The Best Places to Eat and Stay in Manhattan

1. AAA Three Diamonds

The Beaux-Arts bones alone justify a slow lap through the lobby. The Ned NoMad is a hotel that takes socializing as seriously as sleep, with guests getting access to members-only spaces including a whimsically muraled downstairs club. NoMad puts the Empire State Building and Madison Square Park in easy walking range while Downtown stays close enough for a late night. The kind of place where you feel like you're in on something, even as a tourist.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Hotels
2. Time Out The 35 best hotels in New York City

1. AAA Three Diamonds

1. AAA Three Diamonds

The sister property to a London hotel and private club, The Twenty Two New York occupies the restored Margaret Louisa Vanderbilt house near Union Square. It holds a Michelin Key. The vibe is international modern luxury with enough Gilded Age bones in the building to keep things grounded, which is a neat trick for a place that could easily have leaned into its British pedigree and called it a day.

1. Michelin Guide 1 Key

1. AAA Three Diamonds

1. BagelUp #9 · The Definitive 30 Best Bagel Shops in New York City
2. The Infatuation #17 · The 19 Best Bagels In NYC, Ranked
3. Time Out The 18 best bagels in NYC

1. AAA Three Diamonds

1. Roadbook The Best Restaurants in New York City
2. The New York Times #64 · The 100 Best Restaurants in New York City
3. Eater The Best Restaurants in Chelsea

1. AAA Three Diamonds

1. AAA Three Diamonds

Tucked inside the Cherry Lane Theatre, this intimate cocktail bar and bistro from the Frenchette team runs a roving menu that moves from raw bar to steak tartare to fried frog legs with garlic butter, and somehow also a cheeseburger that regulars order without apology. Amber globe lights, curved bar, green banquettes: the room is doing its job quietly. Frozen custard or another round of cocktails closes things out. Reservations are scarce, so plan accordingly.

1. The New York Times 2026 · 1 star · Restaurant Review
2. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

Inside the Neue Galerie on Museum Mile, this Viennese kaffeehaus occupies a dark-paneled room upholstered in Otto Wagner fabric, which sets the tone quickly. The cafe serves schnitzel and goulash, but the cakes are the real argument for coming: Sachertorte, Linzer torte, and a chocolate mousse number with far more going on than the name suggests. The crowd tends toward the museum-going and the unhurried, which fits the pace of the place perfectly.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
2. Eater Where to Eat Brunch in New York City

The bar is stocked with tequila, mezcal, and a page of boutique agave wines, which tells you something about priorities at this warm, festive Mexican restaurant on Columbus Avenue. The cooking roots itself in Jalisco's rancho traditions, so expect slow-roasted beef shank served with tortillas and brothy beans for an unapologetically hands-on meal. Portions are generous and prices are fair enough that the Michelin Bib Gourmand makes sense. Tables fill with families and groups in full celebration mode.

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand
2. Eater The Best Upper West Side Restaurants

1. The New York Times 2026 · Critic's Pick · Restaurant Review
2. Eater The Best Steakhouses in New York City

1. Eater The Best Classic Restaurants in NYC
2. Grub Street The 40 Best Restaurants for Kids (and Parents!)
3. Eater The Best Restaurants Around Times Square

The sage-green tiles and gleaming copper pans of the open kitchen are as composed as the plates coming out of it. La Mercerie is a fine dining French restaurant tucked inside Roman and Williams' SoHo emporium, and the room leans hard into its own beauty, tiny tables, delicate blooms, and a lunch crowd dressed like they have somewhere even better to be afterward. The menu runs to careful, classic indulgence: consommé, profiteroles, tarte tatin.

1. AAA Three Diamonds
2. The New York Times 2018 · 2 stars · Restaurant Review
3. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

Sapphire velvet banquettes and jacketed servers signal exactly what this is: a fine dining room where Angie Mar fuses classic French technique with her Chinese heritage in a Greenwich Village townhouse that glitters like a jewel box. The cooking leans rich and saucy, the way haute French is supposed to, and a tasting menu is available for those who want the full ceremony. James Beard semifinalist, 2026.

1. Esquire Bemelman at the Ritz · The Best Martinis in America
2. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
3. James Beard Awards 2026 · Semifinalist · Best Chef: New York State · Angie Mar

The chef behind Lola's spent years doing refined seasonal cooking at a museum restaurant before deciding she'd rather cook food people want on a Tuesday. The result is a Southern-inflected neighborhood dinner spot on 28th Street where the cooking is casual without being simple, and local produce keeps showing up in places you didn't expect. The New York Times named it one of New York's best new restaurants in 2024.

