My girlfriend and I had a delicious meal at Wa Jeal last December, so even the Upper East Side is not devoid of good Chinese food.

Boy are you ever wrong about Korean food! There's loads of it in Queens! I mean, OK, if you want to limit yourself to Manhattan, but if you're willing to go to Boston, do you hesitate to take the 7 train?

Where were your Malaysian friends satisfied?

My brother and sister-in-law went recently and gave a scathing report. It may have suddenly gone downhill, but not years ago. It was fine the last time I went several months ago.

New York is much more crowded and populous than SF, and you're unlikely to find places no-one knows about, especially in Manhattan.

Given where you're staying, make sure to get a margherita slice at South Brooklyn Pizza, on 1st Av. between 7th St. and St Marks. I went there again last night, and their pizza was even better than usual, but the usual is quite good.

I don't think that people would recommend places they consider stale. :-)

Also especially considering where you're staying, you might consider booking a 10-course kaiseki dinner at Kyo Ya, which is just a wonderful experience.

There really are loads of places to go to in and around the East Village. kathryn posts about lots of them, so read through her posts and think about which of the places might be interesting to you.

I'll throw another name into the mix: Acme: http://acmenyc.com/about It's not going to be a quiet experience at an unknown place for you, but it's part of what's hot. I haven't been there in years, but while it's a big scene place, the food, reportedly, is great, and it's associated with the Nordic aesthetic (the current chef was a co-founder of Noma in Copenhagen).

Since you want to go to places that are less crowded and more off the beaten path, I really encourage you to post to Outer Boroughs. I love the East Village, but feeling part of this neighborhood means that every place you go to was already "discovered" by someone else. And on weekends, this area is party central for people from outside the neighborhood (and some people who live in the neighborhood, too). But there's a lot of good food here.

I have yet to go to any truly good Malaysian restaurant in New York, whereas when I was in London in 2010, I went to a place in their Chinatown which local hounds judged to be only second best, and the food tasted like what I could have had at stalls in Malaysia. I'll try the new place called Mamak in Flushing some time next week, though, probably, but if it's only 1/3 as good as that place in London, I'll be relatively satisfied, for New York. Malaysian food is very weak here.

Well, a contender would be Jerusalem, on Broadway near 104th St., for shawarma or falafel (no sabich), but it's not a place I take a round-trip to on the subway, though definitely good enough to take a detour to if I'm in the area.

I haven't tried the Hallo Berlin cart, but I like their restaurant. It's very good and quite inexpensive, and they have good beer _and wine_ at low prices.

If you found Babbo oversalted, I'm not sure what you'll think of Quality Meats. I didn't find my food at Babbo oversalted, when I went there several years ago, whereas when I had lunch at Quality meats within the past couple of years, I thought their food was good but too salty. So keep that in the back of your mind.

Cool. Thanks for the report!

Georgia is also known for their wines. I imagine they have some on their list, if they have a liquor license.

That's a very broad query, and I think most of us New Yorkers don't care about Michelin stars or, necessarily, restaurants that are trying to get them. I also am unsure whether "best of the best" and "nothing safe" aren't a bit contradictory. So I'll concentrate on the "nothing safe," because a query for "best of the best" will give you mostly the usual suspects, which are all Michelin-starred places (Masa, Per Se, 11 Madison Park, etc.), most of which I haven't gone to, anyway.

If you really want stuff that's out there, I think WD-50 and Atera are the places that are considered avant garde, molecular gastronomy, or whatever the latest buzzword is.

Some people have called Booker & Dax, the great cocktail bar next to Momofuku Ssam Bar (a place that's not so "out there" but is eclectic and very good, though "best of the best" is a little much) a molecular cocktail bar, but though they use fancy techniques like liquid nitrogen, I think they're just really excellent and composing a perfectly proportioned cocktail.

Another place that might possibly interest you because it's a bit off-beat and very good is Salumeria Rosi, which serves salumi-based cuisine (again, I wouldn't call it "best of the best," but I do like it).

