way to enjoy good food: they want cheap eats, but everything is out of their budget, and the more affordable and well-known options are overrated. So, if the endless supply of food content isn’t making it any easier for newcomers to the city to enjoy a good and affordable meal, maybe there is a different way to make sense of the food scene in New York. That’s why I started this newsletter. But to do this, I need your help!

To start, here are some questions for you that will help me understand your needs of what needs to be added to the food information space and provide you with the help you need in navigating the food scene in New York. Your input will allow me to decide which topics you're most interested in and to build a stronger community of foodies. 

But before we embark on a mission to change how we learn about food, I thought of sharing three resources that have helped me find good meals as a newcomer to the city. And when discussing a good meal, I don't just mean at a restaurant. I think of supermarkets and good deals for buying groceries but also places where the experience is more than a good dish. These are ways of finding places that best reflect New York's dining culture and what makes it one of the best cities for eating in the world.

Lunch at Misi in Williamsburg one of my favorite pasta restaurants.

Beli Eats

This was the first tool we found after moving to NYC. We saw it because it also had an Instagram account and shared a lot of food reviews -which were saved in our fabulous NYC folder-. So, we decided to download the app and try it. This app is a social network where you can rank restaurants and access food recommendations. It's basically like Instagram: you get a profile to follow your friends, but instead of uploading photos, you upload and rate the restaurants you've been to, as well as view the lists of your friends who are on the app. The more restaurants you rank, the more recommendation lists will be unlocked for you to see, and you can even access table reservations that people release. What I like about this app is that I can search for lists of good restaurants by neighborhood and type of cuisine (although they have few); it all depends on how much you progress in the app). However, our favorite part is that as you can create your ranking of the places you go to, these are saved in case you want to repeat them or share your list with a friend.

The Infatuation

This website is by far one of my favorite discoveries. The Infatuation is a restaurant recommendation website acquired in 2021 by JP Morgan Chase. The platform not only offers recommendations in NYC but in cities all over the world. However, regarding New York restaurants, it is very accurate in recommending good options. Upon entering the site, the search filters are diverse: you can search, for example, if you want to eat pasta in the East Village and a restaurant perfect for birthday celebrations. The page will almost always yield answers to any type of search, mainly because a team of journalists and experienced restaurant critics is behind it. More than lists, this page has articles where you get reviews and extra exciting facts, such as a chef story or a fun place to go after you had that delicious dinner.

3. Talk to your friends, and save recommendations on your Google Maps.

This is arguably the most genuine way to enjoy NYC's offers. Nothing is better than an honest recommendation from someone who knows your tastes. These months living in NYC have made me realize that at least in my circle, there is a lot of talk about food—especially about inexpensive places—and lists are even shared through WhatsApp. You will be surprised when you enter your Google Maps to look for a home and see a pin in the neighborhood you want to go to; from that one time at a party, your friend gave you a recommendation you didn't remember. Saving those recommendations from everyday conversations, for me, is one of the best ways to navigate the gastronomic experience while at the same time understanding why this topic is so important to people living in NYC or just passing through.

If you like this way of looking at places, we could even make a collaborative pinned map with our favorite spots. Would you be interested in this? Let me know in the comments or by replying to this email. Please don't hesitate to share your personal preferences! In the meantime, here is my list of the recommendations I've been gathering from the sources I told you. Give it a look! 

Best,

Paz