1. The New York Times 2024 · 2 stars, Critic's Pick · Restaurant Review
2. The New York Times 2024 · New York’s 14 Best New Restaurants of 2024
3. The New York Times #71 · The 100 Best Restaurants in New York City

The dining room occupies the restored Marcel Breuer building that once held the Whitney Museum, and the walnut paneling and candlelight make you feel like someone finally figured out what to do with the space. This is a French café and brasserie from the team behind La Mercerie, with omelets, steak au poivre, escargots, and madeleines warm enough to make Proust feel vindicated. Very Upper East Side, in all the ways you'd expect.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
2. The Infatuation The 21 Best New Restaurants In NYC

Velvet chairs, copper fixtures, and stained-glass lamps set a Prohibition-speakeasy mood on Avenue A, though the menu leans firmly into vegan Italian. Soda Club is a natural wine bar where house-made pasta carries the evening, the wine list skews minimal-intervention, and the whole thing holds a Michelin Bib Gourmand. The room is dim enough that everyone looks like they have secrets, which feels appropriate for a place named after Italian hand-crafted sodas.

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand
2. James Beard Awards 2024 · Semifinalist · Outstanding Restaurateur · Ravi DeRossi - Overthrow Hospitality

1. AAA Three Diamonds

Twelve seats at a counter above Central Park, where the skyline does a lot of the talking before the food even starts. YUGIN is an omakase spot inside the Plaza Hotel, opening with composed seasonal courses before moving into a classical nigiri progression, with faint European touches woven through Japanese technique. Custom ceramics, pristine sourcing, and restrained seasoning throughout, for a crowd that books months out and dresses accordingly.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
2. Vogue A Definitive Guide to the Best Omakase in New York City

Tucked inside ABC Carpet & Home, this vegetarian restaurant runs on the kind of clean-lined, chandelier-scattered energy that makes a green juice feel entirely appropriate in a wine glass. The menu moves through breakfast, brunch, and lunch with pressed juices and kombuchas alongside clever plant-based plates. The New York Times named it among the 100 best restaurants in the city, which the business crowd and the ladies-who-lunch set have known for a while.

1. The New York Times 2017 · 2 stars · Restaurant Review
2. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
3. The New York Times #48 · The 100 Best Restaurants in New York City

1. The Infatuation The Best Bakeries in NYC
2. Eater The Best Croissants in NYC
3. The Infatuation The Best Croissants In NYC

1. AAA Three Diamonds

The room is minimal to the point of industrial, which keeps the focus where it belongs: Korean cooking that doesn't explain itself to anyone. This Gramercy fine dining spot runs a prix-fixe-style menu where the combinations are adventurous but never alienating, the sort of place where kimchi beurre blanc makes complete sense by the second bite. Regulars book well ahead, and the team's warmth closes the gap between the spare room and a very full table.

1. The New York Times 2017 · 2 stars · Restaurant Review
2. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
3. Time Out The 45 best restaurants in NYC right now

The coconut cake, four layers tall and with its own devoted following, tells you a lot about what Cafe Commerce is going for. This is a neighborhood restaurant on the Upper East Side, warm and a little glamorous, where Harold Moore runs a contemporary American menu with French and Italian pulls. Steak Diane shares space with sweet potato tortellini carried over from the beloved original. The kind of place you book for a Tuesday because you deserve a Tuesday like this.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
2. Eater The 38 Best Restaurants in New York City

1. AAA Four Diamonds

1. AAA Three Diamonds

1. AAA Four Diamonds

Whitewashed brick, weathered wood beams, and soft lighting give this Upper West Side Greek restaurant the kind of room that makes a Tuesday feel like a reasonable night out. The cooking leans rustic, with spreads and pita giving way to whole grilled fish in lemon and caper sauce. The menu reads like someone's Greek grandmother got hold of a very good pantry, which is more or less the point.

1. AAA Three Diamonds
2. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

1. The Infatuation #1 · The 19 Best Bagels In NYC, Ranked
2. BagelUp #3 · The Definitive 30 Best Bagel Shops in New York City
3. Eater The Best Bagels in New York City

1. AAA Four Diamonds

1. Eater The Best Classic Restaurants in NYC
2. Grub Street The 40 Best Restaurants for Kids (and Parents!)

1. Time Out #16 · The 21 very best coffee shops in NYC
2. The Infatuation 9 Great Shaved Ice Spots In NYC
3. The Infatuation The Best Asian Dessert Spots In NYC

1. AAA Four Diamonds

1. AAA Four Diamonds

1. AAA Four Diamonds

1. AAA Four Diamonds

1. AAA Four Diamonds

1. AAA Four Diamonds

1. AAA Four Diamonds

1. AAA Four Diamonds

Ivan Orkin, a New Yorker who built his reputation running ramen shops in Tokyo, brought the whole project back home to the Lower East Side. The ramen shop is compact and casual, counter seats facing the kitchen, with a menu that mixes Japanese technique and New York personality without making a big fuss about either. The tsukemen, where you dip thick fresh noodles into rich pork broth and season to taste, rewards the curious. Grub Street named it one of the city's best restaurants for kids.

