Otions Mantuano October 19, The mixed shawarma laffa at Al Aqsa. Things To Do.

Frugal dining options -

The second is naengmyeon, originating in North Korea and made from buckwheat or sweet potato and served cold with boiled egg and pickled vegetables: very refreshing.

While this may have once been a Korean seafood market, it now has Dominican flourishes. In addition to selling the freshest fish, it has a seafood prep counter and pleasant eating-in area. The fried fish sandwiches — pick porgy or flounder — are great and cheap, but why not consider the shrimp pastelitos, stuffed clams, or crab cakes?

Yes there are noodles galore, including laksa noodles and peanut satay noodles, but look to fritters, dumplings, and buns for smaller bites. The roti john sandwich is a unique delight, a hero of ground beef omelet with spicy ketchup and caramelized onions.

This branch of a Grand Concourse restaurant is a bit grander, with a dining room a few steps up from the steam table where a dozen or so Ghanaian dishes are displayed. Get sauces of fish, mutton, or chicken — or pick a mixed meat sauce that contains all of them — then choose a starch ball like white yam fufu to go with it.

Harlem has rarely seen a Jamaican steam-table restaurant with such a broad selection of island dishes. The restaurant is one of three locations. For a larger meal than the falafel sandwich, pick the falafel platter, which contains a dozen elements, including the spicy green relish zhoug.

Multiple forms of hummus and the eggplant-and-egg concoction sabich also available at this vegan spot that offers a cauliflower shawarma. There are still plenty of budget-friendly pasta mills around, a fad that peaked late in the last century and lingered thereafter.

These places encouraged you to pick a pasta and match it with a sauce. In a similar but simpler vein, Bigoi Venezia takes a single pasta — freshly made Venetian bigoi, tube-shaped spaghetti — and offers a choice of a dozen or so treatments, some particular to Venice, some not.

Turkey sauce or peas, ham, and cream are two top contenders. Step up the the gleaming steam table and load up your square ceramic plate with any combo of the two dozen dishes displayed. Pay special attention to the ones called chicken roast smothered in onions , beef kala bhuna a very dark curry , and the daily assortment of bhortas mustard-oil-laced vegetable purees.

Then sit in the sunny dining room and eat with your fingers. The one featuring smoked milkfish is a favorite, also including garlic rice, fried eggs, eggplant, and a fresh salsa of onions and tomatoes.

This modest spot just south of the Queens County Farm Museum concentrates on Mumbai-style street snacks and is strictly vegetarian. One favorite is bun chole, a small round roll stuffed with chickpeas, potatoes, and onions sweetened with tamarind sauce, very much like Trinidadian doubles.

The menu also offers samosa chaats, vegetable curries, milk-based sweets, and snacks combining fried lentils, nuts, chips, and crunchy noodles. Little Jakarta is a small neighborhood centered at Whitney Avenue and Broadway in Elmhurst, with groceries and small cafes a modest number of both to be sure radiating from that corner.

It specializes in full-plate combinations that may contain rice, a coconut-laced composed salad, shrimp chips, and a satay or two, all halal. The fruition of a decade-long series of films, TV shows, podcasts, and professorships from hamburger scholar, George Motz, this new spot in Soho channels the lunch counters of the past.

Specimen regional burgers — currently in a smash burger vein — are offered, along with things like egg creams, french fries, icebox pies, and lemonade.

For hamburger deniers, there are PBJs and especially good and inexpensive egg salad sandwiches. This tiny cafe just south of Tompkins Square specializes in the street food of Bangkok with a limited menu of full meals that will make deciding what to eat easier. The best dish on the menu is basil chicken, with ground poultry cooked down to a rich mixture served with rice, a poached egg, and boiled sweet potato.

Relax is a great place to relax, tucked away on a side street in the northeastern part of Greenpoint, and made to look like a cottage in a fairy tale.

Wash everything down with Polish beers. Little Myanmar is quite simply the best Burmese restaurant the city has yet to see. The interior is bare bones and not particularly comfortable — though your ability to see into the kitchen is an advantage and a pleasure.

The item menu covers the vast sweep of the national cuisine, from the salads called athokes try the tea-leaf version to noodle soups, stir fries, and curries.

This halal Turkish restaurant is successor to the long-closed Bereket, a late night favorite of clubgoers. Lots of salads, dips, and kebabs at bargain prices, but my preferred choice is a doner kebab in Turkish bread other breads include pitas and flatbread wraps. Three rotating cylinders of meat are available: lamb, chicken, and veal, each with its own attractions.

The Lower East Side is home to many Hong Kong-styles cafes serving the hybrid Chinese-English cuisine called cha chaan tengs.

