Category: Things to do with kids: Kid-friendly Eats

This chocolatier’s location is always packed with irrepressible chocoholics who come to sample innovative twists on the sweet stuff. As the official Brenner story tells it, the cafe promotes a “chocolate culture” and offers a “sensual chocolate experience.” Despite its breathless marketing shtick, there is a very full, very kid-friendly menu that’s replete with original desserts like chocolate pizza. Their “urban s’mores” will have you camped at your table until you get a toothache.

Contact no: (212) 388-0030

Location: 141 Second Avenue, New York, NY 10003 and 841 Broadway, New York, NY 10003

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The motto at this East Village cafe is “Shut up and eat it!” Don’t be offended by this, it’s all you’ll want to do once they serve you a heaping plate of fried chicken, greens and mashed potatoes. Once you get past the motto, the staff members here are all very sweet natured and polite. You’ll be served from behind a cafeteria style counter with steaming, deliciously smelling trays of their homemade comfort food. Grab a tray, take it to your table, and possibly give your children their very first food coma. The portions are enormous, prices are cheap and the cooking really is just like mom used to make; assuming mom was a chef in Louisiana.

Contact no: (212) 777-4425

Location: 200 East 3rd Street, New York, NY 10009

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Magnolia Bakery is famous for their cupcakes, which are in such demand that they limit sales to 12 per customer, but a dozen should be more than enough. Cupcakes rise and fall on the quality of their icing, and Magnolia’s perfectly thick, near-frighteningly sweet icing is the best. Your children will get the sugar rush their parents don’t usually allow, but which you as parents are obligated to provide. There’s only one small table, so get the pastries to go.

Contact no: (212) 462-2572

Location: 401 Bleecker Street, New York, NY 10014

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The legendary Katz’s Delicatessen is similar to its neighboring Lower East Side Tenement Museum, as they both allow you to explore the old days – only Katz’s takes you back with steaming trays of cured meats, rather than curated artifacts. Katz’s has remained virtually unchanged since 1880. The uniformed butchers behind the counters and the authentically old school decor make you feel like an original lower east side settler at a local luncheonette. Few would contest that Katz’s delicatessen makes the best pastrami in the world, and is the standard by which all other pastrami in the world is measured. The manna-from-heaven portions are enormous, big enough for two, so you and your son could fill yourselves and still have some left to take home.

Contact no: (212) 254-2246

Location: 205 East Houston Street, New York, NY 10002

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Do one thing, and do it well. It’s good advice, but Il Laboratorio del Gelato, in Lower Manhattan, improves on it by doing two things well. They produce extremely high quality gelato and mouth watering sorbet for restaurants around the city. Recently, they’ve opened up a small cafe that serves individual cups of the cold, sweet stuff. Flavors run from the classic (strawberry) to the unusual (champagne) to the bizarre (earl grey). This is an ideal place to take a child who heretofore has only enjoyed the standard 31 flavors at more pedestrian ice cream shops.

Contact no: (212) 343-9922

Location: 95 Orchard Street, New York, NY 10002

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This place seems like nothing more than an open storefront with no door or walls, four huge barrels of pickles (four varieties) plus sauerkraut, olives, marinated mushrooms and pickled peppers. Men, working out in the open even through the winter dole out big scoops of the pickles to sell in bulk. In back, pickles are, well, pickled. But it isn’t just an open storefront; it’s also a time machine, to an older, rawer Manhattan. This is the sort of slowly disappearing business that the city was once full of; in the brine you can taste the culture and history of NYC’s immigrant past. The pickles themselves are real, with a strong flavor, and if you don’t bring the kids here, it would be hard to claim they hadn’t missed something.

Contact no: (212) 334-3616

Location: 85 Orchard Street, New York, NY 10002

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The greatest part of eating in this city is that it’s filled with smaller, inexpensive storefront restaurants that specialize in one regional dish or another. They each make this thing better than anyone else, and focus on their particular dish with laser like intensity. Midtown’s Empanada Mama specializes in (naturally) empanadas, those delicious South American pockets of dough filled with meat. Not content to just offer excellent renditions of traditional baked and fried empanadas filled with chicken, pork, and beef, they’ve invented new varieties to cater to any type of eater. For example, their Polish empanada is made with Sauerkraut and kielbasa sausage. Kids can sometimes be picky about new or exotic foods but the tastes here are so simple and unfussy that they should have a hard time objecting. They’ll think you’re the coolest when you order the peanut butter and banana empanada for dessert.

Contact no: (212) 698-9008

Location: 763 Ninth Avenue, New York, NY 10019

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Parents these days are very good at teaching their kids math, but in our opinion, bad at teaching them about malted milkshakes. It’s not as easy as it sounds; you can’t just go anywhere, as most diners don’t carry the ingredients to make malteds anymore. Eisenberg’s Sandwich Shop is an exception, and stepping into the tiny, no-frills lunch counter is like stepping back to another, much simpler time. A genuine New York treasure not only for its nostalgic quality, Eisenberg’s makes a perfect malted, and the rest of their food is excellent too.

Contact no: (212) 675-5096

Location: 174 5th Avenue, New York, NY 10010

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This lower east side candy store is jam-packed with rare and exotic candies from all over the world, handmade lollipops, and sweets by the pound. When we say packed, trust us, your children will be in awe of the specialty treats practically spilling from the shelves. It’s the sort of place that’s frequented by savvy locals who know where to find the best deals. A trip here with your child can be rationalized as a lesson in the joys of buying wholesale. Prices are extremely low, so you can set a little aside for the dentist.

Contact no: (800) 352-4544

Location: 108 Rivington Street, New York, NY 10002

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This beloved Lower East Side hot-doggery is famous for its original and innovative hot dogs. Sure, you can get the usual sauerkraut and mustard, but really, can’t you find that anywhere? Try something special, like the “Chihuahua,” a frank topped with avocado, bacon and sour cream (your mouth will thank you, your arteries may not). The vintage video games are guaranteed kid-pleasers on the off-chance the franks are not. Also vintage is their selection of sodas, with RC being the prominently featured fountain drink. We recommend sitting at the Pac Man table with a large order of cheese-covered tater tots. Crif Dogs is a great place to take your children for a break from all that health food their parents keep giving them.

Contact no: (212) 614-2728

Location: 113 St. Marks Place, New York, NY 10009

Learn more here.