Moving to CT

I currently live in Princeton NJ, but will be moving soon to Greenwich, CT. Good restaurants (accross the board - from simple to expensive) are important to us.
Can anyone help us get started with a list of recommended restaurants, within 45 minute drive from Greenwich?
We love a little place we go to in Stockton, NJ - Meal's - great food, BYO, always a nice vibe.
Would love to find something like that in the proximity of Greenwich.
Thanks

[maryelaine]

Try Hostaria Mazzei in :Port Chester (about 10 minutes from Greenwich). The food gets better everytime I go. Wonderful fish, pizza. Everything is great.

[KarenNYC]

I am shocked that no one has mentioned Gaia or L'escale for a very nice evening out in Greenwich. As other Hounds mentioned above White Plains, Rye and Port Chester are all close by and have some great restaurants. For a less expensive any day meal in town try Katzenburg's (wraps and salads etc.... for lunch), My Favorite Place, Boxcar Cantina, Kira Sushi and Asiana are all good as well.

[catnip]

We're Ocean 211 "junkies"!
Top-notch food, great entertainment(mix of 60's and 70's),fabulous service,and best of all outstanding food.
We never miss the place when we are in the area for meetings.
Many good places,so little time,but this is still one of our local favorites.
Good Eating!
Catnip

[fetegirl]

I totally agree with Alex! Polpo is terrific, but it's sooooo crowded all the time and you DO feel like you're doing them a favor by being there and unloading your wallet.

For the same (pricey) price, go to Valbella in Old Greenwich. Slick, pretty and during the truffle season, the best spaghetti with truffles ever.

Just over the river in Port Chester is Hostaria Mazzei - very good Italian. The best ricotta salata ever and a terrific braised rabbit. On Westchester Avenue.

Tengda is great for sushi and other things. Terrific. Yes, RK and Bleu have closed down - rents are getting higher and lots of Greenwich turning into banks! Sad stuff.

[Alex318]

just as an FYI for a couple of posts above both Bleu in Greenwich (Ora listed as an ok Bar) and RK in Rye (ncchowdog) have closed down.

Polpo has a great meal, but I hate the service and atmosphere. The waitstaff makes it seem like you should be waiting on them and not the other way around. Terra and Mediterraneo are two of my favorite places, neither are cheap. Mediterraneo has some great thin crust pizzas. Gaia is an under-rated place but has top quality food and service. Tengda has the best sushi in Greeniwch. Elm Street Oyster House has wonderful food, but is tiny and youll be waiting during prime dining hours.

[hungrylikeawolf]

Elm Street Oyster House

In addition to those below and given your 45 minute criteria (you can limit to 25 and stay satisfied) you open enormous possibilities. A cousin to Rebecca's (I think the best) is RK in Rye. Fantastic.
Head the other way to South Norwalk (call it SONO) and you have plenty to choose from: Ocean Drive, Pasta Nostra, Habana, many threads in the New England board. Plus the best bakery in Fairfield County, SONO Bake Shop is located in SONO. Welcome and good eats.

tell us your food prefs and we'll give you some solid recs. I spend a lot of time in Princeton: you're in for a treat.

Some of our favorites here in Princeton are:
Lawrenceville Inn, Meal's (in Stockton), Elements Asia, Passage to India, Soup Du Jour (for brunch)
In NY, Union Square Cafe, Gramercy Tavern, Babbo, Bar Pitti, Payard, Tartine, etc
Thanks for the help
Paulo

Some modest thoughts:

Stamford has a solid fish place called Ocean 211 (Summer Street). Manhattan pricey but worth it. Mona Lisa on Atlantic Street is reliable as a goto lunch/dinner place. It won't knock your socks off but it will grow on you. The wine list is very good and very reasonable. Hacienda (Summer Street) for Mexican is very serviceable for a white linen lunch/dinner. Uncle Dai's on Atlantic Street is the town's best-kept lunch secret. Best Chinese lunch for under $10.

There are others.

tell me more about uncle dai. I've never heard of it... where on Atlantic is it. Google Maps shows it nearly in the stamford town center. Is it across from the Palace Theater? How does it differ from most chinese take out places? What is good to order there that will steer me away from the typical glop at chinese places around here (or around the country for that matter...).

Thanks for the tip and please share!

Uncle Dai's is a few doors north from Mona Lisa at 109 Atlantic St. (same side of the street as the Palace). I've been going there since they opened. When in town for lunch, I sit down and order the hot and sour soup, pork fried rice, shredded beef Szechuan style and a beer. Lunch runs me $5.25 plus beer and tip. My wife is a recent convert. Uncle Dai's has cleaner tastes than many local shops. At these prices, you have nothing to lose.

My modest take is that the Uncle Dai's team (front of the house) has been in place for some time. I like that. The "house special shrimp" is very good. Maybe not as memorable as Rainbow Seafood Restaurant on Lamma Island outside of Hong Kong, but pretty good for Connecticut.

Bottom line? Uncle Dai's has no pretensions. Simple food, reasonable prices, pleasant environs. Go with modest expectations. You won't be disappointed.

In Stamford--Quattro Pazzi is my fav casual italian restaurant. Mona Lisa is quite good for serious Italian. I like Luna Pizza for slices. Ole Mole for Mex. In Greenwich, I love Barcelona, Baang is OK for upscale pan-asian. Greenwich Ave has 1 or 2 OK sandwich shops (cant recall names) and bars (Blue). Darien, Coromandel for Indian. There are a couple of restaurants on the water in Stamford (Waterside area), none have good eats, but do have OK atmosphere for drinks and free live music on nice evenings. There's a cluster of restaurants on Bedford St in Downtown Stamford--none are anything special really, but there is a selection to choose from if in the area--sadly its not the destination it should be. Overall the food quality at Westport and Greenwich restaurants better than that of Stamford, Norwalk and Darien restaurants.

Supermarkets--Greenwich has a Whole Foods, but its a smaller one compared to the big ones elsewhere, there's a huge Wild Oats on Westport/Norwalf line. Check out Stew Leonards--a fav of mine for prepared foods.

Other than that, head to NYC when you really want a great food fix. Good luck.

lots and lots of places around the place - I'm pretty sure you won't have any problem at all finding any kind of restaurant you were able to get in Princeton.

In Greenwich proper, you are at the higher end of the spectrum, with a lot of good, but not cheap, upper middle tier to very high end places. A few that come to mind (Polpo, Ku, Baang, Mediterrano, Chola, Terra, Barcelona for the upper mid range, Jean Louis, Thomas Henkelmann, Rebecca's for the high end).

Then, across the river in Port Chester, you'll have a ton of great Latin places. I think PC is one of the best places outside of NYC for latin food in this part of the country. (tortilleria los gemelos, asi en Colombia, Acuario, Rincon el salvedoreno, Q, kneaded bread (best bakery around, bar none, and on the greenwich border), paleteria fernandez)

Then in Stamford, you have a lot of mid-tier places that are a little less expensive than most of Greenwich, but very good as well. (Telluride, Columbus Park Trattoria, Sienna, Antojitos Chapines, Dakshin).

All of that is within a 10 minute drive. You are also very close to Rye and White Plains which also have a lot of good places. There have been some pretty extensive recent discussions on these boards on all of these places. Have fun exploring and let us know what you end up finding and trying out.

Thanks very much for the suggestions. It will be fun to try them out and discover the area.
Thanks again