A Foodie’s Guide to Bryant Park Winter Village in NYC – 2023

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Bryant Park Winter Village is a key attraction for the holidays in New York City. It’s one of the first markets to open and kicks of the festive season of Christmas in New York.

Let’s be real – this is a fun place to bring family and guests from out of town or even stop in for a little shop yourself, but the food and drink is fairly expensive, even by NYC standards!

Want to find out about other Christmassy places to dine and drink? Check out my guide on places to eat in drink in NYC during the holidays.

Entry, Dates, Hours & Location

Entry Price to the Bryant Park Winter Village by Bank of America: FREE

Dates

October 27, 2023 – March 3, 2024

The Holiday Market portion closes January 4th, 2024.

Location & Getting there

Bryant Park – 42nd Street and, 6th Ave, New York, NY 10018

Subway: B,D,F,M

You can also get a train to Grand Central which is 2 Avenues away.

Hours

8am-9pm daily.

Food stalls officially open at 11am but some a slow to be ready at that time, which is worth bearing in mind if you’re on your lunch break or heading in early.

Special Holiday Hours

November 19 – December 26
Monday – Thursday: 8am-10pm
Friday – Sunday: 8am-11:30pm

November 25 : 8am-11:30pm

December 27 – January 2 : 8am-11:30pm

December 31st: 8am-4pm

Food & Drink at Bryant Park Winter Village

Baked Cheese Haus

Raclette is such a winter classic and Baked Cheese Haus is doing these sandwiches right. They do a crusty baguette with jambon, scallions, pickles and raclette. The bread was good quality and they were not shy on that cheese! Each sandwich is $17.

Sweet Tooth

Sweet Tooth seems to have replaced the chimney cakes that they’ve had at The Lodge in previous years. Sadly, this replacement is no where near as good as the chimney cakes and the ones before rode a line of being better for pictures than to eat.

We tried the caramel one – it’s a croissant with the center cut out and stuffed with cream cheese frosting, caramel, popcorn and pretzels. I love sweet & salty treats so I really enjoyed the filling, there just wasn’t much of it and the croissant was very dry.

Truffleist

The Truffleist sells truffle products year round and pops up during the holidays at multiple Christmas markets to sell their cheesesteaks and other specialties.

We went for the most decadent one, The Truffleist Cheesesteak. It is an extremely rich, over the top sandwich. This cheesesteak has 1/2 a pound of ribeye steak, melted mozzarella and provolone cheese, bechamel sauce, carmelized onions and peppers, foie gras, raclette cheese, of course shaved truffle and even some edible flowers on top too. The truffle itself isn’t overly rich but combines well with the overall flavors including the very rich foie gras to make a very indulgent sandwich.

Perhaps the raclette is not needed as takes away some of the other flavour. The roll is warmed on the plancha and has good chew to it. It’s topped with edible alpine flowers.

It’s a solid cheat day eat at $35 before tax and tip. They only stock 20 of these per day but have other cheesesteak options at lower price points.

Mysttik Masaala

Mystic Masala is serving up Indian and fusion dishes like chicken tikka masala and other curries as well as samosas and Seekh kababs. We tried their naan roll with chicken tikka masala and a biryani rice bowl with, what was just labeled chicken curry. Both were very tasty enough and $15 each. The naan wasn’t served warm and felt like it was long life rather than baked fresh.

Chocolate Works

Chocolate Works has tool-shaped chocolates which you can add to your hot chocolate. The actual drink had more of a spiced ginger/cinnamon/nutmeg flavor to it than chocolate. I actually thought it was pretty tasty, but it definitely wasn’t what I had in mind for a $13 hot chocolate.

: Chocolate Works

: The Truffleist Cheesesteak

: Crepe Cafe’

Casa Toscana

Casa Toscana is an Artisan Tuscan bakery serving doughnuts, hot chocolate and sandwiches. We had a couple of the bombolones – they were only filled half way with the filling. We tried the pistachio and chocolate, but they also do a ricotta one and an apricot jam one. The actual doughnut was okay, but were disappointed with the lack of filling. The bombolones are $6 each.

If you want incredible bombolones and other amazing pastries check out Angelina Bakery in Midtown.

Laksa Shop

Serving flavorful Laksa, Malaysian curry noodle soup. The cost is $14 for a half or $18 for a full.

