The Dish: Pastrami Sandwich. Katz’s is touristy, but it is not for tourists. That’s an important distinction. The famous Lower East Side Jewish deli is, first and foremost, for New Yorkers who need a mountain of the city's finest pastrami. Per square inch, the version at Katz’s is one of the finest foods on the planet. Warm, thick, salty, and smoky, the pastrami pulls apart like a fresh croissant and leaves a grease stain on anything it touches.

The Dish: Cheeseburger. J.G. Melon’s cheeseburger used to feature regularly on "Best Burger" lists across the city’s finest publications. Then, something changed. Maybe the city’s best burgers got better. Maybe J.G. Melon’s burger—flipped on a grill that’s been accumulating grease since 1972—got worse. Despite all that, the nicotine-stained walls of this UES tavern still call to us, and the burger still satisfies.

The Dish: Pineapple Pork Bun. When we hear the words “edible gold,” we’re not thinking about ingestible metal, we’re thinking of Mei Lei Wah’s pineapple pork buns. For decades, the Chinatown bakery has been pumping out these pillowy buns with crackly yellow crusts on top. Break one open and you’ll find a mixture of char siu and pineapple inside, sort of like an al pastor stew, and a pile of crumbs underneath. The line can get long, but these $2 buns are absolutely worth 15 minutes of your time.

The Dish: Square Slice. Sold by the slice or pie, the upside-down pizza at L&B Spumoni Gardens has sweet sauce baked onto the top and cheese underneath, which melds with the dough in such a gooey way that it almost seems raw. But it’s not raw. It’s L&B. Eating a square slice followed by a drip-down-your-hands spumoni cone on the patio at this Gravesend spot is a New York rite of passage, similar to walking over the Brooklyn Bridge, or being yelled at by someone for doing nothing wrong.

The Dish: Black-and-White Cookie. With the exception of the almighty bagel, the black and white might be the most quintessential New York City baked good to emerge from an oven anywhere in the five boroughs. (Sorry, cheesecake.) And this Upper East Side bakery—with a second location on the Upper West Side—has had plenty of time to perfect its recipe since opening in 1946.

The Dish: Potato Pierogi. These stuffed dumplings at Veselka have kept the party going, soaking up booze in the East Village since 1954. But this Ukrainian diner's pierogi aren’t just drunk food. They’re just as life-giving when eaten in the morning, alongside a big plate of pancakes and your third refill of perfectly weak coffee. The dumplings come with a few different fillings, but you can never go wrong with classic potato.

The Dish: Mutton Chop. Like the remarkable artifacts on display all over the Midtown restaurant, including the playbill Lincoln was supposedly holding when he got shot, this protein is a holdover from a different time. Mutton, the meat of adult sheep, was a lot more common when Keens opened in 1885 than it is today. Their mutton chop is 26 majestic ounces of year-old lamb saddle—a thing of fatty, flavorful beauty—served with sautéed escarole.

The Dish: Thinly Pounded Yellowfin Tuna. This light yet decadent starter is a constant on the menu at French seafood titan Le Bernardin in Midtown, and we hope it never leaves. First, yellowfin tuna is pounded thin, until it resembles stained glass, or possibly the world's most expensive Fruit Roll-Up. The translucent fish is draped over a precise rectangle of toasted baguette spread with foie gras mousse, and finally brushed with olive oil and sprinkled with chives.

The Dish: Sfogliatella. There aren’t a lot of places where you can get handmade sfogliatella in New York, but Fortunato Brothers is one of them. The Williamsburg bakery, around since 1976, is a vestige of the old Italian neighborhood here, and you can taste a hint of that history in their sfogliatella. Filled with a ricotta and almond pastry cream with a touch of lemon, the pastry crunches like a stack of Pringles as you sink your teeth into it.

The Dish: Chocolate Egg Cream. This Upper East Side diner and luncheonette is one of the few places you can still get an egg cream made right in front of you, the old-fashioned way. A pint glass gets a pump of whole milk, a squirt of bubbly seltzer, and a pump of chocolate sauce. It’s essentially a refreshingly carbonated chocolate milk, made using equipment that's probably been around since the place opened in 1925.

The Dish: Chicken Adobo. A Woodside Filipino spot that feels like your grandparent’s house and closes at 7pm is quietly one of the most iconic restaurants in NYC. It’s called Renee’s, and it's a destination for many things, including ultra-thick kare kare and charred, sticky longanisa. Order a sampling, and always get the chicken adobo. The tender meat is deeply infused with sweet soy flavor, giving it an almost imperceptible Hershey's-chocolate quality.

The Dish: Mole Poblano. In a room painted with childlike irises and plastered with flyers from various activist groups, you’ll find some of the city’s best, boldest-flavored Mexican food. Everything a this Mott Haven spot is good, but La Morada particularly excels at moles—and the mildly spicy, gently chocolatey, clove-heavy poblano feels foundational. Get it with chicken, served with comforting rice and beans, and then get a tub to take home.

The Dish: Spicy Kimchi Tofu Stew. For decades, Cho Dang Gol has held the unofficial crown for Best Homestyle Korean Restaurant in Manhattan. People will say you need to try their homemade tofu—and they aren’t wrong—but the true highlight of their tofu stew isn’t the crumbly bean curd. It’s the opaque, brick red broth that invades every crevice of your mouth with its sweet and tangy flavor. Get the spicy kimchi version. It's a meal on its own, and reason enough to visit this Koreatown staple.