You might also check on the Outer Boroughs for anything off-beat going on in Brooklyn or Queens.

Spring Street Natural is kind of underwhelming. Last time I went there (admittedly, that could have been a couple of years ago), our waiter pointedly told us when we asked that THEY don't let him try any of the food, so he couldn't personally recommend anything. That's the mark of an unserious restaurant.

Yeah, and it doesn't sound promising. Have you tried it?

I found the analogy offensive. But I think you may be older than I am. I remember some very good Chinese food in the 70s, just not as much of it, and it wasn't as diverse or nearly as well distributed to different neighborhoods. I really enjoyed the food at Foo Joy and Nom Wah when I was a little kid, and I've been going to New York Noodletown since, I believe, the late 70s (I forget precisely when it opened). There were a couple of good Chinese restaurants uptown, though (I grew up on the Upper West Side). For a few years, when they had their good chef, Chun Cha Fu put out what I thought in those days was quite creditable food. And for a while, there was a Sichuan restaurant on the 2nd floor of a building on Broadway between 109th and 110th Sts., starting in the late 70s, which was probably the first restaurant where I had possibly real, spicy, and sometimes strange-tasting (like their "Strange Taste Chicken") Sichuan food.

I know very well that there is categorically better Chinese food (certainly in styles like Cantonese/Hong Kong style) in California, let alone places like Kuala Lumpur, Singapore, Hong Kong, or let alone Shanghainese food in Shanghai. But we're here in New York, and there's a heck of a lot of Chinese food here that doesn't suck.

I'm talking about the standard of Chinese food in New York now as opposed to in previous years. I don't think that's a call to generally dis Chinese food in New York. Besides, I don't agree with you, and my experience of having eaten fantastic Chinese food in many other places qualifies me to have a knowledgeable opinion. If you want to talk about cuisines in which New York is really lacking, you can talk about Burmese and Cambodian food (do we even have a single restaurant in either style?), Malaysian food, Vietnamese food. But repeatedly bashing New York Chinese food is getting boring already. If you don't like it, don't have it. Is the general standard of Chinese food higher in California? Yeah. That doesn't make it suck here, and nothing you say will cause me to change my mind about that because I know what I like.

I'm not assuming anything. I've had good Chinese food in Boston (nothing impressive in Montreal's then-small Chinatown, when I was there in 1996), but I find the idea that the average level of Chinese food is superior in those two cities surprising; that's all.

Meanwhile, since when do you think the standard of Chinese food in New York has dropped? Name the year, please, because I remember back to the late 60s (though I was very young then), and I would strongly state that the standard is higher now than ever.

The standards in New York have dropped? Compared to when?

I do agree with the problems itemized in the comment you quote from. I couldn't disagree more with the idea that standards for Chinese food have dropped in New York.

Also, I haven't been to Boston or Montreal lately, but their average Chinese restaurant is of better quality than the ones in New York? That surprises me.

There's also delicious Chinese food in Bay Ridge. I'm not an expert on Brooklyn Chinatowns, but I get the feeling there may be 3 or 4 by now, as Bensonhurst is also increasingly Chinese.

I was alerted to this article in the "NY Magazine's 'Sichuan Belt' in midtown Manhattan" thread: http://www.menuism.com/blog/manhattan...

Here's a list of the places mentioned:

Cha Chan Tang at 45 Mott Street

Mottzar Kitchen at 70 Mott St.

Full House Café at 97 Bowery

Lee Chung Café, located at 82 Madison St.

Noodle Village at 13 Mott St.

Cutting Board, 53 Bayard

Spicy Village at 68B Forsyth St. (formerly He Nan Flavor

Diamond Hill Café at 147 Canal St. (for want of a better description is the “Asian Chipotle,” and therefore probably not worth our attention)

85 Chinese Restaurant at 85 Chrystie St. (formerly Yogee)

Xi’an Famous Foods at 67 Bayard St.

