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Food Emporium
Rating Details »
- Nearest Transit:
-
59th St-Lexington Ave (4, 5, 6, N, R, W)
- Price Range:
-
$$
- Accepts Credit Cards:
- Yes
- Parking:
- Street
- Wheelchair Accessible:
- Yes
12 reviews for Food Emporium
Is it wrong to love a grocery store? You see, I have to put up with D'Agostino's as my primary store and let me tell you, that SUCKS hairy balls. But this place... it's beautiful. It's large (in comparison to all of the Midtown East grocery stores) and filled with great products. Every time I can't find fresh fruits and vegetables, I come here.
It has a yuppie, high-income feel to it. There are specialty sections: bakery, seafood, a cafe, cheeses, butcher, a florist, etc. It has many European brands. And it's all expensive but everything I've bought here has been wonderful. The occasions I've had to interact with the employees, they've always been helpful and pleasant. They have a 2nd floor where they provide seating (see photo) and some electrical outlets for laptops. Their specialty tea selection is also up there, along w/ some misc. home accessories.
I'm happy to say that this store seems to be ADA compliant. They have ramps to their 59th St. entrance and exit, automatic doors, wide-ish aisles, and an elevator to the 2nd floor.
Summary: if you have to pay for expensive groceries in Manhattan, you might as well do it in a beautiful grocery store.
This store is pretty incredible, architecturally interesting, has an amazing array of luxury products, top quality meat and cheese, and odd promotions that are fun to shop. But it is redickulusly expensive! Every time I check out, I feel like I'm being mugged. Even by Manhattan standards, this place is way way way overpriced (though not Eli's or Dean and Deluca overpriced--which are straight out robbery). Stop by, loiter, and buy an unnecessary 4th bottle of elderflower syrup.
Oh my!!! This place makes me CRAZY!!!!
Here's the thing. I LOVE grocery stores. The endless rows of possibilities; one after the next, after the next. I have always been this way, ever since I was a child. Mom would finish the shopping and I'd be throwing a tantrum in line because I wanted to stay and see more. When I was 6, I would write my mom's grocery lists, clip the coupons on Sunday morning and organize it all by the journey we would take through the store. First stop produce, then on to seafood, then to the butcher, then to the dairy and around the store we went. When I was 9 or 10, those possibilities began to mean more to me. I was cooking quite a bit and I was allowed one item for the pantry every time we went that I would then work into a new recipe. And on life went.
I think my love for them stems from my fathers profession. He worked in the business for nearly 30 years. His job was to design computer systems, networks and mainframes that would enhance the sales of products and move them off the shelves. Dinner table conversations were always about where product was on the shelf and why that placement was important. Marketing meets computer science, in the 80s.
Today, this love for stores and understanding of product placement is innate. Grocery stores are wonderful places. One of my favorite things to do in NYC is to go on a date at Whole Foods for dinner. You can walk the store, choose what you like and then sit in complete comfort and enjoy your findings with your new or old friend. I have had many grocery store dates... you learn a lot about a person by which jar of pickles they choose or which ice cream they take home. I digress...
The point of this review, is that this store has the most convoluted layout of any store I have ever been in. They have cleaning supplies in three different sections of the store. They have four sections of olives. They have specialty foods and regular foods in separate sections of the store - so if you don't know if your olives are Greek, Italian or Spanish you could wind up searching for 10 minutes for the right jar. Their prepared food is on the perimeter of the store and packaged foods are in the middle - save the frozen foods and packaged cheeses which are tucked away behind the meats. But, there are also more packaged cheeses with the cold cuts and the regular cheese section is yet in another location. There is an upstairs section with kitchen utensils and then there is another section on the opposite wall of the store downstairs. There are two bread sections, an organic veggie section and a regular veggie section with all the same vegetables (there are also flies in the produce section - yuck) and there is no defined snack food isle so if you are looking for cake mix, you might assume it is with other baking goods, but it's not, it's near the baby food. I'm confused thinking about it.
I spend three times as much time in this store searching for nothing more than reason, most of the time. It makes me so crazy that I will walk 30 minutes to the Time Warner Center to shop before crossing the street to shop here.
I wish it were better....
S~
p.s. It is also VERY EXPENSIVE for the selection and the lines take FOREVER to check out!
Seriously... Why the heck would I lug groceries from USQ when I can get them at this Food Emporium on the UES?
Dropped by Food Emporium this past Wednesday to pick up a few things. For some reason, I had this premature thought that this place was going to resemble the local Stop & Shop that's near my place in Brooklyn. Boy, was I wrong!
When first entering the Food Emporium, I was amazed at what this Supermarket had to offer...
