The chinese food here is pretty average, but the Pho is actually quite decent. It's the first place I ever had it and the standard by which I measure it. You can find better Pho in Austin, but not much better and you'll have to go a long ways from campus to get it. Service is fast.

Lurking in the back of a rather crowded chinese grocery, Great Wall offers a variety of dishes not found in any of the thousands of identical chinese buffets throughout Connecticut, or even in regular restaurants. You could say it was more authentically chinese, and quite inexpensive to boot. However, the often low quality of the ingredients at the buffet is major strike against them (I once got indigestion from some rather questionable beef with broccoli), and the unfamiliarity of the dishes can sometimes cause problems - once I bit down on what appeared to be a dish with chunks of meet in it, only to find that those apparently bite sized chunks surrounded the sharp chopped bone. It wedged itself between my two front teeth and was quite painful. It's worth getting every now and again, but use caution. The grocery outside is well stocked with a variety of Asian foods including quite a few sweets.

This New Haven institution is virtually unchanged since the day it was founded back in the 50s or 60s, offering short order burgers, hot dogs, eggs, and so forth. The tiny diner has but ten stools, an ancient register, an old style soda fountaint, and only a grill (no fries). It's tasty but not particularly good for you - they put butter on the burgers, and offer a hot dog wrapped in cheese and bacon. Actually, it's probably the only fast food in the immediate Yale area. Give it a go.

Nestled next to a dock and dive shop on Pequot is THE summer hot spot for New London. Specializing in long hot dogs, hamburgers, and clam strips, with an ice cream window and only outdoor seating, Fred's Shanty is a popular destination for the locals. The food is good, the atmosphere is upbeat, and the parking is limited. For an unassuming summer treat, you can't go wrong here.

Nestled next to a dock and dive shop on Pequot is THE summer hot spot for New London. Specializing in long hot dogs, hamburgers, and clam strips, with an ice cream window and only outdoor seating, Fred's Shanty is a popular destination for the locals. The food is good, the atmosphere is upbeat, and the parking is limited. For an unassuming summer treat, you can't go wrong here.

New Haven is, for some reason, absolutely loaded with Thai restaurants. With such a glut of the same thing around, it's inevitable that some would try to distinguish themselves by claiming to also serve food from other regions, in this case Vietnam, with predictably wrong results. The litmus test here for me was Pho, AKA Hanoi Noodle Soup, a cheap absolutely delicious dish often referred to as Vietnamese soul food. The Pho at Indochine was anything but. They did not offer the side garnishes, just mixed them into the soup; the flavor was weak, and was heavily loaded with black pepper. In fact, I have yet to find a truly good example of Pho in Connecticut (there is one place in Old Saybrook that is so-so). Indochine certainly isn't it.

This is some of the best Mexican food I have ever eaten. The chicken and beef is always perfectly seasoned and very tender, the servings are generous, the tortillas are warm and soft. Everything is just perfect. Indoors is a bit unusual, with many small dining rooms, while outdoors they have a playground making it a big hit with parents and kids. Well worth the wait.

Haya's may not be the fanciest or best rated Japanese restaurant in the city, but it does have is a semblance of humble authenticity. Upstairs, the Sapporo-born proprietor makes sushi, and downstairs there is a main dining room and second one suited for parties - everywhere there are numerous little japanese crafts and dishes for sale. The menu covers not only the basics like ginger-beef hibachi and chicken teriyaki but also lesser known traditional dishes like Okyakudon and a mild, tasty japanese-style curry. Prices are reasonable (for a Japanese restaurant).

Everybody has tried tacos, right? Wrong. Real tacos come come as heaping piles of spiced meat over soft corn tortillas, with red salsa, green salsa, pico de gallo and more to spice to taste. They come in a building so non-descript and modestly decorated you wouldn't even see it if you weren't looking for it, and inside there are only one or two people who even speak english, with a cooler full of Jarritos sodas (and you must try the Tamarindo flavor). In short, you look for a taqueria, which can be found wherever there is a population of recently-arrived Mexicans in the US, assuming you look for them. Taqueria Mexicana is such a place.

Captain Scott's serves lobster, straight off the dock and with outdoor seating only (during the summer of course), at quite reasonable prices. The draw is lobster, cooked in all the usual ways, but they also serve clam strips and some other items. They are always packed, and are well known within the city, despite the fact that the restaurant is down some side streets and well off the beaten path. So if you're looking for a quintessentially summer-in-New-England experience, drop by sometime.