1. The New York Times 2014 · 2 stars · Restaurant Review
2. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
3. Grub Street The 40 Best Restaurants for Kids (and Parents!)

Jean-Georges Vongerichten started here before the global empire, and the cozy two-story townhouse still feeds the Upper East Side's moneyed regulars like it has been around forever. The menu reads like a confident neighborhood restaurant that doesn't need to impress anyone: roast chicken, seared salmon, rack of lamb. Seasonal, polished, and utterly unbothered by trends. The molten chocolate cake has outlasted several food movements and shows no signs of leaving.

1. AAA Three Diamonds
2. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

1. AAA Four Diamonds

A bar anchors the narrow room at this buzzy south Indian restaurant named for the city at the tip of the subcontinent, which tells you where the kitchen's loyalties lie: seafood, regional spice, and coastal flavors that don't pull punches. The slow-cooked beef short rib, draped in Madras onion rings and crispy curry leaves, has become something people keep coming back to mention. The Michelin Guide has it selected.

1. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
2. Grub Street The 43 Best Restaurants in New York
3. Eater Sleeper Hit

1. AAA Four Diamonds

1. AAA Four Diamonds

1. The Infatuation The 21 Best New Restaurants In NYC
2. The New York Times The 22 Best Pizza Places in New York Right Now

1. AAA Four Diamonds

1. The Infatuation #2 · The 19 Best Bagels In NYC, Ranked
2. BagelUp #8 · The Definitive 30 Best Bagel Shops in New York City
3. The New York Times The 17 Best Bagels in New York City Right Now

Gregory Gourdet runs this prix-fixe inside the Printemps department store on Wall Street, pulling Caribbean, French, and Asian threads into a tight, composed menu. The tilework and green patterned booths are very much meant to be photographed, and the crowd obliges. The duck glazed in cane syrup with tamarind jus is the kind of thing that makes the rest of the meal feel like buildup. The New York Times named the rice and beans among its favorite dishes of the year.

1. Esquire The Best New Restaurants in America
2. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
3. The New York Times #75 · The 100 Best Restaurants in New York City

1. AAA Four Diamonds

1. AAA Four Diamonds

1. AAA Four Diamonds

The omakase option is how regulars talk about this place, and the downtown room backs it up with a charged, buzzy atmosphere that makes sitting still feel like a missed opportunity. Nobu Downtown is fine-dining Japanese in a sleek, energetic space on Broadway, where the menu leans into small plates built for sharing. The celebrity-chef brand is global at this point, but the kitchen keeps the standards high.

1. AAA Four Diamonds
2. The New York Times 2018 · 1 star · Restaurant Review

1. AAA Four Diamonds

A converted townhouse in Tribeca that runs its own upstate farm, so the vegetables on your plate were probably pulled from the ground by someone who also designed the menu. One White Street is a contemporary restaurant with both à la carte and tasting menu options, housed in a wood-paneled room with marble and tilework that makes "intimate" feel earned rather than euphemistic. The kitchen leans into bold, produce-forward cooking with a Michelin Guide selection to its name.

1. AAA Three Diamonds
2. Bon Appétit America's Best New Restaurants
3. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

1. AAA Four Diamonds

Hong Kong cinema posters line the walls and a glowing marquee floats above the chef's counter at this high-energy Cantonese American restaurant on Chrystie. The cooking is generous and unfussy, built on good ingredients without making a big speech about it. The XO fried rice and salt and pepper fried chicken pull regulars back repeatedly. A Michelin Bib Gourmand, and priced like they mean it.

1. Michelin Guide Bib Gourmand
2. The New York Times 2023 · 1 star · Restaurant Review

1. AAA Four Diamonds

1. AAA Three Diamonds

1. AAA Four Diamonds

1. AAA Four Diamonds

1. AAA Four Diamonds

1. BagelUp #4 · The Definitive 30 Best Bagel Shops in New York City
2. Time Out The 18 best bagels in NYC
3. The New York Times The 17 Best Bagels in New York City Right Now

Gold busts line the walls of this cavernous Upper West Side Italian restaurant, which reads as a deliberate joke at the expense of every shoebox apartment in the neighborhood. The menu runs the familiar Italian playbook, calamari to tiramisu, but the kitchen adds enough texture and brightness to keep it from feeling rote. Generous tables, a big room, and a wine list that rewards lingering make it a natural anchor for the block.

