‘Lower East Side food tour!’ a man with a yellow umbrella called out, practically shoving a pamphlet into my face as I stumbled out of the subway at Houston Street on 2nd Avenue. The summer air was thick and humid. Crowds spilled out of bars and cafes, and the scents of pastrami, shawarma carts, and — oddly enough — charcoal wafted through the streets. It was my first evening in New York City after a turbulent 8-hour flight from London that had worsened both an emerging headache and hunger pangs, and I was ready to eat my body weight in anything within arm’s reach.
Most visitors to New York City think they know its food scene from films and television, and will find themselves grabbing questionable street cart hot dogs or one of the many dollar pizza slices scattered across the city.
But the reality across NYC is far messier and more compelling. New York is where immigrant communities have shaped entire neighbourhoods through corner shops, cramped kitchens, and restaurants that serve as community centres as much as places to eat. For four centuries, this has been the city’s defining pattern: each new wave of arrivals finding a place to live, building economic footholds through food, and gradually reshaping what it means to be a New Yorker. The Lower East Side, with its layers of Jewish, Latino, and Asian immigration, tells this story as clearly as anywhere — but it’s a pattern repeated from Flushing to Brighton Beach to Queens.
The aim of my trip was to explore New York City’s decades of immigration history, shaped through its food. And with the city having just reached its 400th birthday, it felt like the perfect time to pay homage to New York’s culinary heritage.
My first stop was Little Myanmar in the East Village, a restaurant specialising in Burmese cuisine, where I caught up with a local New Yorker friend. The place was stacked with rickety tables and mismatched chairs, and a curtain separated the kitchen from the rest of the restaurant. Despite its modest size, the place was packed, which I took as a good sign. I flipped through the menu, featuring a range of tea leaf salads, shrimp curries, and Burmese soups. We decided on two servings of…
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