In celebration of a close friend’s 30th birthday, my group of girlfriends and I travelled up to New York City. We spent a portion doing a food tour through Greenwich Village, eating at approximately ten stops along the way. This area is filled with charm, history and delicious mom-and-pop Italian specialty food shops and restaurants. The tour was led by the Foods of NY Tours group (two thumbs up to our guide).
Our first destination on the food tour was Joe’s Pizza. If you want to experience true New York style pizza, this is your stop. They use filtered New York water to give the dough a unique, delcious taste. (Fun fact: a company in Florida has the water driven down regularly to use for their pizza dough -because it’s that good). The pizza sauce is created using tomatoes imported from Italy. Enjoy a slice on the go, in true New York fashion, but don’t let any of that delicious melted cheese slip off the plate!
Sweet dreams are made of cheese. Mmmm this next stop is still making me smile. Y’all, Murray’s Cheese Shop is the Beyonce, or Brieonce, of cheese shops. It was loaded with cheese wheel on top of cheese wheel. We sampled a few different cheeses, and then admired their assortment of cheeses from all around the world.
We had quite the treat stopping at Ristorante Rafele when we met the head chef, Rafele, himself! The guy is as nice as he is talented. After winning Food Network’s Chopped competition, he donated his earnings to the Elizabeth Seton Pediatric Center to fund pediatric rehabilitation projects. We sat down for a small meal, enjoying creamy pasta, fried artichokes and red sangria (cue sashay emoji). I can’t recommend this place enough.
For an afternoon snack, we devoured incredible cookies at Milk and Cookies. Made with premium ingredients, these cookies were quick to melt in my mouth. My gluten-free friends were generous to share a portion of their gelato, which led to an epic gelato-cookie sandwich.
During the tour we learned about architecture and history of the area. In more recent history, we saw this building pictured below. Do you recognize it? It was the featured apartment in Friends!
Lastly we visited Pasticceria Rocco, an Italian pastry shop. We dove into a box of their famous cannoli. It has a homemade crunchy shell filled with rich, decadent ricotta filling. Mmm I’ll take the whole box, thank you.
We had a great time learning and eating our way around Greenwich Village. If you visit New York I would recommend this tour for your list of things to do.
Do you have any favorite food tours you have done?
Live your life joyfully so,
Ashley
