Vicarious NYC food adventures
November 20, 2021 8:49 PM   Subscribe

I'm looking for videos--preferably a Youtube series or channel--that are focused on interesting food in the greater NYC area.

I've seen Bourdain's relevant episodes and so on, so now I'm just looking for Youtubers. I don't know enough about types of Youtubers to say what I do or don't want, but I'd prefer people who are positive about what they're eating--definitely not anyone whose schtick is getting grossed out on camera or tearing restaurants apart. Bonus points if a channel isn't all white guys all the time, and for non-forced humor.

Steakhouses I don't care about, but pretty much any other type of food is fine. The more regional or difficult to find in other parts of the US, the better, but really pretty much anything.

I've been to NYC twice, both times briefly, and (largely due to my own poor planning!) the only memorably good meal I had was at the Great Northern Food Hall in Grand Central. Now I live much closer to NYC than I ever have and I'm looking forward to getting to explore. Someday. So for now, YouTube.

Ideally, I'd really like a series or a channel rather than individual short videos, but if there's something you just love, please link it anyway. Thank you!
posted by wintersweet to Food & Drink (9 answers total) 8 users marked this as a favorite
 
Best answer: Food Insider, the food offshoot of Business Insider, has some good videos, including a whole 257(!)-part playlist on NYC eats.
posted by carrienation at 9:05 PM on November 20, 2021


Best answer: I highly recommend Food and Footprints. It's the channel of a couple based in New York. They left a couple of years ago to travel the world, but almost all the content before then is in New York City and largely in Queens. They love food and their enthusiasm is infectious. The videos have themes. Some examples:


Ethopian food in New York
Greek food in Astoria
New York's best night market
Frozen dessert tour
South Indian food tour

They cover a lot of places that aren't restaurants. For example, the South Indian video includes the Ganesh Temple Canteen, and they have a whole video about places that make tacos on weekends only. Poke around on their channel, you'll find a lot of gems.

Bear in mind that some of these places may have gone out of business since the videos were made, but I saw a few that I know are still going strong.

They have a ton of videos. Poke around and I'm sure you'll find something of interest.
posted by zorseshoes at 1:18 AM on November 21, 2021 [2 favorites]


Best answer: Mike Chen has a channel called Strictly Dumpling that is mostly Asian based and he was originally based out of NYC.
posted by tipsyBumblebee at 2:36 AM on November 21, 2021 [4 favorites]


Best answer: They haven't posted in a few years but I liked this series from two guys who hit each stop on the A-Train and got random people to suggest restaurants.

For more recent content, the Munchies channel does nice short documentaries on food trucks and small restaurants. Not all NYC but the location is usually mentioned in the title. Here's a good one about a Burmese Restaurant inside a subway station.
posted by Gortuk at 8:01 AM on November 21, 2021


I was going to suggest Mikey Chen/ Strictly Dumpling too. He's very positive about the food he eats and very diplomatic about the restaurants. But you'd have to dig to find his NY videos, I remember seeing some in the past but he's moved a few times and he travels a lot, so his new stuff isn't based out of NYC. But I think there might still be a lot of older videos that are, maybe even on his other channel. He's still very entertaining to watch.
posted by Dimes at 11:36 AM on November 21, 2021


Best answer: Mike Chen returns to NYC on a regular basis (his parents live there and he owns a home upstate), he had several new NYC videos in the past week.

Jennifer O'Brien has gone a little quiet on food content in the past two years but her older videos might scratch your itch.
posted by Lyn Never at 1:52 PM on November 21, 2021


Response by poster: (Just in case anyone else was wondering, yes, non-restaurants are also excellent! Bakeries, markets, carts, trucks, temples, etc. are all great. Thank you all so far!)
posted by wintersweet at 2:40 PM on November 21, 2021


Best answer: oh man, surprised no one has mentioned mike colameco - https://www.thirteen.org/programs/mike-colamecos-real-food/

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Michael_Colameco

pbs for the win : ) I’m sure there are some shows of his out there to watch online for free , if you dont have ota broadcast tv, but also, the wnet/pbs app, called passport last time i downloaded it, is great.
posted by elgee at 1:17 AM on November 22, 2021


Best answer: The Fung Bros on YouTube do a lot of videos trying different foods and cuisines in NYC.
posted by Lexica at 9:40 AM on November 23, 2021


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