Food Special: Eating through the Big Apple

Twice a year, NYC Restaurant Week showcases the best of New York's food at prices affordable to mere mortals, writes Kim Haughton.

The Plaza Hotel Food Hall. Photo: Getty

It was supposed to be for the lobster cocktail that I found myself on an escalator underneath the Plaza Hotel on Fifth Avenue in Manhattan. After starting my gourmet trip to the city at Harry Cipriani's bar with a perfectly crisp white peach and prosecco bellini, my appetite was ready and the hotel's Food Hall was waiting.

A selection of 20 bar-style stalls with 132 seats spread over 500 square feet on the ...