New York City: Chinatown, Little Italy and the Lower East Side
Café Gitane 242 Mott St (between Prince and Houston sts) tel 212/334-9552.Sunny little café serving coffee and creative light lunch fare.
Caffè Roma
385 Broome St (between Mulberry and Mott sts) tel 212/226-8413.
Old Little Italy
pasticceria
, ideal for a drawn-out coffee and pastry. Try the homemade Italian cookies, exceptionally good cannoli (plain or dipped), or gelato at the counter in back.
Ceci-Cela
55 Spring St (at Mulberry St) tel 212/274-9179.
Tiny French
patisserie
with a stand-up counter and bench out front for coffee and delectable baked goods. The croissants and palmiers are divine.
Chinatown Ice Cream Factory
65 Bayard St (between Mott and Elizabeth sts) tel 212/608-4170.
An essential stop after sampling one of the restaurants nearby, but the wondrously unusual flavors make it good anytime. Specialties include green tea, ginger, almond cookies and lychee ice cream.
Ferrara's
195 Grand St (between Mott and Mulberry sts) tel 212/226-6150.
The best-known and most traditional of the Little Italy coffeehouses, this landmark has been around since 1892. Try the cheesecake, cannoli or
granite
(Italian ices) in summer.
Grilled Cheese
168 Ludlow St (between Houston and Stanton sts) tel 212/982-6600.
Great salads and grilled cheese sandwiches; very tiny dining space.
Kossar's
367 Grand St (at Essex St) tel 212/473-4810.
Jewish baker whose bialys may be the best in New York.
Kwong Wah Cake Company
234 Canal St (at Lafayette St) tel 212/925-3614.
You can't get more authentically Chinese than this cake establishment on teeming Canal St.
Saint's Alp Teahouse
51 Mott St (between Canal and Bayard sts) tel 212/766-9889.
Great stopoff in Chinatown's heart if you don't want the full restaurant experience, with hot green tea, Chinese fruit drinks and shakes (many with tapioca pearls at the bottom of the cup), and a good choice of snacks - try the vegetable dumplings or preserved eggs.
Yonah Schimmel's
137 E Houston St (between Forsyth and Eldridge sts) tel 212/477-2858.
Knishes, baked fresh on the premises, and wonderful bagels. Unpretentious and patronized by a mixture of wrinkled old men wisecracking in Yiddish and young uptowners slumming it while they wade through the Sunday papers.
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