The Little Wonder Restaurants of Rome

Even in the Eternal City's third millennium, you can still enjoy a feast fit for a Roman emperor. The tricky part is finagling a full meal in Rome for less than $12. Your best bet is to hunt down one of a handful of traditional Roman osterie, the sort of down-home, family-run restaurant holdover straight out of a 1950s Fellini film. There are several listed below, but to find your own just listen for the clink of glasses and murmur of Roman dialect emanating from behind the strings of beads hanging in a doorway with no sign and no menu posted...
  

The Other New York*

A different, better, and cheaper way to enjoy a renowned city

The ethnic restaurants of Jackson Heights. Superb ethnic eateries litter all five boroughs, but most New Yorkers agree that the finest concentration is in Jackson Heights, Queens. Grab the number 7 subway for a 20-minute ride from Grand Central to the 74th Street/Jackson Heights stop to partake of Indian, Argentinian, Ecuadorian, Peruvian, Thai, and Colombian cuisines. North of Roosevelt Avenue, 74th Street comprises a thriving Little India of sari stores, Bollywood video shops, and cheap curry restaurants galore. King of the all-you-can-eat buffets is Jackson Diner...

* Coverge of the Chelsea arts scene, Lower East Side, and enthnic dining in Jackson Heights

  

Eat Like a Local: Florence & Venice

Florence is the cradle of the Renaissance; Venice, threaded with canals, is that most serene city of Gothic palaces. Both are renowned for their excellent cuisine. Florentine cooks choose the thickest, juiciest cuts from the Chiana valley's snowy white cattle, brush them with olive oil and cracked peppercorns, and slow-grill them to perfection to become the mighty bistecca fiorentina. Venetian chefs cruise the ancient loggias of the Rialto market with an eye for the finest fish and shellfish caught that morning, which they will put in their famous fresh-seafood medleys. So basically we're talking about one town famous for its steak and another for its seafood. Neither comes cheaply. We're here to help...