S Wan is a charming walk-down spot offering a full range of breakfasts designated by letters that might includes fried eggs, waffles smeared with peanut butter, Spam, toast with butter and honey, and pork chops, in addition to lots of noodle soups and stir fries.

Hearty working-class Chinese fare at favorable prices is the forte of this bare-bones shop conveniently located on Queens Boulevard in Forest Hills near the Kew Gardens subway station. Noodles, dumplings, and soups make up most of the menu, with Sichuan dumplings and dan dan noodles available in memorably good renditions.

This Jamaica Estates Afghan restaurant offers kebabs of chicken, beef, and lamb in various combinations — and little else. The lamb chops, in particular, are superb, often cut to order from the rib cage you can hear the saw thrumming in the kitchen , smeared with a reddish spice rub, and grilled to complete succulence.

A few doors down from a mosque, this chandeliered restaurant occupies a lively corner location that was previously a diner. This place upholds diner principals, filling out its menu with Afghan kebab platters as well as Bangladeshi and Indian dishes, plus pizza and excellent hamburgers.

The platter shown here features yogurt-marinated chicken and beef kofta with pulao rice, Afghan bread, and salad, with several sauces. Sure, there are dozens of great, old-fashioned, mainly Pueblan taquerias within the borders of Bushwick, but this place opened early in with a zingier demeanor, including a brightly painted minibus on its exterior.

The lure is a humongous rotating trompo of pineapple-marinated pork al pastor, sliced and deposited on a rustic corn tortilla. Cactus, chicken, and carne asada fillings are also available. This small storefront in the wilds of Glendale specializes in Balkan bar food, an apparent branch of a place in Subotica, Serbia.

It concentrates on grilled meats and pastries, the former including the skinless sausages cevapi and the burger-like pljeskavica, which comes on a round bun that may be dressed with kaymak thick sour cream and ajvar a red pepper paste — plus the usual onions, tomatoes, and lettuce.

This relative newcomer to the Fresh Pond scene offers a revival of the Cuban cuisine that was common in the city 50 years ago, but now less so.

The list of roti is expansive, but I still prefer the bone-in goat, chicken, and conch. Mama Kitchen is a kosher Israeli restaurant that far exceeds expectations everything except the composed salads are cooked to order at a lower price than you might expect.

Entrees include a full plate of food plus another plate from a salad bar with over a dozen selections. The pizzas come out hot and fast and oozing cheese, and lines form to buy slices the line inside moves faster. Often identified as the national dish, the cou cou and flying fish consists of a cornmeal porridge shot with okra and said fish.

Jerk specialties and pastries are also available. Sandwiches available in three sizes, which is an economic and probably health-wise boon. Specializing in Chicago-style hot dogs, Dog Day Afternoon is named after an Al Pacino movie about a bank robbery that was partly shot on the same block of Windsor Terrace.

The hot dog boasts a couple of small innovations New York style pickles, for example, and sweet miniature plum tomatoes , but otherwise the genre remains intact.

Located a short bus ride straight uphill from the Staten Island Ferry, New Asha, founded in , is a funky sort of place with excellent Sri Lankan food. A glass case displays heavy tubular fritters that are good for snacks, but why not sit and chow down on halal meats like mutton or jackfruit curries, poured over rice and served with yellow dal and a chopped vegetable salad.

At lower prices and with more of a lunch counter atmosphere, Al Aqsa specializes in pita or laffa sandwiches, tucked or rolled, respectively, and filled with chicken shawarma, falafel, or lamb shish kebab, slathered with a strong toum, a garlicky white sauce. Kufta, bread dips, lahmacun in several variations, and even schnitzels round out the menu.

This hour West Midwood Pakistani cafe with a chile-pepper logo has it all, from snacks like samosas and stuffed breads that are great for rapid snacking to full meals that include meat and vegetarian dishes served with rice, bread, or both.

Go for the ground meat kebabs, which absorb lots of smoke in the clay oven, or haleem, a delicious porridge of lamb, wheat, and lentils. The steam table offers many vegan dishes.

The pizzas remain on the menu, and they are quite good in themselves. It specializes in roast beef sandwiches on kaiser rolls, the meat rich, moist, and deliciously rimmed with fat.

Dip it in meat juices small extra charge , or eat it plain. It can get pretty crowded on weekends as patrons line up for multiple forms of khachapuri — often hot out of the oven — along with roast chicken, stout smoky sausages, and other beach-friendly tidbits.

Lamb or chicken shawarma sandwiches of mind-boggling volume are a sideline. Cookie banner We use cookies and other tracking technologies to improve your browsing experience on our site, show personalized content and targeted ads, analyze site traffic, and understand where our audiences come from.

