There's a Disney here right? - NY & DC - May 2012

[Hannikins]

New York food tour

We'd done a food tour while in san fransciso and loved it so I really wanted to do one in the new york. I found lots of companies offering tours but they all seemed to cover just one small area of new york and that really wasn't what I wanted, I wanted the WHOLE experience, so instead I decided to plan my own ;P I looked on forums and a brilliant website called Serious Eats and found lots of places which were considered new york staples alongside some new and quirky places which are current new york 'fads'

I plotted the stops on a map and it now looks something like this:



Ignore the blue and green dots, those are places to visit (blue) and restaurants (green). The pink dots are my stops, all 17 of them! Now I know I'd never going to manage all 17 of them in one day, I won't, not unless Adam wants to pay for an extra seat for my enormous backside on the way home anyway!

Instead some of the places I'm using as lunch spots, the rest, mainly the ones in the pink pink cluster in the lower part of manhattan are going to be part of the 'tour'

The Stops in no particular order

The original Chinatown Ice Cream Factory



Zabar's



Looking to sample some of their own blend coffee and some deli items

Chelsea Markets

Not really one place but lots of separate little counters for us to sample from, see the list


Jacques Torres Chocolate

Apparently THE place to go for hot chocolate. And yes, that is a brownie floating on top!

[Hannikins]

Papaya King



Famous for their hot dogs, which look YUMMY!

Milk & Cookies Bakery



Yummy cookies... with ice cream in the middle!

Levain Bakery



Know for their seriously gooey cookies


Parisi Bakery



They supply lots of NY delis and restaurants with their bread so I thought we could do straight to the source for a serious sandwich

Doughnut Plant



Some weird and wonderful flavours here, I have my eye on the jam filled ones with peanut glaze, nom nom nom

Murray's Cheese Shop

"The best cheese shop in NY" planning on getting some cheese to sample and a baguette to eat with it

Beard Papa Sweets Cafe



'Cream puffs' never heard of them but they look yummy

Pudding NYC



Current 'Fad', only opening in Nov but they take the american childhood staple and add a gourmet twist to it


Bouchon Bakery



Gourmet treats. As this is near central park I may save this one for our picnic

Juniors's


Right next to our hotel so I think this one might be a late night stop after a broadway show rather than part of our 'tour'

Excellent Dumpling House




Sampling dumplings in china town

[Hannikins]

Katz's Delicatessen



Famous for it's pastrami Sandwiches, and as a film location of course

Ess-A-Bagel



Going for a cream cheese and Lox Bagel!


And that's it! What do you guys think, anything I shouldn't bother with or anything else I've missed?

[MichelleB]

Wow! Some great planning here! All those food pics look yummy! Serious Eats is great isn't it! We're off to NYC at Easter and have the Foods of NY Tour booked in Greenwich Village, which includes Murray's Cheese and Milk & Cookies. We shall also be visiting Chelsea Market. We are staying on the UWS so near Zabar's, Levain bakery (- how good do those cookies look?) Beard Papa's and will be calling in at Columbus Circle too.
Must work the LES into the itinerary too, Doughnut Plant looks fab!

[Chilly80]

That has made me so hungry.

I must go back to NY! We nearly went this year but Alaska won out.

[tonymc]

Originally Posted by Hannikins

After getting engaged in WDW in 2009, taking a break to DLP in 2010 AND honeymooning in Disneyland in 2011 we were ready for a little break from the mouse and wanted to try something new... well Adam thought this, I was all up for florida again, after three years on the trot I'm already suffering withdrawal

See more...

We also wanted a break from Florida and the Theme Parks last year and visited New York (plus Maine and Boston) and even though I wasn't too keen on visiting NY, found that I thoroughly enjoyed it (as did DW and DD).

TBH, we didn't try to do too much each day but took things at a leisurely pace, and tried to visit attractions in the same area on the same day rather than travelling the length of Manhatten (all those years of Disney planning have not been wasted

If you haven't visited NY before, we found a couple of guides on the Trip Advisor forums invaluable - one covered using the subway, and another how to get to the Brooklyn Bridge to walk back to Manhatten.

[Hannikins]

Originally Posted by tonymc

We also wanted a break from Florida and the Theme Parks last year and visited New York (plus Maine and Boston) and even though I wasn't too keen on visiting NY, found that I thoroughly enjoyed it (as did DW and DD).

TBH, we didn't try to do too much each day but took things at a leisurely pace, and tried to visit attractions in the same area on the same day rather than travelling the length of Manhatten (all those years of Disney planning have not been wasted

If you haven't visited NY before, we found a couple of guides on the Trip Advisor forums invaluable - one covered using the subway, and another how to get to the Brooklyn Bridge to walk back to Manhatten.

See more...

thanks for the tip Tony, tripadvisor has been a great help

[00swan]

Wow, looks like you've really thought this through - what fab planning & great attention to detail ! I feel as if we're rather winging it in comparison.

[Hannikins]

Originally Posted by 00swan

Wow, looks like you've really thought this through - what fab planning & great attention to detail ! I feel as if we're rather winging it in comparison.

See more...

That's my hubby's prefered style of travelling too. I'm more of a plan it and laminate if kinda gal

[Hannikins]

Restaurants

Now you will probably have noticed from this pre trip so far that FOOD plays a huge part in our holidays so it's probably about time I add some detail on the restaurants we've chosen for our trip.

After hours checking recommendations, food blogs and the dibb here they are...