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Dining in New York City – Our Anthony Bourdain-Inspired 'Authentic' 'Ethnic' Food Quest. New York, New York, USA. Copyright © 2022 Terence Carter / Grantourismo. All Rights Reserved.

Dining in New York City – Our Anthony Bourdain-Inspired ‘Authentic’ ‘Ethnic’ Food Quest

On the long flight to New York City from Tokyo, I drifted through an episode of Anthony Bourdain’s No Reservations while lying comfortably horizontal in Cathay Pacific’s brilliant business class ‘coffin’.

Lamenting his middle age (the former whippet-thin, ex-junkie chef Anthony Bourdain has put on a few pounds) and lack of knowledge of New York’s boroughs other than Manhattan, Bourdain decides to go on a mission to find ‘authentic’ ‘ethnic’ cuisine in New York. Just what is ‘authentic’ and ‘ethnic’ cuisine in NYC anyway?

Bourdain’s quest does indeed turn up some great food in the boroughs. One of Bourdain’s guests on his adventure was New York City’s current culinary rock star, David Chang, of Momofuku restaurants fame, whose food we were eager to try during our two-week stay. I dozed off dreaming of ginger scallion noodles.

Our driver from the car service that collected us from JFK was from the Dominican Republic and lived right around the corner from our East Village holiday rental. He praised the local ‘authentic’ ‘ethnic’ cuisines you could get in our neighbourhood and we were quickly salivating.

We decided that, seeing Chinatown and Little Italy were just down the road, and landmarks such as Katz’s Deli were nearby, that we should undertake an ‘ethnic’-focused culinary adventure centred on the East Village and Lower East Side and eschew the stuffiness of restaurants such as Per Se (not to mention its $275 a head menu).

Instead, we would tuck into the local, affordable, ‘authentic’ representations of the ‘ethnic’ cuisines of the waves of immigrants that have come ashore in New York in recent history. Sadly, the taste test would quickly sour.

Published 6 August 2010

Dining in New York City – Our Anthony Bourdain-Inspired ‘Authentic’ ‘Ethnic’ Food Quest

On our first night in East Village we played it by ear and were walk-ins at a local Italian joint that looked fabulous, but the food was uninspiring. Okay, that was our own fault for deciding to wing it and not having done enough research.

The next evening, jet-lagged and eager to stay in, and having spent much of the day doing what travel writers do and consulting the usual suspects when it came to eating out in NYC, and cross-checking and triangulating data, we set off for some ‘authentic’ ‘ethnic’ fast food and decided on Turkish at Bereket. But alas, another disappointing experience with unfeasibly dry meat and sad salad, accompanied by an awful sauce that was as authentically Turkish as I am.

Dining in New York City – Our Anthony Bourdain-Inspired 'Authentic' 'Ethnic' Food Quest. New York, New York, USA. Copyright © 2022 Terence Carter / Grantourismo. All Rights Reserved.

Next, we tried Veselka, an inexplicably popular Ukrainian diner that would have made Lara’s Russian-Ukrainian grandparents weep – and not for joy. The meatballs had a tough exterior masking a dried cement centre, the vareniki (potato dumplings), ordered fried, were deep fried sarcophagi. The food was only redeemed by a simple beetroot salad that was delicious. When we couldn’t finish it our waitress pointed out that it was the best dish on the table. Boy, was she right.

Later on in the week, trying what was called ‘New American’ cuisine at a locally recommended place regrettably called Prune, we had the most overpriced plate of food ever put in front of us – a few miniscule, sad-looking pieces of chewy calamari atop masses of sliced celery and other vegetables for $14.

Prune’s version of pho, the classic Vietnamese soup dish, had some beautifully slow-cooked beef accompanied by a limp broth and a few bean sprouts. A fatty lamb shoulder defied all attempts to get a piece to a fork that didn’t contain 50% fat, while a Greek salad (with barely a drop of olive oil) would have had the chef kicked off Santorini. If this was ‘New’ American cuisine, I had much sympathy for those who suffered through ‘Old’ American cuisine.