Padi D’NYC

We absolutely love satay so we had to try Padi D’NYC which is a new vendor this year. We got a mix of 6 satay sticks, 3 chicken and 3 lamb for $20. They are cooking them in front of you just how they do it in Singapore! The meat had a nice smokey flavor and were topped with a ton of their peanut sauce. Beef Rending was also on offer, but if you want to try a larger range of items you can visit their full time location at Urban Hawker Food Market.

Doughnuttery

At the Doughnuttery, you can have your fill of mini donuts with all sorts of flavored sugar to add on top. We chose the flower power which is rose hibiscus and honey as well as a few plain powdered sugar ones. We also had their chocolate dipping sauce which would have been way better warm.

They do cook the doughnuts in front of you and they are quite light and fluffy.

6 for $6, 12 for $11 25 for $22.

Destination Dumpling

We got the steamed pork buns here which were 1 for $5 or 2 for $8. They had a nice flavor overall but there wasn’t loads of meat inside

Crepe Café

Crepe Café is serving up crepes and hand cut fries, which we normally love. These fries were very crispy, like too crispy, and not at all fluffy at all inside. We ordered the parmesan ones and could barely taste the seasoning.

To top it off they are weren’t that hot. We expected a lot better for $13 a pop.

If you want some seriously good Belgian fries check out Pommes Frites in Greenwich Village.

Pickle Me Pete

At Pickle Me Pete you can buy a range of fresh pickles or tried their sliced + fried pickle stick.

They are tasty, batter is really simple, basic, but good bar food item. They came with ranch which definitely tasted store bought. For $11 they’re certainly overpriced even for New York, but you empathize that they’re probably paying a lot to be there.

Joey Bats Café

Go here for delicious, flaky Pastéis de Nata! The cost of these is $4 for 1 or $20 for a 6 pack.

: Pastel de nata

: Steamed pork buns

Food & Drink options :

A few of these outlets are new to the Lodge and seem like they were created just for this event.

El Pambazo Shop
The Lodge Bar by Stout NYC
Alcove Bar
Rinkside Bar by Stout
S’mores N’More
Sweet Tooth

Food vendors throughout the Holiday shops

N56 Baked Cheese Haus
S16 Baked Cheese Haus
R9 Bao by Kaya
R5 Bel-Fries
R8 Casa Toscana
S27 Casa Toscana
N54 Cheese Wheel Pasta
S23 Cheesesteaks by the Truffleist
S9 City Chowder S28 Crepe Café
R3 Crispy Chick S26 Curds the Word
N58 Destination Dumplings
R6 Doughnuttery
S11 Enfes NYC
S31 Frida’s Favorites
S8 4 x 4 Burger
S22 German Bratwurst
S13 Happy Dumpling
S10 Hell’s Kitchen Paella Heaven
S17 Home Frite
N53 Jian Bing
S15 Joey Bats Café
R2 Koukli Saucy Greek
S29 The Laksa Shop
R7 Lazy Dog
N55 Lemak Malaysian Kitchen
S30 Little Biggs
S14 Mama’s Chicken Shack
N63 Mama’s Cupboard
R4 Max Brenner
57 The Migrant Kitchen
S25 Mysttik Masaala
N62 Padi D’NYC
N60 Palenque BBQ
N61 Palenque Empanadas
S24 Petisco Brazuca
W23 Pickle Me Pete
S7 SeaPark
N59 Tada Noodles
N10 Toastieland
R1 Wafels & Dinges
S19 Whoopie Company

Permanent Dining Options at Bryant Park

Bryant Park Grill & Cafe – 11:30am-8:30pm

Fever Tree Porch – noon-9pm, weather permitting

Food Kiosks

Le Pain Quotidien 8am – 6pm

Waffels & Dinges 10am – 10pm

Joe Coffee Company 9am – 5pm

The Lodge —

Hours: 10am-10pm

The Lodge at Bryant Park Winter Village

Acivities & Things to do at Bryant Park Winter Village

Ice Skating at Bryant Park Winter Village

Believe it or not, this activity is FREE is you bring your own skates!

Holiday Shops at Bryant Park Winter Village

There are so many different types of shops to browse. From art to jewelry, to handbags and scarves.

Bryant Park Curling Cafe & Cozy Igloos (Opening November 15th)

Rent out one of their Igloos or for a private experience with friends or family. The Curling Café is open Monday through Sunday 11:30 am – 10 pm.

Bumper Cars on Ice (Opens in January)

Bumper cars on ice return to the park for January!

: Bryant Park Skating Rink

: Market Shops

The Best Hotels near Bryant Park

If you want to stay close to the action, check out some of these hotels that are steps from the Bryant Park Winter Village!