- Super Fresh Produce
- USDA Certified Grade A Meats
- High Quality Seafood
- Over 15 Varietals of Pasta
- An Abundance of Regional Cheese of Italy, France, the US, etc...
- Freshly Baked Bread
- Desserts that plays the role of Eye Candy and Diet Breaker
After being hit with such a perfect display of Supermarkets, I asked myself why I would bother going back to the Nightmare that is Whole Foods (oh right... They have things like Jicama & Quinoa).
Another thing worth noting... The Price!
Where can someone get a 90/10 piece of Sirloin Steak for $6.99 / pound? Granted, the Steak was on sale but really, that's dinner for 2 nights!
One thing I didn't like though (thus explaining 4 stars), the employees all seemed to drag around and weren't as energetic as other Supermarkets I shop at. When I greeted the Butcher to acquire my piece of Sirloin, I didn't receive the best of responses. The dialogue is denoted below...
Chun: Good Evening Sir, How Are You?
Steve (Butcher): Fine... Want Something?
Chun: ...
Needless to say, that transaction lasted all of 74 seconds.
Despite that one misstep in Food Emporium's Road to perfection, the Supermarket deserves a 4 star approval rating for their vast selection of consumables as well as cleanliness.
If it wasn't for my love of Jicama and Quinoa, I'd never go back to Whole Foods again!
Gorgeous store. The building looks like a scaled-down version of Grand Central Station. Sloping, arching tiled ceiling with skylights, excellent lighting.
This is a swanky place to buy a bundle of Kale (sometimes all you need is Kale. and love).
This place is absolutely fantastic. It has a huge selection of groceries. I like to cook and I was being driven to distraction by the less-than-adequate selection of vegetables at the other stores close to me.
Not only does this place have a extensive selection of pretty much every category of foodstuffs you could shop for, it has beautiful, arched ceilings. It's slightly less claustrophobic than the other NYC grocery stores I have been to. It even has a little chill out cafe area that I have yet to use.
I would agree with one of the other yelpers that it can be hard to find things here. However, when you go to your regular grocery store, you eventually figure out where everything is, so that's not an issue for very long.
It may seem strange to be so excited about a grocery store, but YOU trying cooking with yucky old onions and then you'll see.
I've had much better grocery experiences in Manhattan than at this FE location. For a memorial service, a cousin had put fruit bowls, crudites, sourdough and challah on hold and none of it was waiting for me when I went to pick it up. Once the problem was solved and the recovered the order, things moved quicker, but still, I'd opt for other locations, or D'Agostinos or Fairways.
Not Perfect, But One of the Better Supermarkets in NYC
This store has its pros and cons but it is one of my favorite places to shop for groceries in NYC (and I don't even live on the East Side).
Cons: Weird product layout (many items grouped by country); some high prices (but finding bargain groceries in NYC is a challenge save for Fairway and Trader Joe's - but I'm not willing to put up with those mobs)
Pros: Stunning space with tall, vaulted ceilings adds some extra panache to grocery shopping, excellent selection of gourmet foods (wonderful pasta), staff generally helpful, and cashiers even smile!, great flower selection.
All in all, it can be a pain to find things in this store due to the unconventional layout. But you do come to figure out where they keep the things you buy the most often. It's also a fun store to people-watch.
I know grocery shopping in Manhattan is not the same as it is in California, and I always forget that I can only shop for what I can carry back home! I hate that the only place where I can find "real food" like bacon, cream, baking items and etc are from Food Emporium. The prices are ridiculous, but I'm sure that's normal for NYC. I still give it 2 stars because it is a crime to pay over $6 for a box of Honey Bunches of Oats. It just is!! Cereal used to be my comfort food but now I can't even afford that! The selection is so small... I miss my huge Albertsons!!
Beautiful building. Terrible layout, indifferent and uninformed service, bizarre product selection (you don't have to stock every single item a company makes) and ridiculous prices. If you want to be an upscale market, don't continue to call the store "Food Emporium". It pisses people off when they just want some groceries.
Terrible idea, really. Go back to what you do "best", a mediocre grocery store with (at best) mediocre service.
This place is gorgeous and has everything you want...if you can find it. The first time I went I couldn't find milk or pesto sauce. After coming back, I've now found them (back right corner and north wall respectively) and throughly enjoy that they have such a fantastic selection. I particularly like the 'international center' in the middle, where food is divided by country of origin. It doesn't get 5 stars because I still get lost...
Pretty much a waste of time as a grocery store. Fancy chocolates, almost artisanal breads, yes. But ordinary canned goods, hardly!
Finding anything is like trying to get through a maze - no aisles, very poor signs.