We’d been craving Indian for months, which we used to eat at least once week when we lived full-time in Dubai, where the largest percentage of the population is from the Indian Sub-Continent. There, the Indian restaurants specialise in regional cuisines, and it’s as authentic as any you’ll find in India, and that’s according to Indian expats. Devi, the restaurant we tried here, reached for the heights of the master of gastronomic Indian, Vineet Bhatia, but failed, inelegantly.

The aforementioned David Chang’s cuisine was another beast altogether. His vaguely Korean deconstructions and reinterpretations seemed pointless to these Korean food fans – kim chee pork tamales sounded interesting, but managed to insult both Korean and Mexican food in one mouthful.

Having just come from Tokyo, Chang’s ramen noodles were well below the quality of even local chain noodle shops in the city. His pork ‘buns’ were just okay, but it’s hard to go wrong with slow-cooked pork belly and hoisin sauce.

His much-admired ginger scallion noodles, which I’d been cooking since I first came across the recipe, were a letdown: too dry, with too little ginger to give it kick, perhaps to not scare off the hipsters banging elbows and screaming their orders over the shrill soundtrack as they sipped ostentatiously marked-up $50 bottles of plonk from glasses with no stems.

The problem with Momofuku – and this is a problem that we had with most of the ‘ethnic’ food we tried in New York – is that Chang is not really catering to Asians. He’s catering to people who probably know little about Asian food and are willing to swallow the hype to suffer though their first bites of kimchee, which they probably think Chang invented.

To laud Chang as a culinary luminary shows how the New York City dining scene reporting is in a state of flux, having now reviewed Per Se, Jean-George, etc a dozen times.

But these are just some examples of the meals we had. New York might be the greatest city in the world to some (in my opinion it’s certainly one of the most interesting), but based on our experiences it’s certainly not the greatest eating city in the world.

New York City certainly has some fine restaurants at the top end, some fun places to eat at the bottom (if you turn a blind eye to the food’s departure from its ethnic roots), and a lot that are overrated or clearly maddeningly inconsistent in the middle.

The current fads – Shake Shacks, gourmet burgers, hot dogs, and mobile cup cake trucks – confirm that it’s a culinary scene in a state of flux.

The noise level of some places, spurred on by already ludicrously loud and often ill-chosen soundtracks, had me reaching for the beverage menu to soothe my nerves, only to be reminded of the outrageously marked-up bottles of vino you have to drink from stem-less glasses. What’s with that?

Dining in New York City – Our Anthony Bourdain-Inspired 'Authentic' 'Ethnic' Food Quest. New York, New York, USA. Copyright © 2022 Terence Carter / Grantourismo. All Rights Reserved.

Two days before we left New York we ditched the Bourdain-inspired plan and visited the restaurant Eleven Madison Park. The room was divinely Art Deco and the service was note-perfect – just the right balance of familiarity and formality – and both our waitpersons were graduate chefs from the Culinary Institute of America (CIA).

The food was contemporary French, beautifully presented, but with no silly affectations apart from a delicious tomato lollipop. Despite the presence of Maldon sea salt on the table (primarily there to dip a little of the heavenly bread and butter into), I never reached for it. I have to cast my mind back a long way to recall a better seasoned or better cooked meal.

We’ve certainly had more creative and culinary adventurous fare in Europe and Australia, but when the cooking is of this high a standard the ‘wow factor’ comes with, well, just how perfectly the food is prepared and presented.

Dining in New York City – Our Anthony Bourdain-Inspired 'Authentic' 'Ethnic' Food Quest. New York, New York, USA. Copyright © 2022 Terence Carter / Grantourismo. All Rights Reserved.

As we lamented our ‘bad luck’ on the rest of the trip – courtesy of recommendations by the New York Times, The New Yorker, Village Voice, and various New York-based restaurant critics and food bloggers – and poured out our woes to our new New Yorker friends, they told us that we would have had to leave the island and go further afield to get ‘authentic’ ‘ethnic’ food, to areas where the newcomer chefs and restaurateurs had not yet started watering down their cuisine because they had an audience of customers not wanting it any other way.

On our last day, deeming our ‘ethnic’ experiment to be a failure, and having had the best meal by far at Eleven Madison Park, Lara asked, “Do you think we could still get a booking at Per Se?”

