Where to Eat: New York City
Pasta for carb loading, options for first dates, dinner before a concert at Madison Square Garden and more urgent needs.
Welcome back, dear readers! This week, we wanted to do our favorite type of newsletter: answering your restaurant questions. We reached out on our Instagram stories and you sent in your queries, from the very vague (“steak houses?” … try Gallaghers!) to the hyper specific (“new, fun dinner restaurant for 8 startup colleagues based in Bryant Park?” … how about Berimbau?).
Below are answers to a few of our favorite prompts, including where to carbo-load before a marathon, and where to take a date you’re on the fence about. We’re also excited to announce that you can now send us reader questions through a dedicated form that will be linked at the bottom of this and all future newsletters. It will make it easier for us to organize and read through reader questions, though you can still reach us at wheretoeat@nytimes.com.
Carbo-loading before the big race
Where should I carbo-load before the New York City Marathon? — Maggie M.
I’m no marathoner, but I’ve always associated carbo-loading for marathons with eating pasta. And who am I to recommend otherwise? I think you’ll be running on air if you dig into any one of the seven pastas (but especially the bucatini amatriciana) at Lupetto near Madison Square Park. Over the weekend, I nearly passed out from the pleasure of the soy butter bigoli with shiitake mushrooms and shallot gremolata, at Kimika, a Japanese-Italian restaurant in NoLIta from the Wayla team. I could have eaten two more bowls. Even better, both are lovely spaces to bring the whole family before they cheer you on. NIKITA RICHARDSON
Korean BBQ with your BFF
Where to eat with my best friend before a concert at Madison Square Garden? — Margaret F.
I’m this close to recommending the Bar at Moynihan, shockingly an amazing place to hang out in Moynihan Train Hall, a.k.a. the new, yassified Penn Station. But this is your best friend we’re talking about! I’d take my own bestie to Jongro BBQ in Koreatown — she’d get a kick out of the entrance (through a nearly unmarked door in what appears to be an office building, up an elevator), the décor (a big pink Jinro Soju frog sitting on a bench, Korean LPs on the walls) and the opulent feeling of having a spread of banchan in front of you and a server grilling galbi for you. BECKY HUGHES
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