Poon Kee at 39 Monroe St.

Xian has been covered extensively and doesn't need to be covered in this thread. Spicy Village/He Nan Flavor has also been covered pretty extensively and is a very good and worthwhile place to visit if you have a reason to be in the neighborhood.

I've been to Noodle Village, though not recently, and found it very good. I went to the old Yogee and was very underwhelmed. I haven't been to the rest of these and would love to hear your opinions on whether they were well picked for an article by this title.

Kalustyan's.

Are you saying Sietsema is to blame for hipsters? :-)

Their cuttlefish balls are very good.

OK, I get what you're saying, but I don't think the fact that there are more sources of information now reflects on him.

I certainly think one can reasonably criticize Sietsema. He is no god. But I think that while there are criticisms that can be made on an absolute basis, it would be great if this discussion had a little more light (specific criticisms and praise) and a little less heat (unsupported assertions).

So let's go back to your initial remark. I may have missed something, but I don't think I ever saw a specific elaboration on this from you:

"In retrospect, he missed some of the best places and I hate to say it, did the city a disservice by leading people off the trail of really exceptional and accessible food."

How did he "lead people off the trail of really exceptional and accessible food"? Just by not reviewing some places you liked (which I don't think would have led people away from them, as "leading away" is an active verb)? Which places?

"Now that there are other sources, there are others doing it better."

Who is doing it better? Please give us his/her name, so we can follow them. I'll give you an example: I love Lau, who posts here and on his site, Lauhound. His recommendations are great. But I don't think he would pretend to be as prolific in his coverage as Sietsema, nor as broad in his overall coverage (yes, he does cover a broad spectrum, but with a bias toward East Asian food that coincides with mine, and therefore is congenial for me).

So who do you suggest we follow as better than Sietsema, or is your argument that it is better to follow numerous sources, and in that case, how does it benefit anyone if one of our sources is silenced?

I think New York Chinese food has changed a great deal since the 80s. On topic for this thread, there is much more Sichuan food, and more of it is good. There are also the beginnings of a Hunanese food scene. And the diversity in Flushing blossoms apace - for example, there are several Dongbei restaurants, and I'm not sure there were any in the Five Boroughs in the 80s. Also, in Manhattan, I believe there's much more Fuzhounese food than there was in the 80s.

Yeah, that's true.

Well, I used to live in Malaysia and have also had fantastic Chinese food in Hong Kong, China, Thailand, and Singapore, not to mention London and California. I have no outsized "local pride" in New York's Chinese food. But I do think that - especially if we include Flushing - it's more diverse and more of it is good than ever.

I've never been to Lan Sheng and have no axe to grind about it, so that had nothing to do with my reaction to you.

You seem to think you can discredit people who respect Sietsema by calling them "fans." I posted my take on him right near the top of this thread:

"I found that sometimes, Sietsema was overly excited about a place he thought was great that I found merely good, but I loved his passion and commitment, and he's a good writer."

Does that make me a "fan"? I'm not sure I care whether you think it does or doesn't, but I think that having passion for one's work, plus at least a reasonable amount of specific knowledge, and being a good writer is enough to make someone a worthwhile restaurant critic. I didn't always agree with Sietsema, but I also found him a good read, and I appreciated that he cared about his work. It's certainly true that I've read him much less in recent years, but then I've read all newspapers much less and seldom watch TV because I get most of my news and information on the internet, and secondarily the radio. That's not a function of the quality of anyone's work, though; it's just a change in medium.

The way to efficiently make this happen is to take the subway. And everywhere on the East Side is easily reachable via the Lexington Av. Line (4/5 express, 6 local). Chelsea Market will involve either a long walk or a slow crosstown bus. Familiarize yourself with the MTA website, http://www.mta.info. You can see subway and bus maps there. You can also get walking+transit directions via Hopstop or Google Maps.