By that stage I was almost starting to think it was a good idea… and that Bourdain was on to something by heading to the other boroughs. Next trip.

Enjoy this? Our brief and no-holds-barred thoughts on every place we sampled in NYC.

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About Terence Carter

Terence Carter is an editorial food and travel photographer and infrequent travel writer with a love of photographing people, places and plates of food. After living in the Middle East for a dozen years, he settled in South-East Asia a dozen years ago with his wife, travel and food writer and sometime magazine editor Lara Dunston.

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Comments

  1. soultravelers3 says

    August 6, 2010 at 7:58 am

    New York City is really a place that grows on you over time and being an insider by living there for years and knowing many people who have lived there a long time makes a HUGE difference.

    Did you talk to Wendy Perrin? I bet she could have advised you on some great places to try. She grew up in NYC and has exquisite taste.

    I found that the longer I lived in NYC, the more I loved it. I’ve lived and spent a lot of time in some great cities, but NYC is one of the tops for food and many other things.

  2. Terence Carter says

    August 6, 2010 at 8:24 am

    Thanks for your comment. I do think NYC is one of the most interesting cities in the world, but the post was about the food.
    There were a *lot* of people we could have spoken to about where to eat before we got there but we’re not going to name drop.
    We did consult Condé Nast Traveler and all the usual NYC magazines, newspapers and guides. Many of these places were in the NYT Top 50, for what it’s worth!
    If you need to talk to someone like Wendy Perrin personally to dine well in NYC, well, it proves my point. ;-)

  3. Megan says

    June 14, 2016 at 9:11 pm

    The food in New York is absolutely amazing! Next time I go I want to make it a food trip where I eat anything and everything I want for 3 days and write all about it.

  4. Terence Carter says

    June 14, 2016 at 9:16 pm

    Good to hear Megan! Might find it a bit hard to get a table at 11 Madison these days though… It’s now one of the top restaurants in the world. Glad we went there instead of Per Se.
    T

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Still looking for Christmas cooking inspo? Check o Still looking for Christmas cooking inspo? Check out our seafood recipe collection, especially if you celebrate Christmas on Christmas Eve with a fish focused meal in the Southern Italian tradition, transformed by Italian-Americans into the Feast of the Seven Fishes, or like Australians, who celebrate Christmas in the sweltering summer, feast on seafood for Christmas Day lunch, we’ve got lots of easy seafood recipes for you.

Our recipes include a classic prawn cocktail, blini with smoked salmon, a ceviche-style appetiser, and devilled eggs with caviar. We’ve also got recipes for fish soup, seafood pies and pastas, salmon tray bake, and crispy salmon with creamy mashed potatoes.

You’ll find the recipes here: https://grantourismotravels.com/seafood-recipes-for-christmas-eve-and-christmas-day-menus/
(Link in bio if you’re seeing this on IG)

Merry Christmas if you’re celebrating!! 

#christmas #christmasfood #seafood #fish #recipes #christmasrecipes #foodstagram #foodblogger #food #foodlover #igfood #picoftheday #igfood #igfoodie #cooking #foodblog #food #foodstagram #instafood #instafoodie #foodie #foodies #foodlover #foodpics #foodporn #foodphotography #foodwriter #foodblogger #grantourismo #grantourismotravels #xmas #merrychristmas #happychristmas
If you’re still looking for food inspo for Chris If you’re still looking for food inspo for Christmas Eve or Christmas Day meals, my smoked salmon ‘carpaccio’ recipe is one of dozens of recipes in this compilation of our best Christmas recipes (link below). 

The Christmas recipe compilation includes collections of our best Christmas breakfast recipes, best Christmas brunch recipes, best Christmas starter recipes, best Christmas cocktails, best Christmas dessert recipes, and homemade edible Christmas gifts and more.

My smoked salmon carpaccio recipe makes an easy elegant appetiser that’s made in minutes. If you’re having guests over, you can make the dish ahead by assembling the salmon, capers and pickled onions, and refrigerate it, then pour on the dressing just before serving. 

Provide toasted baguette slices and bowls of additional capers, pickles and dressing, so guests can customise their carpaccio. And open the bubbly!

