The 50 Best "Cheap & Tasty" Restaurants in Manhattan

One’s definition of “cheap” becomes skewed when they live in a city like New York for a long enough time. Cheap becomes relative.

It’s no different when it comes to cheap eats — what one friend may consider a “cheap eat” will be different from your other friend (not to mention my definition of “cheap”).

Well, my definition of cheap is below $10 after tax, preferably a few dollars below $10. Once you begin filtering restaurants into that price range, finding a great meal becomes that much more difficult. Oh, there are plenty of okay meals to be had for $5-8, but to find a great one, especially in Manhattan takes some patience.

Below you’ll find a list of restaurants that range from $5-15 for a meal that I put together from online articles and review sites. Primarily this list was created because I tired of looking for a cheap, sit down restaurant every time I was hungry for cheap and tasty.

Due to the differing ideas of “cheap,” I came up with my own list of cheap eats using information from the “experts”:

Yelp dollar signs + ratings
Time Out’s 50 Best Cheap Eats List
Grubstreet/NY Mag’s 2006 & 2014 list of “cheap eats”
Urbanspoon’s Map of cheap eats in Manhattan
Restaurants that I’ve eaten at

Both Yelp and Urbanspoon display dollar signs to indicate the restaurant’s price range. On this list, the dollar signs are taken directly from Yelp and if a listing has an percentage rating in the Urbanspooon column, that’s the restaurant’s approval rating and also means it’s been rated one dollar sign (if it has a “N/A” that means it’s $$).

This is useful because the conventional logic is if both Yelp and Urbanspoon report one dollar sign, there’s a good chance it’s a “cheap eat” and if Time Out or Grub Street have listed in their top affordable restaurants, there’s a good chance it’s extra tasty.

List of Cheap Eats in NYC (Manhattan)
Restaurant	Location	Style	Yelp	Grub Street	Time Out	Urban Spoon
Artichoke Basille Pizza	East Village	Pizza	$	Yes	No	No
Bánh Mì Saigon Bakery	Little Italy	Vietnamese sandwich	$	Yes	No	93%
BobWhite Lunch & Supper Counter	Alphabet City	Southern/Soul Food	$$	Yes	No	No
Cafe Hong Kong	Chinatown	Authentic Chinese dishes	$$	Yes	No	No
Curry Ya	East Village	Japanese curry	$$	Yes	No	97%
Cutting Board	Chinatown	Japanese/Italian	$	Yes	No	40%
Daheen Wang Mandoo	K-Town	Korean king dumplings!	$$	Yes	No	No
Emmetts	South Village	Chicago deep dish pizza	$$	Yes	No	No
Francela	Upper East	Turkish cuisine	$$	Yes	No	No
Gaia Italian Cafe	East Village	Italian	$	Yes	No	No
Gotham West Market	Hells Kitchen	Modern Food Court	$$	Yes	Yes	No
Gray's Papaya	Upper West Side	Hot dogs	$	No	No	86%
Han Dynasty	East Village	Sizuan (spicy!)	$$	Yes	Yes	No
Ivan Ramen	Lower East Side	Ramen	$$	Yes	Yes	No
Kung Fu Little Steamed Buns Ramen	Hell's Kitchen	Dim Sum / Ramen	$$	Yes	Yes	100%
Larb Ubol	Midtown West	Thai specializing in larb	$$	Yes	No	86%
Lumpia Shack Snackbar	Greenwich Village	Filipino Lumpia	$$	Yes	Yes	No
Mark	East Village	Sliders	$	Yes	No	96%
Mei Li Wah	Chinatown	Dim Sum	$	No	No	89%
Mighty Quinns BBQ	East Village	BBQ duh	$$	Yes	Yes	No
Mimi Cheng's Dumplings	East Village	Dumplings	$$	No	Yes	$
Motorino	East Village	Pizza	$$	No	Yes	No

List of Cheap Eats in NYC (Manhattan)
Restaurant	Location	Style	Yelp	Grub Street	Time Out	Urban Spoon
Noodle Village	Chinatown	Chinese Noodles / Xiao Long Bao	$	No	No	100%
Oda House	Alphabet City	Russian/Georgian cuisine	$$	Yes	No	No
Prosperity Dumpling	Lower East Side	CHEAP DUMPLINGS YES	$	No	Yes	97%
Punjabi Grocery & Deli	East Village	Indian vegeterian	$	No	No	95%
Rai Rai Ken	East Village	Ramen	$$	Yes	No	88%
Senor Pollo	East Village	Peruvian	$	No	No	100%
Sontum Der	East Village	Thai	$$	Yes	Yes	No
Sao Mai	East Village	Vietnamese / Pho	$$	Yes	No	No
Spicy Village	Lower East Side	Chinese noodles– Spicy	$	Yes	No	100%
Sun Hing Lung Co.	Chinatown	Chinese	$	No	No	N/A
Taïm	Greenwich Village	Falafel	$	Yes	No	92%
Tasty Hand Pulled Noodles	Chinatown	Chinese	$	Yes	No	95%
Vanessa's Dumplings	Lower East Side	Dumplings	$	No	No	92%
Westville	Alphabet City	American / Farm fresh	$$	Yes	No	No
Woorijip	Koreatown	Korean steam tables	$	No	No	88%
Xi’an Famous Foods	East Village	Chinese	$	Yes	No	95%
Zen 6	East Village	Ramen	$$	No	No	No