Italian Food Near Park Avenue South, by Train
Priya Raman · August 4, 2026 · 5 min
Five Italian rooms on and around Park Avenue South, sorted by the subway stop you came in on and the walk from the turnstile.
Park Avenue South looks like an office corridor, and for most of the day it is one. Typing “best italian restaurant near me” while standing on it returns a list sorted by ad spend rather than by walking distance, which misses what is actually here. The stretch from Union Square up to 23rd Street holds more good Italian food than the glass lobbies let on, and nearly all of it sits within a five-minute walk of the same two subway stops. The trick is knowing which door you came out of. Below are five rooms on or just off the avenue, sorted by where you get off the train and how far you walk from there.
At a glance
The 6 train stops at 23rd Street and Park Avenue South, which is the closest station to most of this list. Union Square, five blocks south, brings in the 4, 5, 6, L, N, Q, R and W. From the 6 at 23rd, Novità is a minute east, and Rezdôra and Isabelle’s Osteria are three to four minutes south. From Union Square, Tarallucci e Vino is a block north and Paul & Jimmy’s is a couple of blocks northeast toward Irving Place. Nothing here is more than about a seven-minute walk from a turnstile.
Coming up from the 6 at 23rd Street
This is the stop to aim for. The station sits right on Park Avenue South, and three of the five are a short walk south or east.
Novità, 102 East 22nd Street
One minute east of the station, just off Park Avenue South, Novità is the quieter, warmer northern Italian room of the group and the closest sit-down table to this exit. Lunch runs Monday to Friday from noon to 3:30 and dinner from 5 to 10, with weekends dinner only. It is the pick when you want to hear the person across the table, which the louder rooms nearby do not always allow.
Rezdôra, 27 East 20th Street
Half a block west of Park Avenue South on 20th, about four minutes from the 6. Rezdôra cooks Emilia-Romagna pasta and does it well enough to be the hardest table on this page to get. Lunch runs Tuesday through Friday from noon to 2:30 and weekends from 11:30, with dinner nightly to 10:30 and Monday dinner only. Reservations go through SevenRooms from its own site. This is the one to plan around rather than walk into.
Isabelle’s Osteria, 245 Park Avenue South at 20th Street
Walk south on Park Avenue South from the 23rd Street exit and you reach Isabelle’s in about four minutes, on the corner of 20th. It is a big room, 150 seats around a long bar, which makes it the easy answer when a group cannot agree: the kitchen cooks homemade pasta and seasonal plates rather than one narrow specialty, so the person who wants pasta and the person who wants fish can sit at the same table. Named pastas on the current menu include rigatoni alla vodka, tagliatelle Bolognese, bucatini carbonara, a mushroom lasagna and a shrimp linguine fra diavolo. The seasonal dishes turn over, so treat any specific plate you read about elsewhere as a maybe. The bar runs a weekday Aperitivo Hour from 2 to 6, which makes arriving early a feature rather than a wait. Reservations open thirty days out on OpenTable and Resy for parties up to ten, and walk-ins go to the bar first come first served. You can view Isabelle’s current menu to see what the kitchen is running this month before you commit.
Coming up from Union Square
If your train drops you at 14th Street instead, walk north. Two of the five are closer to this end.
Tarallucci e Vino, 15 East 18th Street
A block north of the square, between Fifth and Broadway, Tarallucci e Vino opens early and stays flexible all day. It runs breakfast, lunch, brunch and dinner, opens at 8 on weekdays and later at the weekend, and keeps a happy hour from 3 to 6 in the bar and outdoor seating. This is the answer for the meal you did not plan, or the one where nobody wants to commit to a two-hour dinner.
Paul & Jimmy’s, 123 East 18th Street
A couple of blocks northeast toward Irving Place, Paul & Jimmy’s has been a Gramercy fixture since 1950, cooking southern Italian and Italian-American food with handmade pasta. It is open from noon daily, closing at 10 Tuesday through Saturday and 9 on Sunday and Monday. Come here when you want the food to be familiar and the room to feel like it has been there a while, because it has.
Putting it together on the map
Draw a line down Park Avenue South from 23rd to 14th and four of these five sit within a block of it, with the fifth a short jog east.
If you are starting from the bottom of that line rather than the top, the seven rooms grouped by Union Square exit covers the same walk in reverse and names the staircase to use. Two avenues west, the six rooms reached from the Flatiron Building picks up the Broadway and Fifth Avenue side. And if you drift east instead of south, the walk from the 6 train platform in Gramercy covers the rooms one avenue over.
For the newer, market-minded kitchens, the ones a few blocks south toward Union Square that rewrite their menus with the season are worth a look on the same walk, and there is a block-by-block guide to Italian dinner in Gramercy for the streets east of here.
Frequently Asked Question
Where can I eat around Park Avenue South if I only have an hour for lunch?
Lunch is where this corridor is easiest. On a weekday, Rezdôra runs midday service from noon and Novità goes to 3:30, while Tarallucci e Vino is open straight through from the morning, so you are not gambling on whether a kitchen is between services. If the hour is tight, Tarallucci is the safest bet because it does not seat you into a fixed dinner rhythm. For a sit-down lunch with a little more ceremony, Novità is calm enough to hold a conversation. Check the day’s hours before you walk over, since weekday lunch windows are the first thing that shifts.
Where to start
Pick by your train. Off the 6 at 23rd, start east toward Novità, or south to Isabelle’s, or west to Rezdôra if you booked ahead. Off Union Square, walk north to Tarallucci for something easy or over to Paul & Jimmy’s for something old. The whole cluster fits in a ten-minute radius, so a first choice that is full rarely means more than a two-block walk to the next one.
Editor’s note: Isabelle’s Osteria is affiliated with this publication. Restaurants were selected using the criteria described above.
