Favorite NYC Foods (Thus Far)

Hello! It's been a while. The past couple months have been a whirlwind as I have recently moved to New York City! I am here attending graduate school at Columbia (the MFA Acting Program). I've always wanted to live in New York; I think it's an exciting, fun, and challenging place to be in your 20's, and I am looking forward to making it my own.

Some photos from my first couple weeks in New York City :)

Views from Dumbo

Steps of the NY Public Library

Morgan Library

Grand Central

Columbia

Domino Park

To celebrate my move, I thought I'd write down some of my favorite NYC food spots (so far). While I've never lived here before, I have visited many times before, both with my mom and with friends. Most notably, my friends Sarah, Anusha, Meghana and I had a tradition in college of visiting New York City during our October Break and doing a food tour. Almost all the foods you'll see on this list are from those trips! (Also please excuse the bad food photos - a lot of them were hastily taken on Snapchat before digging in 😅)

Savory

Cacio e Pepe from Lupa (Greenwich Village)

Anyone who knows me knows that I love pasta. I also have kind of high standards for pasta - I've eaten enough of it in my life to know what's good and what's not so good. And let me tell you - the pasta at Lupa is amazing.

I went here on Food Tour my senior fall with Sarah, Anusha, and Meghana. It took us a while to get a table, (I would recommend making a reservation here), but once we were finally seated at 9:30pm we had a great time! The restaurant gave us free champagne for the wait (we were supposed to be seated at 9pm) and the food was delicious.

I ordered the cacio e pepe which had to be the best cacio e pepe I've ever had. The other pasta dishes were also excellent - you can't really go wrong here!

Soup Dumplings from Joe's Shanghai (Chinatown)

Sophomore year, the SAME (Sarah Anusha Meghana Evan) Food Tour theme was dumplings. My favorite were the xiao long bao (soup dumplings) from Joe's Shanghai. This place has quite the reputation; the walls are decorated with pictures of famous people who've eaten there.

I would say Joe's Shanghai lives up to the hype. These are great soup dumplings and quite cheap, especially for NYC prices. Joe's Shanghai also has many other menu items so I definitely want to return and try more!

Spicy Spring Slice from Prince Street Pizza (Soho)

One can pretty much find pizza on every block of NYC. There are an overwhelming number of options and I'm sure everyone has an opinion on what is the "best" pizza in the city. I cannot consider myself an expert, but all I know is that the "Spicy Spring" slice from Prince Street is awesome.

This is the Instagram-famous slice with their special fra diavolo sauce with the iconic spicy pepperoni curls and fresh mozzarella. Believe the hype and try this out.

Sweet

Dark Chocolate Peanut Butter Chip Cookie from Levain (multiple locations)

This cookie from Levain Bakery might be my favorite dessert ever. It's definitely my favorite cookie of all time. It is fabulously rich and decadent. The dark chocolate dough is beautifully deep and the peanut butter chips add the perfect amount of sweetness. The texture of the cookie is really what makes it special; it's super thick and soft and gooey - SO GOOD.

Because of the richness, one cookie is honestly enough for two people. But the more likely situation is I buy one cookie, eat half right then, and save the other half for later 😉

Milk Bar Pie from Milk Bar (multiple locations)

Milk Bar's reputation (and the reputation of its founder, Christina Tosi), precede it. While Milk Bar got famous because of the Cereal Milk Soft Serve, in my opinion the best item there is the Milk Bar Pie. Milk Bar Pie is a delicious mix of sweet gooey butter and an oat cookie crust. This is the ideal comfort food and definitely what I'd turn to in times of dessert need.

Second picture from Google because my sad photo simply does not do this pie justice!

Crema Antica Gelato from Gelateria Gentile (Williamsburg)

This is the only non-SAME Food Tour food on here. I visited Gentile with my friend Abe during one of our classic NYC days (Abe and I loved to visit during college). There are so many high-quality, artisan ice cream and gelato places in New York. It's hard to choose one. Gentile makes it on purely because of one flavor: crema antica.

Crema antica is a very classic Italian flavor, but one you hardly ever see in the United States. Crema antica is basically vanilla with lemon zest. It sounds simple and it is; it's also amazing. Crema antica is light, creamy, sweet, and summery. It tastes kind of like the frosting filling inside those cheap lemon sandwich cookies you can get at the grocery store.

So there you have it! My favorite foods in NYC so far. I am sure that I will be adding many more to this list and I'm excited to see (and eat) everything this extraordinary city has to offer. 😊