New York MeFites: where can I get a decent egg cream?
September 9, 2023 7:20 AM Subscribe
I'm visiting New York City in a month, and one of my to-do list items is to have a proper New York egg cream. I keep reading references to it in Richard Boch's Mudd Club memoir and elsewhere (like the terrible late-period Lou Reed song of the same name) and I can't help but be curious. Suggestions for places in either Manhattan or Brooklyn? Or am I 50 years too late for the real thing?
It's been a while since I've gotten there, , but there is a wonderful, old time soda fountain shop in the unlikely neighborhood of the UES that has amazing egg creams, and to me is a gentler, less time-consuming experience for a soda fountain drink than the chaos of the classic delis ..Lexington Candy Shop..
posted by ojocaliente at 7:44 AM on September 9, 2023 [3 favorites]
posted by ojocaliente at 7:44 AM on September 9, 2023 [3 favorites]
(PS 50 years ago, you'd probably have gotten the egg cream at this style of counter luncheonette during the course of your day. )
posted by ojocaliente at 8:02 AM on September 9, 2023
posted by ojocaliente at 8:02 AM on September 9, 2023
Best answer: I'm weirdly reminded of the time a dude I was briefly seeing long-distance came here to Brooklyn to visit me. At some point he asked me "is there a place nearby where I could find a bagel?" He didn't know why I thought that was so funny.
I'm going to warn you right now that you're going to find a whole lot of answers to this, and here's why: there are egg creams, and then there are egg creams. A lot of delis, diners, and soda fountain-type places will have the bare-bones basic version of an egg cream - it's just a mix of milk, seltzer, and chocolate syrup, and it's such an iconic "this is a New York thing" kind of thing that a lot of places will put it on their menu. But there's a difference between an egg cream that you can throw together with whatever random crap you get off the shelf, and an egg cream that you make with quality ingredients - or at least the ingredients which tradition holds are the optimal ones. (There is a school of thought which holds that a proper egg cream must use Fox's U-Bet brand chocolate syrup, for instance.) So it's worth actually seeking out some place that does it Right.
Fortunately there are a lot of those. The Lower East Side or Brooklyn are where you'll find most of them; the place that was regarded as the place with the best egg creams has unfortunately closed (it was called Gem Spa), but nearby is a place called Ray's Candy Store which has a similar vibe. (The "accidentally Wes Anderson" instagram follows their Instagram page, which somehow says something.) Nearby you will find Russ & Daughters, which is a longtime deli in the Lower East Side; they've been around for nearly a hundred years, they can be trusted.
Ray's and Russ & Daughters are more takeout places; Katz's Deli is a sit-down place, and I would trust their egg creams for sure. (And you want to go to Katz's anyway for its own "iconic New York" cred.) If you want an option in Brooklyn, Brooklyn Farmacy is an ideal option - this is a former soda fountain that got re-opened and revived by Brooklyn foodie hipsters in 2010, but they did a more straightforward revival than a "hipster re-imagining" or whatever. Brooklyn Farmacy is also a fun spot for diner food and has great ice cream as well, with fun sundaes (that's where most of the hipster energy went, into designing sundaes).
Speaking of "hipster re-imagining" - because the basic egg cream recipe is so basic, it's inspired a lot of improvisation, especially recently; some places offer coffee egg creams, egg creams with ube, chai egg creams, and other variants. If you're into improvisations like that, I'd start with the basic version first to set a baseline.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 8:26 AM on September 9, 2023 [14 favorites]
I'm going to warn you right now that you're going to find a whole lot of answers to this, and here's why: there are egg creams, and then there are egg creams. A lot of delis, diners, and soda fountain-type places will have the bare-bones basic version of an egg cream - it's just a mix of milk, seltzer, and chocolate syrup, and it's such an iconic "this is a New York thing" kind of thing that a lot of places will put it on their menu. But there's a difference between an egg cream that you can throw together with whatever random crap you get off the shelf, and an egg cream that you make with quality ingredients - or at least the ingredients which tradition holds are the optimal ones. (There is a school of thought which holds that a proper egg cream must use Fox's U-Bet brand chocolate syrup, for instance.) So it's worth actually seeking out some place that does it Right.
Fortunately there are a lot of those. The Lower East Side or Brooklyn are where you'll find most of them; the place that was regarded as the place with the best egg creams has unfortunately closed (it was called Gem Spa), but nearby is a place called Ray's Candy Store which has a similar vibe. (The "accidentally Wes Anderson" instagram follows their Instagram page, which somehow says something.) Nearby you will find Russ & Daughters, which is a longtime deli in the Lower East Side; they've been around for nearly a hundred years, they can be trusted.
Ray's and Russ & Daughters are more takeout places; Katz's Deli is a sit-down place, and I would trust their egg creams for sure. (And you want to go to Katz's anyway for its own "iconic New York" cred.) If you want an option in Brooklyn, Brooklyn Farmacy is an ideal option - this is a former soda fountain that got re-opened and revived by Brooklyn foodie hipsters in 2010, but they did a more straightforward revival than a "hipster re-imagining" or whatever. Brooklyn Farmacy is also a fun spot for diner food and has great ice cream as well, with fun sundaes (that's where most of the hipster energy went, into designing sundaes).
