The popular weekend retreat for New Yorkers is a food and wine destination on its own, from the Hamptons to Sag Harbour.
Growing up in Hamilton I heard of Long Island before I heard of New York — the area’s high-alcohol “iced tea” recipe being the stuff of teenage legend.
On a recent trip to the East Coast I got a couple of days out of the Big Apple to see Long Island for myself — we didn’t drink any iced tea, but the cute seaside towns and sprawling vineyards made for plenty of great eating and drinking of a more civilised nature.
Long Island is a huge area (it’s worth taking a look at it on the map, particularly in comparison to the tiny sliver of Manhattan where you’ll most likely have come from).
Some lucky (read wealthy) New Yorkers treat it as a summer escape, while others live on the Island and commute into the city when necessary.
Either way, as a New Zealander you’ll be struck by the seemingly endless mansions visible from the road, even if they’re sometimes obscured by equally huge hedges.
Tourists pay the same prices for dinner as locals like Jerry Seinfeld and Billy Joel do, so plan to mix up your (excellent) restaurant meals with a slab of pizza when the opportunity allows.
A car trip up the south coast toward the famous Hamptons (a collection of 17 small towns at the forked tip of the peninsula) is great for rubbernecking, with a few good beaches to stop at if you’re interested (the coastal towns swell in summer but you’ll sometimes feel like you have them to yourselves even in the shoulder seasons).
The century-old Snapper Inn makes a nice stopping point for a seafood lunch on the way up to the tip of the Southern Fork — it’s also a good place to talk your way on to a boat cruise or a tour of Fire Island, a strip of sand with a lighthouse that becomes a hedonistic resort in the hotter months (there are 18 bars in 80 acres).
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Advertise with NZME.After a trip up Route 27 to the eastern end of the island it’s fun to follow your nose around villages you’ve heard about and maybe even seen on screen.
Look out for 75 Main, a sceney restaurant in Southampton where they film Serving the Hamptons, a hit reality show looking behind the scenes of the local industry. A long meal here will provide some of the best people-watching in New York State, but do book early in summer.
From here we drove to Sag Harbour, where you can catch a car ferry to the northern fork of the Long Island, via Shelter Island, a popular piece of real estate for celebrities seeking a less flashy part of the area (well, these things are relative — Kendall Jenner hosted a party at the local Sunset Beach Hotel last summer).
While you wait for the ferry in Sag, consider picking up supplies in the boutique grocery store, eating a meal at Baron’s Cove restaurant or dropping into Gwyneth Paltrow’s Goop store — one of the few brick-and-mortar locations for her successful, puzzling global brand.
There are any number of lovely towns you could pick to stay the night in, but you’ll be hard-pressed to beat Greenport, your disembarkation point from the Shelter Island ferry.
There is plenty to eat and drink in this quaint seaside town, from Claudio’s, a heritage family business that seems to own almost every eatery on the waterfront, to Noah’s, a restaurant specialising in Long Island-farmed ingredients and great wine — if you’ve been saving yourself for a lobster roll, this is the place.
The next morning, be sure to eat at Crazy Beans cafe, a family-owned diner-style breakfast joint where the service is warm and the portions are huge (consider their special quesadilla: eggs, bacon, sausage and cheese served between two pancakes with maple syrup).
The town has some good bars too, though they close early out of season so you’re better to stay at your restaurant or take a bottle of rosé back to your hotel.
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Advertise with NZME.We kept our day-two itinerary fairly relaxed and still enjoyed a lot of what makes Long Island’s north coast special. We had a morning of apple-picking at Wickham’s Fruit Farm, scoffed through a few cider doughnuts, drank our way through a flight of fine wine at Terra Vite vineyard then found a great spot for lunch in the town of Mattituck.
A concentrated street block of gourmet foods including international cheeses, wood-fired pizzas and excellent coffee, “Love Lane” offers a charming mix of old and new (during my visit, traffic stopped while a bemused local police officer mediated between the driver of a dusty pickup truck and the owner of an Audi he’d just collided with).
We drank seasonal pumpkin beers at Love Lane Kitchen and toasted our happy luck in finding such a picturesque American town to pause in after the morning’s travels.
From there we travelled back down the island to the one of the most memorable hotels I’ve stayed in. Oheka Castle is the USA’s second-largest private residence, and if it looks familiar to you, maybe you saw Taylor Swift’s Blank Space video or the TV show Succession’s “Boar on the Floor” episode, both of which were filmed there.
Time your arrival for “Gatsby Hour”, named for the novel the castle is said to have inspired: a drink in the outdoor courtyard with owner Gary is a conversation you’re unlikely to forget — though I’m undecided on whether you should google him before or after your chat.
If your funds are starting to strain at this point, do what we did and have a casual dinner in nearby Huntington Village, a historic town with plenty of great pizza and the Six Harbors Brewing Company, a good craft beer producer where you can bring along your own food or just order a pilsner, pat the local dogs and watch baseball on TV.
The next morning we had a lovely vineyard lunch at Del Vino then (I got outvoted) a chaser at America’s most beautiful McDonald’s, in New Hyde Park. From here you’re within spitting distance of Queens and the rest of New York City.
That’s a taste of my own culinary experience, but every town has so many good eateries that you can’t really miss, especially if budget isn’t an issue. And if you have the body (or the confidence) for it, time your trip for the height of summer, eat an egg white omelette for lunch and spend the afternoon at a Montauk pool party, treating Long Island as so many New Yorkers seem to: as a luxurious break from real life.
Five things to eat on Long Island
1. Ask a local what’s for breakfast and the answer trips easily off the tongue: bacon, egg, cheese, salt and pepper and ketchup on a roll (that’s “BEC” for short). Order one made fresh from one of the delis that sit on the corners of most towns, owned and run by Jewish families that go way back in the area (you can get your BEC on a bagel, too, if you prefer).
2. The area is famous for its seafood and while the oyster harvest is still in recovery following a big storm in the early 20th century, clams, crabs and lobsters are in plentiful supply. Try a lobster roll from a great restaurant, cold with mayo or hot with butter (“Connecticut-style”) if you can find it, and always with a side of fries.
3. Pizza isn’t unique to Long Island but the locals say theirs tastes better than it does in New York City. Find an Italian-owned store — generally the less pretty the shop, the better the pizza, and try a pepperoni or a local special — penne a la vodka pizza (yes, that’s pizza with pasta on top). Little Vincent’s and Rosa’s are both reliable, but if in doubt, ask a local (and don’t over-order: one 18-inch “pie” was enough for five of us).
4. The north coast of Long Island is a fruit bowl, and depending on the season you should drop by a farm shop and pick your own apples — or try something prepared earlier. The apple cider doughnut is a proud local treat, or pick up an American-style fruit pie to take with you.
5. According to an old saying, people in the Hamptons drink more rosé than water, and to be honest there is something lovely about sipping a cold glass of something pink with a view of the sea. Pick up a bottle from a nearby vineyard or cheat and buy “Hampton’s Water”, Jon Bon Jovi’s delicious French-grown brand designed for the thirsty local market.
Jesse stayed at Sound View Greenport, 58775 Country Rd 48, Greenport, NY. Phone (631) 477-1910m, info@soundviewgreeport.com, and Oheka Castle, 135 W Gate Dr, Huntington, NY. Phone (631) 659-1400, Oheka.com
