Thinking about going out for dinner in the Big Apple? Fuhgeddaboutit! Better you should be thinking about going out for lunch.
I care about your pocketbook and your digestive system. If you are in town for only a short time and don't know exactly where to dine, this is the way to go, trust me, bubbe. There are plenty of great lunch deals in the city. You get the same food and the same portions (or sometimes larger) for significantly less in price. Gorge yourself at two o'clock and spend the next six hours walking it off. Bring home a light snack to your hotel. You'll be a happier traveler and you might actually come home with money in your pocket (ha!). In the summertime the best restaurants in town have $20 prix fixe lunch specials and some extend this to all year round.
Okay, so where to eat? It's not hard to find a place to eat in New York: just walk out the door. New York has literally thousands of restaurants. Certain city blocks have more joints than many small towns. The problem for most visitors isn't how to find a good restaurant, it's how to choose from among so many.
As you will see from my recommendations for Where To Eat in Chinatown, I don't like people
to give me a million options about where to eat when I'm in an unfamiliar city. I want advice. If you have endless time and endless money, buy a Zagat Guide and start at this year's top contenders. If, however, you are only going to be in the city for a few days and you aren't a zillionaire but you want some good, maybe even memorable meals, here are my choices with one caveat:
Caveat: some people (especially thin, wealthy ones) consider it a privilege to spend several hundred dollars for a meal and not walk away feeling full. I am not one of these people. I like to go to a place where I get more than enough to eat and it's all delicious and I don't come out broke. If you aren't interested in this kind of bargain, then I am not the guide for you.
Caveat #2: things change. I don't go back to these same places every week, or even every year sometimes. Recently I had to drop two of my recommendations after returning and being very disappointed, so I'm now going to add the approximate dates of the last time I ate at these places and came out happy. Yes, every kitchen is entitled to an off day, but if any of these let me down twice, they're outahere!
Okay, and now on to the winners.