You’ll find that recipe and many more Christmas recipes here: https://grantourismotravels.com/best-christmas-recipes/ (link in bio if you’re seeing this on IG)

Merry Christmas!! X

#christmas #christmasfood #recipes #christmasrecipes #foodstagram #salmon #smokedsalmon #foodblogger #food #foodlover #igfood #picoftheday #igfoodie #cooking #foodblog #food #foodstagram #instafood #instafoodie #foodie #foodies #foodlover #foodpics #foodporn #foodphotography #foodwriter #foodblogger #recipedeveloper #writingacookbook #grantourismo #grantourismotravels 
#xmas #merrychristmas #happychristmas
If you haven’t visited our site in a while, I sh If you haven’t visited our site in a while, I shared a collection of recipes for homemade edible Christmas gifts — for condiments, hot sauces, chilli oils, a whole array of pickles, spice blends, chilli salt, furakake seasoning, and spicy snacks, such as our Cambodian and Vietnamese roasted peanuts. 

I love giving homemade edibles as gifts as much as I love receiving them. Who wouldn’t appreciate jars filled with their favourite chilli oils, hot sauces, piquant pickles, and spicy peanuts that loved-ones have taken the time to make? 

Aside from the gesture and affordability of gifting homemade edibles, you’re minimising waste. You can use recycled jars or if buying new mason jars or clip-top Kilner jars, you know they’ll get repurposed.

No need for wrapping, just attach some Christmas baubles or tinsel to the lid. I used squares of Cambodian kramas (cotton scarves), which can be repurposed as napkins or drink coasters, and tied a ribbon or two around the lids, and attached last year’s Christmas tree decorations to some.

You’ll find the recipes here: https://grantourismotravels.com/homemade-edible-christmas-gifts/ (link in bio if you’re seeing this on IG)

Yes, that’s Pepper... every time there’s a camera around... 

#christmasgiftideas #ediblegifts ##christmasfoodgifts #foodgifts #giftideas #homemadegifts #christmasfood #ediblegiftideas #hotsauce #chillisauce #sriracha #pickles #homemadepickles #recipes #foodstagram #foodblogger #food #foodlover #igfood 
#blackcat #blackcatsofinstagram #picoftheday 
#christmas #christmastree #xmas #merrychristmas #happychristmas #cambodia #siemreap
This crab omelette is a decadent eggs dish that’ This crab omelette is a decadent eggs dish that’s perfect if you’re just back from the fish markets armed with luxurious fresh crab meat. It’s a little sweet, a little spicy, and very, very moreish.

Our crab omelette recipe was one of our 22 most popular egg recipes of 2022 on our website Grantourismo and it’s no surprise. It’s appeared more times than any other egg recipes on our annual round-ups of most popular recipes since Terence launched Weekend Eggs when we launched Grantourismo in 2010.

If you’re an eggs lover, do check out the recipe collection. It includes egg recipes from right around the world, from recipes for classic kopitiam eggs from Singapore and Malaysia and egg curries from India and Myanmar to all kinds of egg recipes from Thailand, Japan, Korea, China, Mexico, USA, Australia, UK, and Ireland.

And do browse our Weekend Eggs archives for further eggspiration (sorry). We have hundreds of egg recipes from the 13 year-old series of recipes for quintessential egg dishes from around the world, which we started on our 2010 year-long global grand tour focused on slow, local and experiential travel. 

We’re hoping 2023 will be the year we can finally publish the Weekend Eggs cookbook we’ve talked about for years based on that series. After we can find a publisher for the Cambodia cookbook of course... :( 

Recipe collection here (and proper link to Grantourismo in our bio):
https://grantourismotravels.com/22-most-popular-egg-recipes-of-2022-from-weekend-eggs/

If you cook the recipe and enjoy it please let us know — we love to hear from you — either in the comments at the end of the recipe or share a pic with us here.

#recipe #recipes #eggs #eggslover #breakfasteggs #WeekendEggs #egg #breakfast #brunch #igfood #igfoodie #cooking #foodblog #food #foodstagram #instafood  #instafoodie #foodie #foodies #foodlover #foodpics #foodporn #foodphotography #foodwriter #foodblogger #recipedeveloper #lookingforapublisher #writingacookbook  #grantourismo #grantourismotravels
I’m late to share this, but a few days ago Angko I’m late to share this, but a few days ago Angkor Archaeological Park, home to stupendous Angkor Wat, pictured, celebrated 30 years of its UNESCO World Heritage listing. 