Speaking of "hipster re-imagining" - because the basic egg cream recipe is so basic, it's inspired a lot of improvisation, especially recently; some places offer coffee egg creams, egg creams with ube, chai egg creams, and other variants. If you're into improvisations like that, I'd start with the basic version first to set a baseline.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 8:26 AM on September 9, 2023 [14 favorites]
Oh, another vote in favor of Ray's - Anthony Bourdain's last-ever Parts Unknown episode was about the Lower East Side and the East Village, and he stopped by Ray's for an egg cream.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 8:30 AM on September 9, 2023 [1 favorite]
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 8:30 AM on September 9, 2023 [1 favorite]
Another vote in favor of Russ & Daughters -- to add to what was said before, it has a cafe, which IS sit-down/dine-in (on Orchard between Rivington and Delancey) -- and has delicious egg creams, including a malt version.
posted by virve at 9:37 AM on September 9, 2023
posted by virve at 9:37 AM on September 9, 2023
An NYC food blogger I like very much did egg creams for her letter E as she ate her way through the alphabet of New York: e is for egg creams
posted by PussKillian at 11:21 AM on September 9, 2023
posted by PussKillian at 11:21 AM on September 9, 2023
Tom’s Restaurant in Prospect Heights, Brooklyn does them right.
posted by soy_renfield at 12:21 PM on September 9, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by soy_renfield at 12:21 PM on September 9, 2023 [2 favorites]
S&P lunch, 174 Fifth Ave/22nd St. It's the old Eisenberg's and they've kept the old-timey look of the place.
posted by essexjan at 12:51 PM on September 9, 2023 [3 favorites]
posted by essexjan at 12:51 PM on September 9, 2023 [3 favorites]
Beryl Shereshewsky just did a "NYC A to Z" video, which included this stop for Egg Cream:
Egg Cream
Where to go: Old John’s Luncheonette, 148 W 67th St, New York, NY 10023
What to eat: chocolate egg cream
https://www.iloveoldjohns.com/
posted by Lyn Never at 1:02 PM on September 9, 2023
Egg Cream
Where to go: Old John’s Luncheonette, 148 W 67th St, New York, NY 10023
What to eat: chocolate egg cream
https://www.iloveoldjohns.com/
posted by Lyn Never at 1:02 PM on September 9, 2023
Anywhere that makes them is going to be fine. They have three extremely common ingredients and the proportions don't matter a ton. I love an egg cream and have never had one where I was like "damn, these people don't know how to make an egg cream."
posted by less-of-course at 1:27 PM on September 9, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by less-of-course at 1:27 PM on September 9, 2023 [2 favorites]
(Upon reading some other answers, it looks like I'm out of step! I just...I think there's a kind of bestism that gets intense around certain kinds of food things and it's hard for me to understand it with respect to an egg cream unless you're like a "supertaster" to whom different seltzers taste radically different. But maybe I'm just a lowbrow.)
posted by less-of-course at 1:32 PM on September 9, 2023 [2 favorites]
posted by less-of-course at 1:32 PM on September 9, 2023 [2 favorites]
Best answer: Upon reading some other answers, it looks like I'm out of step!
To redirect and address this: this is what I was getting at when I said that the OP would be able to find an egg cream in many places. I think, though, that there's a difference between someone who lives here and is in a hurry and isn't particularly fussy about whether their egg cream is the platonian ideal or not, and someone who's never had one before and is visiting the city and wants One That's Done Right.
It's like with pizza - there are the super-ultimate-best-ever pizza places like John's on Bleeker or Grimaldi's, and then there are the "not as good as John's on Bleeker or Grimaldi's but still okay" corner places when all you need is your bog-standard slice in between meetings or something. It's not like the corner slice places suck - lots of times they're perfectly fine and tasty. But they're still not the places you recommend to someone looking for "The BEST pizza in the city", you know? So it's like that - the OP is looking for the Grimaldi's of egg creams.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 3:17 PM on September 9, 2023
To redirect and address this: this is what I was getting at when I said that the OP would be able to find an egg cream in many places. I think, though, that there's a difference between someone who lives here and is in a hurry and isn't particularly fussy about whether their egg cream is the platonian ideal or not, and someone who's never had one before and is visiting the city and wants One That's Done Right.
It's like with pizza - there are the super-ultimate-best-ever pizza places like John's on Bleeker or Grimaldi's, and then there are the "not as good as John's on Bleeker or Grimaldi's but still okay" corner places when all you need is your bog-standard slice in between meetings or something. It's not like the corner slice places suck - lots of times they're perfectly fine and tasty. But they're still not the places you recommend to someone looking for "The BEST pizza in the city", you know? So it's like that - the OP is looking for the Grimaldi's of egg creams.
posted by EmpressCallipygos at 3:17 PM on September 9, 2023
Response by poster: Thanks to everyone for their suggestions. I was in NYC for a week and tried several egg creams. Final verdict: Ray's Candy Store for taste, and Brooklyn Farmacy for presentation.
I also had a meatlovers pizza at Grimaldi's in Manhattan. Good time all around. Cheers!
posted by spoobnooble 3D: the spoobening at 2:33 AM on October 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
I also had a meatlovers pizza at Grimaldi's in Manhattan. Good time all around. Cheers!
posted by spoobnooble 3D: the spoobening at 2:33 AM on October 21, 2023 [2 favorites]
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Russ & Daughters
posted by slkinsey at 7:38 AM on September 9, 2023 [2 favorites]