1. AAA Three Diamonds
2. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant

1. Eater The Best Breakfasts in New York
2. Grub Street The 40 Best Restaurants for Kids (and Parents!)

1. The Infatuation The Best Bakeries in NYC
2. The Infatuation The Best Croissants In NYC
3. Eater The Best Croissants in NYC

1. AAA Four Diamonds

1. AAA Four Diamonds

1. AAA Four Diamonds

1. AAA Four Diamonds

1. Forbes Travel Guide Forbes Four Star

A seasonal rooftop pool a few blocks from Columbia University is not something you expect from a hotel on 126th Street, which is part of the point. The George sits in a former industrial stretch of Harlem that's been pulled into the present without losing its bones. Rooms run compact and modern, the outdoor lounge leans chic without trying too hard, and the Broadway line is close enough to make Midtown feel like a minor inconvenience.

1. AAA Three Diamonds

1. AAA Four Diamonds

Black walls, scarlet booths, polished chrome, and a limestone fireplace that anchors the whole room: the Lambs Club is a Midtown steakhouse that knows exactly what it is and leans into it without apology. Dry-aged steaks with a full spread of sauces are the main event, and the pre-theater prix-fixe keeps the curtain-time crowd moving. Inside the Chatwal Hotel, steps from Broadway, it draws the kind of clientele that orders a second cocktail on purpose.

1. Forbes Travel Guide Forbes Recommended
2. Eater The Best Restaurants Around Times Square

1. AAA Four Diamonds

1. AAA Four Diamonds

1. AAA Four Diamonds

The neon sign out front has been pulling in Tribeca's night owls since the neighborhood was mostly parking lots. This brasserie wears its '80s bones proudly, all red banquettes and buzz, and Vanity Fair once called it "a movie set that doubles as a restaurant," which tracks. The French-ish menu runs burgers to croque monsieur, comfortingly unchanged. The New York Times gave it a star in 2016.

1. AAA Approved
2. The New York Times 2016 · 1 star · Restaurant Review
3. Eater The Best Classic Restaurants in NYC

1. AAA Four Diamonds

1. AAA Four Diamonds

1. AAA Four Diamonds

1. AAA Four Diamonds

1. AAA Four Diamonds
2. The New York Times 2021 · Critic's Pick · Restaurant Review

1. AAA Four Diamonds

José Andrés runs this steakhouse inside the Ritz-Carlton NoMad like a controlled burn, with an open charcoal and wood-fired kitchen that fills the room with smoke and a sense of occasion that most restaurants wouldn't dare attempt. The cuts run American and Japanese, aged both ways, cooked over fire that does real work rather than just looking good. It landed on the World's Best Steak Restaurants list, which tracks.

1. World's 101 Best #71 · World's Best Steak Restaurants
2. AAA Three Diamonds

Some of the bagels here are so large they've lost their holes entirely, which feels like a metaphor for Midtown but is actually just breakfast. This no-frills bagel shop near Penn Station runs like a commuter train that actually shows up: the line moves, the bagels come out hot, and the chewy, twisty exterior is what you came for. The New York Times named it among the city's best, and the 8 a.m. crowd would agree without looking up.

1. The New York Times The 17 Best Bagels in New York City Right Now
2. The Infatuation #11 · The 19 Best Bagels In NYC, Ranked
3. BagelUp #29 · The Definitive 30 Best Bagel Shops in New York City

1. AAA Four Diamonds

1. AAA Four Diamonds

1. Eater The 38 Best Restaurants in New York City
2. James Beard Awards 2023 · Semifinalist · Best Chef: New York State · Charles Gabriel
3. James Beard Awards 2024 · Semifinalist · Best Chef: New York State · Charles Gabriel

1. AAA Four Diamonds

The xiao long bao are made in-house, and you can watch through the glass as the pleating happens at speed. This is the New York outpost of the global dumpling chain, set in a large underground room near Times Square that runs loud and packed most hours of the day. The New York Times gave it a star in 2024, which did nothing to shorten the line. Expect a menu of soup dumplings in various fillings, a youthful crowd, and prices that won't require a moment of hesitation.

1. AAA Approved
2. The New York Times 2024 · 1 star · Restaurant Review
3. Eater The Best Restaurants Around Times Square

You book by phone, get buzzed through the door, and receive a handwritten menu, which either sounds precious or exactly right depending on your mood. Eulalie is a cozy, French-leaning prix-fixe spot in Tribeca where the formality is purely theatrical, the cooking is warm and assured, and the Named by the Times one of New York's best new restaurants in 2024, it feels less like a debut than a place that's been waiting for you to find it.

1. The New York Times 2024 · 3 stars, Critic's Pick · Restaurant Review
2. Michelin Guide Selected Restaurant
3. The New York Times 2024 · New York’s 14 Best New Restaurants of 2024

1. Esquire The Best New Restaurants in America
2. Roadbook The Best Restaurants in New York City
3. James Beard Awards 2024 · Semifinalist · Best New Restaurant

1. AAA Four Diamonds

1. AAA Four Diamonds