That’s as good an excuse as any to put this magnificent, sprawling archaeological site on your travel list this year.

While riverside Siem Reap, your base for exploring Angkor is bustling once more, there are still nowhere near the visitors of the last busy high season months of December-January 2018-2019 when there were 290,000 visitors. 

Last month there were just 55,000 visitors and December feels a little quieter. A tour guide friend said there were about 150 people at Angkor Wat for sunrise a few days ago.

If you’re looking for tips to visiting Angkor, Siem Reap and Cambodia, just ask us a question in the comments below or check Grantourismo as we’ve got loads of info on our site. Click through to the link in the bio and explore our Cambodia guide or search for ‘Angkor’. 

And please do let us know if you’re coming to Siem Reap. We’d love to see you here x

#siemreap #cambodia #asia #travel #instatravel #traveldeeper #slowtravel #localtravel #experientialtravel #exploremore #neverstopexploring #goexplore #igtravel #angkorwat #angkor #temple #temples #angkorwithoutcrowds #unesco #unescoworldheritagesite #unescoworldheritage #archaeology #archaeologicalsite #traveladdict #beautifuldestinations #beautifulplaces #travelgram #wanderlust #picoftheday📷 #grantourismotravels.
Our soy ginger chicken recipe will make you sticky Our soy ginger chicken recipe will make you sticky, flavourful and succulent chicken thighs that are fantastic with steamed rice, Chinese greens or a salad, such as a Southeast Asian slaw. 

The chicken can be marinated for up to 24 hours before cooking, which ensures it’s packed with flavour, then it can be cooked on a barbecue or in a pan.

Terence’s soy ginger chicken recipe is one of our favourite recipes for a quick and easy meal. I love the sound of the sizzling thighs in the pan, and the warming aromas wafting through the apartment. 

It’s amazing how such flavourful juicy chicken thighs come from such a quick and easy recipe.

Recipe here (and proper link to Grantourismo in our bio): https://grantourismotravels.com/soy-ginger-chicken-recipe/

If you cook it and enjoy it please let us know — we love to hear from you — either here or in the comments at the end of the recipe on the site or share a pic with us x 

#recipe #recipes #chicken #soygingerchicken #asianfood #southeastasianfood #igfood #igfoodie #cooking #cookingtime #recipe #recipes #comfortfood #foodblog #food #foodstagram #healthyfood #instafood #healthy #instafoodie #foodie #foodies #foodlover #foodpics #foodporn #foodphotography #foodwriter #foodblogger #recipedeveloper #writingacookbook #grantourismo #grantourismotravels
Who can guess the ingredients and what we’re mak Who can guess the ingredients and what we’re making with my market haul from Psar Samaki in Siem Reap — all for a whopping 10,000 riel (US$2.50)?! 

Birds-eye chillies thrown in for free! They were on my list but the seller I spent most at (5,000 riel!) scooped up a handful and slipped them into my bag. She was my last stop and knew what I was making.

My Khmer is poor, even after all our years in Cambodia, as I don’t learn languages with the ease I did in my 20s, plus I’m mentally exhausted after researching and writing all day. I have a better vocabulary of Old and Middle Khmer than modern Khmer from studying the ancient inscriptions for the Cambodian culinary history component of our cookbook I’m writing.

So when one seller totalled my purchases I thought she said 5,000 riel but she handed back 4,500 riel! The sum total of two huge bunches of herbs and kaffir lime leaves was 500 riel.

Tip: if visiting Siem Reap, use Khmer riel for local shopping. We’ve mainly used riel since the pandemic started— rarely use US$ now as market sellers quote prices in riels, as do local shops and bakeries, and I tip tuk tuk drivers in riels. I find prices quoted in riels are lower.

Psar Samaki is cheaper than Psar Leu, which is cheaper than Psar Chas, as it’s a wholesale market, which means the produce is fresher. I see veggies arriving, piled high in the back of vehicles, with dirt still on them — as I did on this trip. 

