I come to New York City to eat.

Yes, I see friends. I shop. I go to events. I do all the things you're supposed to do in New York. But there is almost always a restaurant reservation, or five, sitting somewhere in my plans.

And increasingly, the food I'm chasing is Caribbean.

New York is my favourite food city, and I love the sheer amount of incredible Caribbean and Afro-Caribbean food available. I can have Trinidadian food one night, Jamaican the next, Haitian flavours somewhere else and still have barely scratched the surface.

These aren't restaurants trying to make Caribbean food into something it isn't. The preparations may be more modern and the dining rooms may look different, but the flavours are ours — bold, familiar, authentic and done really, really well.

Kabawa, chef Paul Carmichael's modern Caribbean restaurant, is my splurge. The three-course prix fixe menu is $150 before drinks and gratuity, and it's worth it.

Instead of the usual bread and butter, you're served buss up shut roti, which immediately tells you what kind of experience you're about to have. The goat is fantastic — and I don't even like goat like that — and the open kitchen makes the entire room feel alive. Chef Paul is a friend, but I'd tell you to eat there regardless.

Then there's Tatiana by chef Kwame Onwuachi.

I wanted to eat there so badly that for my birthday in December 2024, I flew into New York, had dinner and flew back out the next day.

Yes. For dinner.

I made a reel about it, the New York Post found it and interviewed me about flying into the city essentially to eat at Tatiana. The chicken shawarma and oxtail were standouts, and I would absolutely do it again.

There are plenty of less dramatic options.

At Mango Bay in Brooklyn, give me the whole grilled branzino, ackee and saltfish egg rolls and a sorrel spritz and I'm happy.

At Omar's Kitchen on the Lower East Side, I almost always order the whole brown stew fish. The oxtail is excellent too, the goat ribs are unlike anything I've had elsewhere and the margaritas come in flavours like soursop, coconut and tamarind.

For something more casual, Fat Fowl by chef Shorne Benjamin has the viral oxtail grilled cheese, but I love the lavender rotisserie chicken, black rice and stovetop mac and cheese. I'm firmly a baked mac and cheese person, so I don't give stovetop versions compliments lightly. This one is insane.

And then there are tacos. Not Caribbean, I know, but tacos are easily one of my top three favourite foods, so Los Tacos No. 1 is part of my New York routine. I'm getting carne asada or chicken, plenty of spicy salsa and an agua fresca.

If I take the train into Penn Station, there's a good chance that's my first stop. Otherwise, I start with a slice of pizza, preferably pepperoni with hot honey. Then the trip can begin.

What excites me about eating Caribbean food in New York isn't the idea that our food is suddenly being “elevated”. Our food doesn't need elevating.

It's seeing our flavours presented confidently in different spaces, from a casual lunch to a restaurant you have to fight to get into. Nobody needs to apologise for the heat, explain away the seasoning or turn the food into something else.

We're just showing up with our food and our flavours, and doing them exceptionally well. That's why food isn't something I figure out once I've booked New York.

It's part of the reason I booked the trip in the first place.