Features > Best Of Travel > New York’s Best Ethnic Eateries
New York's status as a melting pot – cosmopolitan, cutting-edge, and diverse – has never been more true than today. And few fields reflect the unique nature of New York's international outlook than its dining scene, which ranges from Australian to Zimbabwean and everything in between. Here are a few recommendations for lesser-known or less-common cuisines.
INDIAN
Banjara – 6th St, 1st Ave.
This sumptuously decorated restaurant in the East Village's Curry Row might well have its reputation tarnished by its neighbors – the area's known for cheap, mediocre Indian cuisine. But despite its low prices, Banjara's romantic setting and phenomenal food make it one of the best Indian restaurants in the city, and one of the best bargains overall.
Tamarind, 92nd St, 3rd Ave
Located bizarrely in Yorkville, a random destination for an Indian restaurant, this kitschy-classy restaurant, decorated in vibrant turquoises and oranges, offers Upper East Siders an oasis of exoticism in the middle of an otherwise unexciting neighborhood. The food is great, the prices reasonable, and the fig ice cream worth a trip in and of itself.
MOROCCAN
Cafe Mogador, St. Mark's Place between 1st and 2nd
This Moroccan cafe in the heart of the East Village has a hip clientele of brunching twenty-somethings, newlyweds, and a generally up-and-coming crowd. The food – especially the tagines – is savory and sweet enough to merit hours spent in the hipster-harem-decorated room, sipping glass after glass of mint tea.
BARBES, 36th St. between 5th and Madison
A higher-end Moroccan place, this midtown restaurant is spacious, elegant, and slightly “chill-out” cool, appealing to trendy and well-heeled businesspeople for lunch or dinner. With a more consciously French colonial influence than Mogador, Barbes's fusion of pate and tagine on the menu betrays a sophisticated attempt to experiment with cross-cultural and colonial palates.
VIETNAMESE
LE COLONIAL, 57th St Between Lexington and 3rd
Politically correct it may not be, but this French-Vietnamese restaurant is nevertheless a marriage of tastes out of Marguerite Duras. Le Colonial attempts to recapture the romance of “Indochine,” and its evocative cuisine and 1920's-inspired decor nevertheless provide a perfect night out in this idealized oasis of history.
By Tara Isabella Burton
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