Go to Barney Greengrass. At this Upper West Side staple that's been open since the early 20th century, your tourist friends can check " bagels " off their list, and you can eat some world-class nova in an unpretentious room that feels like an old-school diner.

It's not too hard to get a table here, but keep in mind that this place is cash-only. Lower East Side. Even if you hate crowds, you still need to come here.

The thick, steamy pastrami at Katz's is one of New York City's crown jewels. Royal Seafood gets crowded on weekends—but it doesn't draw huge lines like Jing Fong or House of Joy. So if you don't want to wait an hour for your har gow and rice rolls, come here. The dim sum is fantastic, and there are always fresh batches arriving from the kitchen via a dumbwaiter.

This place is a bit smaller than other dim sum parlors in the neighborhood, but there's still plenty of room, and if you arrive before 11am, you'll probably get seated right away. Be sure get the shu mai and chicken feet. West Village. Corner Bistro has been around for decades, and some people will say that their burger is the best in NYC.

Get a beer in a heavy glass mug to go along with your food, and feel free to loiter in this divey West Village tavern for several hours. Hou Yi Hot Pot is a magical place. If you don't want to sweat while you eat, go with one of the mild broths. The little room on the Lower East Side is casual and no-nonsense, and it will inevitably smell like meat and boiling chilis when you stop by.

If you need something to do after dinner, check out a nearby bar. There's nothing wrong with Joe's —but everyone's already been there.

If you're looking for a downtown slice shop that your cousin from Connecticut will get excited about, the obvious answer is Scarr's. This little LES spot looks like it should be inside of a s bowling alley, and it tends to be filled with the sort of people who stand in long lines outside of clothing stores in Soho and Nolita.

The pizza is some of the best in the city, and there's always a crowd out front. Tucked into the side of Chelsea Market, this counter-service spot from the people behind Los Tacos No. The aguachile is also an essential order, and you can round things out with a Pacifico.

Bar Food. Upper East Side. The burger at J. Melon is classic and straightforward. The tavern-like room is filled with checkered tablecloths and random decor that looks like it was picked up at an estate sale several decades ago, and the kitchen is open until am most nights.

Eat at a little table in the barebones space, or take your food to the park a block away. It looks like a big, bright old-timey diner, and there's a good chance you've seen it on TV.

This is a popular place to film shows and movies. There's also a good chance you've eaten eggs here semi-drunk at 4am. Unfortunately, Veslelka is no longer open 24 hours, but you can still come by for breakfast, lunch, or dinner and eat some good borscht and pierogies. If we had to choose a few restaurants to take a desert island, Khao Kang would be one of them.

Options change daily, but they generally include things like braised five-spice pork belly, sweet moo tod, and jungle curry packed with fish and vegetables. The southern sour curry is a favorite of ours, and the person behind the counter will probably tell you that it's spicy.

Believe that person. Coming to New York for the first time ever is exciting and intimidating. Let us take some of the pressure off by suggesting where to eat.

Italian Pasta. This place is the ultimate utility player. American Bar Food. New York. What are you looking for?

Perfect Fors. Subscribe Sign Up. let us help you make a decision. NYC Guide 14 Affordable Places To Impress An Out-Of-Towner All the best places where you can eat with a tourist without having to spend an upsetting amount of money.

Bryan Kim August 22, THE SPOTS photo credit: Hannah Albertine ratings guide. Save to a list Website Phone Directions. Bangladeshi Jackson Heights.

Earn 3x points with your sapphire card.

Over the last diningg months, grocery Free trip samples Beauty sample offers skyrocketed with the average Frugal dining options of eggs —aka our go-to lazy, nothing in the optiobs meal—jumping Frugal dining options percent. And Fining is Free tea discovery to be the more affordable optioons to takeout, dininy or Frubal out at a restaurant. Scroll on for the most flavorful fiscally responsible cheap eats in NYC to satisfy your cravings for great food on a budget. Not familiar with Malaysian food? Few things in life give us as much joy as diving into a big bowl of noodles. These addictively chewy ribbons of steamed wheat flour noodles, stir-fried with scallions, bean sprouts, cucumbers and cilantro is totally worth the chili oil splatters we inevitably incur while slurping like a maniac. Prices shown include Value-priced grocery items Offer ends November 28th at pm Beauty sample offers. Frual are rising everywhere. And Fruga, includes restaurants, making Optons particularly challenging to find affordable restaurants in Manhattan, where a meal can cost you an eyebrow-raising sum. In fact, if you know where to look—or, ahem, keep reading this article—you can still eat well without emptying your wallet or pocketbook. The below restaurants are sure to wow your palate without overwhelming your wallet.