New York City travel guide
NYC Half Weekend: Lysee's Madeleines, Pecking House's Wings, and a $21 Bagel Worth It
We came to New York to run the NYC Half, and ate our way across Manhattan and Brooklyn in between: a pizza landing after a long travel day, a fried chicken feast with friends, a madeleine tasting that required a month of advance booking, and a bagel expensive enough to make us question our life choices.
Where we ate.
Brooklyn Pizza Crew
Brooklyn, NYPizza
Get: A Bianca pizza and a Margherita pizza
Our landing meal after a long day of traveling, when all we wanted was something fast. The Margherita hit exactly right, and we joked about having to fight grannies for a table in the crowded dining room.
Pecking House
Brooklyn, NYCantonese-style fried chicken
Get: Salted egg yolk wings, a spicy version, oyster mushroom "fried chicken" for the vegetarian option, a honey glaze, and a cheddar flavor, plus fries
We met up with local NYC foodie friends here, and every version of the chicken delivered. The oyster mushroom "fried chicken" was genuinely convincing, so crispy and saucy we had to double check it wasn't meat; the salted egg yolk and honey glazes were standouts, and the cheddar flavor edged out the plain fries, which went mostly untouched.
Lysee
New York, NYFrench patisserie, dessert tasting menu
Get: An assortment of madeleines and pastries, including a citrus-and-apple dessert
Art you can taste, and priced like it: each piece ran over $10, with our whole spread landing around $60. We tried both a denser and a fluffier madeleine (we preferred the dense one for how it carried the chocolate) plus a citrusy, orange-peel-topped dessert with an apple-sauce consistency made from what might be the juiciest apples we've ever had. You can't eat inside without a reservation booked a month in advance, so plan ahead.
Raku
New York, NYJapanese izakaya, udon and yakitori
Get: Monkfish liver, umeboshi, a fatty duck breast, and QQ udon noodles in a light broth
A first for us on the monkfish liver, and the QQ (springy, bouncy) udon noodles were a texture we don't get often. The duck breast was pleasantly fatty, and the broth underneath the noodles was clean and light instead of heavy, the kind of dish we said we needed to figure out how to make at home.
Ess-a-Bagel
New York, NYClassic NYC bagel
Get: A loaded bagel with whitefish and lox instead of cream cheese
A $21 bagel, toasted just right, with whitefish standing in for the usual cream cheese. Genuinely great texture, crunchy outside, soft inside, and the lox were a highlight, even if the price means we're not having this every day.
Royal Seafood
Brooklyn, NYCantonese seafood and dim sum
Get: Ask what's fresh that day
Another stop on this trip; a well-known Brooklyn Cantonese seafood spot worth checking out if you're in the area for dim sum.
Devocion
Brooklyn, NYCoffee roaster
Get: Ask for whatever's fresh-roasted
A coffee stop on this trip, known locally for roasting beans on-site.
Furman's Coffee
Brooklyn, NYCoffee
Get: Ask what's fresh that day
Another coffee stop worth a mention from this trip.
Brodo
New York, NYBone broth, to-go
Get: A cup of bone broth
A quick warm-up stop on a cold day; good for exactly what it is, a simple, clean cup of broth.
Good to know before you go
- We also grabbed a lamb skewer from a street cart, cumin-heavy and juicy enough that we called it one of the best we'd ever had, in 10-degree weather no less.
- Not every stop on this trip was in Brooklyn; this was a broader New York City trip built around running the NYC Half Marathon.