The Dish: Double Dip Roast Beef. Maybe you took AP English in high school, or Calculus 101. But at Brennan and Carr’s, you’ll learn something far more valuable—the ins and outs of Broth 101. Each of the three broth-ing techniques at this Sheepshead Bay sandwich shop are worth trying, but on your first visit, get your sandwich double dipped. The entire sandwich (thinly sliced roast beef, bread, and all) is dunked into an industrial vat of au jus, resulting in a brothy behemoth.

The Dish: Hot Antipasto Platter. Someone we know has celebrated every life milestone—sweet 16, bridal shower, and baby shower—at Gino’s of Bay Ridge. And they’ve started each of these occasions at the old-school Italian restaurant the same way: with the hot antipasto platter. It’s got rollatini, fried calamari, and baked clams, with a big lemon wedge, and a warm cup of tomato sauce studded with basil for dipping.

The Dish: Boneless Chicken Cracklings. La Dinastia on the Upper West Side has a long menu of Chino Latino classics (glistening fried pork chops, ropa vieja on a bed of fried rice), but we always get the same thing. The boneless chicken cracklings are delicately crispy, and salty enough to keep you coming back until your plate’s empty. They come with your choice of side—we like the tostones or fried rice—and a lemon wedge for squeezing.

The Dish: Frank. Around the corner from La Dinastia is this overwhelmingly yellow “hot doggery”—a 72nd Street landmark founded and little-updated since 1973. It’s okay to be slightly dubious about the $3.25 franks glistening behind a counter next to random buckets of relish, and the dispensers of florid, tropical fruit-flavored drinks. A single bite of a snappy Sabrett dog, buried under condiments, will put you at ease.

The Dish: Signature Delmonico Ribeye. Delmonico’s signature steak has a legacy of its own. Coined by the FiDi institution sometime in the 1800s, the cut refers specifically to a thick, boneless chunk of meat sourced from somewhere between the rib and short loin. These days, it’s become a universal term for any steak that’s at least two-inches thick. This one, at the original Delmonico’s, is a juicy, 18 oz cut of ribeye, with char marks that look like a street map of Manhattan.

The Dish: The Casa. Your mission upon arriving at Casa della Mozzarella is clear: acquire fresh mozzarella, preferably served between bread. This Arthur Avenue deli often has a line out the door, full of people peeking over each other to get a glimpse of the guy behind the counter. He’s the one hand-pulling your precious cheese until it turns into the creamy, juicy, tangy batch of mozz that motivates people to queue up at 6am on Christmas Eve.

The Dish: Fried Pork & Chive Dumplings. The main source of light at the closet-sized Kai Feng Fu in Sunset Park is a glowing menu above the counter, listing offerings that range from sesame pancakes to beef noodle soup. By all means, explore your options. Just don’t leave without some fried pork and chive dumplings. They arrive juicy and scalding hot, with thick, crisped-up bottoms and plenty of meat mixed with coarsely chopped chives.

The Dish: Sour Cream Donut. This Greenpoint shop feels like a 1950s time capsule, from the counter seating to the staff's mint-green uniforms. But there's nothing stale about their donuts, figuratively or otherwise. The apple crumb and the red velvet are first-ballot hall of famers, but the sour cream donut in particular is simple perfection. We love the contrast of textures in every bite: the soft, moist interior, the crispy crust, and the sweet (but not too sweet) glaze.

The Dish: Doubles. The doubles at Ali’s Roti Shop in Bed-Stuy cost $2 and hold their own against anything coming out of a kitchen with tweezers and tall white hats. It’s a simple formula—a scoop of stew-thick channa between two soft and springy bara—and the result is greater than the sum of its parts. If you need a top-tier snack or quick vegetarian meal, swing by the counter-service spot, and find out what it’s like to get that first whiff of cumin-scented chickpeas and warm, fried flatbread.

The Dish: Everything Bagel, Scallion Cream Cheese & Sliced Lox We’re ready to admit that there is good pizza outside of New York. Not the best, but good. That said, we do not believe there’s a single good bagel shop outside of the tri-state area, despite what our national colleagues might think. It’s not their fault—we have a very high benchmark with bagels like the ones at Whitestone’s Utopia. Since 1981, this shop has been making perfectly puffy, chewy, salty but slightly sweet bagels.

The Dish: Lechón. The perfect bite exists, and it consists of crisp lechón splashed with pique. At Lechonera La Isla, an East Harlem Puerto Rican spot that’s been open since 1991, the fatty pork and sweet, vinegar-based hot sauce fuse together on an atomic level, bringing out the best in one another. Grab a stool at the counter in the little room with morcilla and chicharron displayed in the window, order a big platter with rice and beans, and pace yourself.

The Dish: Plain or Pepperoni Slice. L’Industrie is marvelous, and Joe’s is an institution. But when you hear the term “classic New York slice,” it’s Lucia you should think of first. The narrow Flushing pizzeria has no tables, and it isn’t trying to impress anyone with artisanal toppings or a natural wine program. Choose from cheese or pepperoni, then enjoy your crisp and impeccably ordinary slice with cascading amber grease and molten strands of mozzarella that stick to your chin.