Ride the 7 train as it rumbles above Roosevelt Avenue, and with every stop, you’ll find another world of where to eat in Queens, New York. Get off in Jackson Heights, and the air might be fragrant with Nepali spices and frying Indian jalebi; a few stations later in Corona, fresh-pressed tortillas and slow-cooked birria will welcome you. Here, the globe has unpacked its many kitchens alongside its luggage and moved in. This is Queens, a borough with more than 1 million foreign-born residents, thrumming with hundreds of languages, foods, and wares.

Home to countless immigrant stories, Queens is the most diverse borough in New York City, with over two million people, half of whom were born outside the United States. So it’s no surprise that the area’s markets – some sprawling, many more pocket-sized – are equally as diverse, serving immigrant communities both old and new. We recently sent out New York-based photographer Melanie Einzig to document fall’s bounty at five of the borough’s diverse marketplaces. Her visual harvest can be found below.

Hnin “Snow” Wai is on a mission to introduce Burmese food and culture to New York. Together with her husband, Snow (Hnin means “Snow” in Burmese, so she likes to be called “Snow” in English) is the co-founder of DeRangoon, a Burmese catering company based in East Elmhurst, Queens. The couple began vending at the Queens Night Market in 2017, and Snow’s tea leaf salad recipe was included in “The World Eats Here: Amazing Food and The Inspiring People Who Make It At Queens Night Market” (The Experiment, 2020). Earlier this year we spoke to co-authors John Wang, the Queens Night Market founder, and Storm Garner, a filmmaker and oral historian, about the cookbook, which showcases 88 diverse recipes directly from Queens Night Market’s vendor-chefs, many of whom are first- and second-generation immigrants.