Essex Street Market

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This La Guardia-era covered market is one of the few vestiges of a rapidly vanishing Lower East Side, full of local families and longtime residents on the prowl for dinner bargains. There’s a fish vendor, Jeffrey the butcher, a botanica, and perhaps the city’s foremost collection of canned Goya products. This isn’t exactly a haunt of Jean-Georges Vongerichten’s, but Tía Pol’s Alex Raij likes to pop in for the basics and “really good prices on lemons and plum tomatoes, Mexican chickpeas, legumes, and herbs. It’s really good for family meal—posole, tamales, whatever the guys like. They’re Mexican, but I teach them how to make it.” — Rob Patronite and Robin Raisfeld