The scent of a mountain of incredibly aromatic pineapples offloaded from the back of a dusty ute was so heady they smelt like they’d just been cut. More exotic European style veggies arrive by big trucks in boxes labelled in Vietnamese (from Dalat) and Mandarin (from China), such as beautiful snow-white cauliflower I spotted.

Note: the freshest produce is sold on the dirt road at the back of the market.

#cambodia #siemreap #foodwriter #foodblogger #foodphotography #igfood #foodstagram #instafood #instafoodie #foodie #instadaily #picoftheday #market #siemreapmarket #psarsamaki #marketfresh #vegetables #healthyfood #marketshopping #traveltips #foodtravel #culinarytravel #localtravel #cooking #cookingtime #curry #homemade #currypaste #grantourismotravels
My Vietnamese-ish meatballs and rice noodles recip My Vietnamese-ish meatballs and rice noodles recipe makes tender meatballs doused in a delightfully tangy-sweet sauce, sprinkled with crispy fried shallots, with carrot-daikon, crunchy cucumber and fragrant herbs. 

The dish is inspired by bún chả, a Hanoi specialty, but it’s not bún chả. No matter what Google or food bloggers tell you. Names are important, especially when cooking and writing about cuisines not our own.

This is an authentic bún chả recipe:  https://grantourismotravels.com/vietnamese-bun-cha-recipe/ You’ll need to get the outdoor BBQ/grill going to do proper smoky bún chả meat patties (not meatballs).

My meatball noodle bowl is perhaps more closely related to dishes such as a Central Vietnam cousin bún thịt nướng (pork skewers on rice noodles in a bowl) and a Southern relation bún bò Nam Bộ (beef atop rice noodles, sprinkled with fried shallots (Nam Bộ=Southern Vietnam) though neither include meatballs. 

Xíu mại= meatballs although they’re different in flavour to mine, which taste more like bún chả patties. Xíu mại remind me of Southern Italian meatballs in tomato sauce.

In Vietnam’s Mekong Delta, home to millions of Khmer, there’s bánh tằm xíu mại. Bánh tằm=silk worm noodles. They’re topped with meatballs, cucumber, daikon, carrot, fresh herbs, crispy fried onions. Difference: cold noodles doused in a sauce of coconut cream and fish sauce. 

Remove the meatballs, add chopped fried spring rolls and it’s Cambodia’s banh sung, which is a rice noodle salad similar to Vietnam’s bún chả giò :) 

Recipe here: (link in bio) https://grantourismotravels.com/vietnamese-meatballs-and-rice-noodles-recipe/

For more on these culinary connections you’ll have to wait for our Cambodian cookbook and culinary history. In a hurry to know? Come support the project on Patreon. (link in bio)

#recipe #recipes #vietnamesefood #cambodianfood #asianfood #southeastasianfood #ricenoodles #rice #noodlebowl #meatballs #igfood #igfoodie #foodblog #food #foodstagram #instafood  #instafoodie #foodie #foodies #foodlover #foodpics #foodporn #foodphotography #foodwriter #foodblogger #writingacookbook #writingacambodiancookbook #patreon #patreoncreator #grantourismo
It is pure coincidence that Pepper’s eye colour It is pure coincidence that Pepper’s eye colour matches the furnishings of our rented apartment. So, no, I did not colour-coordinate the interiors to match our cat’s eyes. 

I keep getting DMs from pet clothing brands wanting to “partner” with Pepper and send her free cat clothes and cat accessories. Although she did wear a kerchief for a few years in her more adventurous fashion-forward teenage years, I cannot see this cat in clothes now, can you? 

#pepper #blackcat #blackcats #blackcatsofinstagram #blackcatsrule #blackcatsmatter #cat #cats #catsofinstagram #catstagram #catlover #catlovers #catlove #catoftheday #catphoto #catpic #catpics #cambodiancat #cambodiancatsofinstagram #catlife #catloversclub #catoftheday #catgram #catstagram #cats_of_instagram #catphotography #catsofig #catsoftheworld #catsofinsta #cats🐱 #siemreap #cambodia

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