Skewered: A Survey of Astoria’s Souvlaki Street Vendors

Elpida Vasiliadis, the Souvlaki Lady, photo by Dave Cook

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Peking BBQ: No-Frills Chifa in Queens Featured Image

A half-century Chinese-Peruvian counter spot in Queens feeding Roosevelt Avenue with no frills.

The Essentials

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.

A worker at J Mart adds more persimmons, a fall fruit, to the display, photo by Melanie Einzig

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.

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