The bar known simply as "Bar" is a popular and crowded spot in New Haven, sporting both bar, pizza, and dance floor in multiple rooms throughout the building. The bar (or rather bars) are fully stocked and with numerous beers on tap. This also includes Bar's homebrewed varieties alcohol, which tend to be mostly ales and on the bitter end of the hops spectrum. The pizza is of a style unique to New Haven - paper thin, black on the bottom, and with more pungent mixture of cheese than the mozzarella mix found in most places. Some folks like it, although personally I don't, but it's worth checking out at least once. In the backroom they've got a full fledged dance club, with theme nights, meaning you'll be waiting in line to get in in the evenings.

I sat in on a lecture by Claire herself once, where she showed how to make a variety of salads and fresh dressings, all of which were quite good, but when I actually went to Claire's I was disappointed with what I got. They do know their salads though, and offer a wide variety of desserts. As the others have mentioned, the prices are very high for the amount of food that you get. The taste, like so many organic vegetarian type places, tends to be a rather bland and somewhat predictable. The ordering system is unusual/confusing and rather slow. In short, if you're not a vegetarian don't bother - if you are, you're bound to come here sooner or later.

This gourmet grocery and deli has a variety of good sandwiches and options, but its chief draw is the very nice per-pound gourmet buffet. There is a variety of italian pastas; asian options including sushi; latin options like fried plantains; and hot vegetables of all kinds. Perhaps the best feature are some of their hot entrees, including perfectly roasted chicken, duck, and turkey. The price per pound is a bit steep, but the options are delicious and varied. Seating is upstairs, and while you have to pay for parking there are many places to shop nearby including the biggest bookstore in Connecticut.

New Haven is packed to the gills with Thai Restaurants, but Thai Inter is in my opinion one of the better ones - especially if you like curry. They serve many different varieties of varying spiciness. I'm particularly fond of the very spicy but very good Panang curry with chicken myself. Takeout portions are larger than the dine in variety, and a great value at less than $10. The dining room is small but rarely packed, and the service is prompt. The only real drawback is the extremely limited parking in the area.

Bo's Bar-B-Q Barn was the best bbq in the city. Actually, it was the only bbq in the town (although there's also Joe Grate's in Hamden, but they can't even seem to do brisket right). And now, there is no bbq in the city, because Bo's went out of business. It was usually empty, I suppose because there was little demand for Texas-style BBQ in health-concious New England, and apparently succumbed to the inevitable a few years back.

This fine dining establishment goes boldly where few fine dining restaurants dare to go - to the really spicy end of the universe. Like the closely related Thai style of cuisine, this Malaysian restaurant doesn't shy away from the seasonings, with a variety of sauces and in particular satays. Lunch prices are reasonable, but dinner is for the well-dressed and you need a reservation. They have an excellent wine selection. In short, this rare instance of a unique regional cuisine is worth a trip.

Humphrey's East is indeed crowded, and could definitely use some more space, but the parking is at least adequate. Like Archie Moore's, it's really just a bar that happens to serve a lot of bar food, hamburgers, hot sandwiches, and a few more specialized options. Portions are generally large, but not atypically so. As Angela said, it's definitely a neighborhood place, but nothing to write home about.

Archie Moore's has slightly better food than the comparable Humphrey's East, but with a smaller selection, much less room, and terrible parking which is just barely adequate for the bar's traffic and difficult to navigate under any conditions. In any case, the food is decent bar food with some slightly healthier and fancier choices on the menu than your usual bar.

Yorkside's late nights, good seating, and close proximity to both Yale and Toad's is about the only thing going for it. There are about a million pizza-and-grinder restaurants in the area, and Yorkside's overpriced, undersized, uninspiring options do not put it high on that list. So, give it a miss - unless you happen to be in the area some late night, in which case you will surely end up there.

If you're looking for a fine seafood restaurant in New Haven, look no further. The Rusty Scupper has a refined selection, excellent service with all the trimmings, classy bar and indoor seating and just about the only waterfront dining in New Haven. Admittedly, that view is of the rather industrial New Haven Harbor, but it's better than nothing.