Unless you work on Wall Street or are a tourist on your way to the ferry to see the Statue of Liberty, there aren’t a lot of reasons to spend time in the Financial District. Then again, there are at least 10 restaurants that are worth pointing yourself southward to the Financial District for. Forget about bulls and banks. There is good food to be consumed in the Financial District. Here are the 10 best restaurants in the financial district of NYC.
Bodega Gran Via
Newly opened Bodega Gran Via partners with Spanish specialty grocer Despaña to source great ingredients from Spain. The restaurant, located on ambient Stone Street, has a crowded menu of pinchos and tapas: all the Spanish staples are here, such as Jamon croquetas, tinned seafood, Galician octopus, garlic shrimp, and patatas bravas. But there are also grilled artichokes, Jamon-spiked deviled eggs, and plenty of morcillas (or blood sausage).
El Vez
New Yorkers don’t love restaurant imports. They want to be the first, to have birthed a great restaurant. El Vez, an import from Philadelphia, is an exception. This Mexican restaurant puts out solid south-of-the-border fare, especially its nachos which you can get with chorizo, birrio, mushrooms, and/or queso Chihuahua. El Vez has even gotten in on the birria trend and the birria tacos, accompanied by a side of consumé, are quite good here.
Related Reading: Check out our top 12 picks for the best nachos in NYC!
Brooklyn Chop House
Though it’s called a “chophouse,” this popular downtown spot is much more than just steaks and chops. Sure, the dry-aged tomahawk steak is incredible here and so is the 48-ounce porterhouse. But Brooklyn Chop House also has a menu loaded with dim sum deliciousness. It’s dumplings galore here. And some creative ones at that: pastrami dumplings, Philly cheesesteak dumplings, lamb gyro dumplings, lobster roll dumplings. You get the idea.
The Dead Rabbit
The three-level Dead Rabbit is more known for its cocktails—after all, it’s often cited as the best cocktail bar on the planet—but no lower Manhattan restaurant list would be respectable without having the Rabbit on it. The Irish comfort food menu here is very good and it goes very well with a cocktail. For example, Crab-and-cheese fritters, sausage rolls, Guinness-braised rib sliders, beer-battered fried chicken, and a hearty lamb stew will put enough good food in the tummy to have a few more drinks.
Cicci di Carne
The mad butcher from Tuscany, Dario Cecchini, who played a near-starring role in Bill Buford’s book “Heat,” is the man behind this excellent sandwich shop in Brookfield Place. Cicci di Carne, which roughly translates as “pals of meat” in Italian, specializes in superlative sandwiches. After eating the porchetta sandwich you’ll wish you had a second stomach for the smoked pastrami or the roast beef sandwiches.
Delmonico’s
This eating institution was opened in 1827, first as a cafe and pastry shop, then as a full-blown restaurant. Today it is widely considered to be the first fine-dining restaurant in the United States. A lot of boldface names have tucked into a steak here, including Jackie Kennedy, Marilyn Monroe, Elvis, and Elizabeth Taylor, and, going way back, Charles Dickens, Oscar Wilde, and Napoleon III of France, among many others.
Delmonico’s is often attributed with inventing several fishes, including egg Benedict, baked Alaska, lobster Newburg, and the wedge salad. This is why it had to make our list of best restaurants in the financial district. But Delmonico’s is most known for its steak. Order a martini and a medium-rare steak and get ready to bite into a piece of culinary history.
Fraunces Tavern
The oldest tavern in New York, Fraunces began pouring beer in 1762. Twenty-0ne years later, George Washington threw a huge feast on the second floor to celebrate the permanent departure of British troops from New York City.
Today you can have your own feast at this atmospheric spot. In addition to several beers on tap, Fraunces has a menu loaded with above-average pub grub. Morcilla and brie pintxos, slow-roasted chicken pot pie, a bison burger, lobster mac ‘n’ cheese, and crispy fish and chips are probably not what Washington ate, but they are the standouts on the menu today.
Kesté
One of the best pizzerias in New York City, Kesté helped kickstart the Neapolitan pizza revolution in the Big Apple when it opened in 2009 in the West Village. Now the sole location is here, in lower Manhattan. And the pizza is good enough to make a trek from anywhere in the five boroughs. There is a large handful of pizzas on the menu—both with sauce and without, aka “pizza bianca”—but the uninitiated should opt for the montanara, a fried Neapolitan pizza that oozes with flavor thanks to the mozzarella di bufala cheese.
Crown Shy
Housed in an Art Deco building on Pine Street, Crown Shy is an elegant fine dining destination that’s worth getting excited about. The food is creative American with worldly flair including crispy gruyere fritters, white bean hummus, and a great grilled chicken. If olive bread is on the menu, always start with that. You won’t regret it.
Pisillo
Pisillo trafficks in Italian panini sandwiches. And they’re molto buono! There are 35 overstuffed sandwiches on the menu, all of which are named after and inspired by cities in Italy. So the Napoli sandwich has mozzarella di bufala, for example, or the Parma version has, of course, prosciutto and the Bologna sandwich has mortadella.
David Farley is a West Village-based food and travel writer whose work appears regularly in the New York Times, National Geographic, BBC, and Food & Wine, among other publications. He’s the author of three books, including “An Irreverent Curiosity: In Search of the Church’s Strangest Relic in Italy’s Oddest Town,” which was made into a documentary by the National Geographic Channel. You can find Farley’s online homes here and here.
