What JeffTastes loves
Food
Art and Design
I believe food is the greatest medium to communicate and connect. I create accessible, authentic experiences of cultures, designed to open up our minds and palates. I have 2 areas of expertise: Pizza and Roosevelt Avenue, Queens.
Here’s the difference with me: I live here. I am not a tour guide, and I am not a company. I am an insider to this community, showing you my bests and my secrets, telling you everything I’ve learned. I will take you through passageways to the cultures that live here, and cherry pick the most eye-opening, heart-warming experiences. You won’t be lectured, you’ll be a participant in the most diverse area on the planet.
Learn more about me, Jeff Orlick, on iwantmorefood.com
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Reviews for Jeff Tastes
We recently had the pleasure of joining Jeff for the midnight food crawl through the queens area. It was one of the most unique tours I've been on. We tried food from around 10 or so different street food vendors, majority I'd never seen or heard of before. It was awesome to try diverse foods from countries like Peru and Dominican Republic to name a few! Jeff was a great guide and definately knew the best places to try. Highly recommend for anyone who wants to try something unique! Highly recommend!
We recently had the pleasure of joining Jeff for the midnight food crawl through the queens area. It was one of the most unique tours I've been on. We tried food from around 10 or so different street food vendors, majority I'd never seen or heard of before. It was awesome to try diverse foods from countries like Peru and Dominican Republic to name a few! Jeff was a great guide and defiantely knew the best places to try. Highly recommend for anyone who wants to try something unique! Highly recommend!
AMAZING experience! Great food and great people. Totally stuffed at the end. I'm joining a day tour next. Highly recommend.
I really enjoyed this tour. All the food we tried was really great and there was such a big variety. I ate so many things I have never had before or would even think to order. Jeff was clearly very knowledgeable/well researched about the area and food - he also seemed to know everyone in the neighborhood! Make sure you bring a big appetite because you will sample a lot of food!
Brilliant tour. The area of Queens where our tour took place is fascinating; MANY different cultures very tightly packed together. Jeff took us to places which we would never have found and would have found quite inaccessible. I really liked his style of asking the vendors about the foods and ordering off the cuff depending what we wanted to try. This wasn't a 'sit over there, your food will arrive' tour. This was more like 'right, here we are, this is an Ecuadorian bakery, it does great fried rice, shall we try some?'. We were always up at the counter with Jeff which was great.
The places we visited weren't fixed; in fact there were loads we just dipped into unplanned; like a halal food truck with some amazing marinated meat and an elderly lady selling fresh tamales out of a steam bucket! It made the tour really exciting and it was nice to not know exactly where we were going. We tried LOTS of food; far more stops than any other food tour I've ever done.
Particular highlights were watching momos get made in a tiny Tibetan kitchen, eating Nepalese thali in the tiniest food court in the world, an amazing shrimp cocktail made from a little stand in the back of a Mexican convenience store and an incredible Ecuadorian desert.
Jeff obviously loves the area and has a huge depth of knowledge about the food and the people. His stories made the whole tour very interesting and he gave us a great recommendation for a craft beer bar afterwards; that was great Jeff the Maine Mo pale ale was awesome.
All in all, superb, would HIGHLY recommend...best food tour we've ever done and we've done a few both in the US and in the Far East.
We just finished our tour last night and I may not have room to eat for a week but it was worth it. Jeff not only knows his food, he knows, and more importantly cares about the people who make it. You will learn about a neighbourhood and what sustains it. And the food is amazing.
WOW!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Had a great time with Jeff and also with the group. The places Jeff picked were real treasures with awesome food and interesting people. My favorite was a guy named Nacho from Mexico City. He can do magic with fish. Would definately recommend Jeff's tour to anyone who wants to have a special experience in New York.
Doing a tour with Jeff was a profound experience. A knowledge trade off was underway. I learned about the restaurants he does tours of in Queens, and am exited to take his food tour in the near future. I can only hope that Jeff learned some things about the history of NYC going on my experience as well! What a cool person to spend the day with!
Jeff is amazing. For three years I have taken advantage of Jeff's broad base of knowledge and connections on a Jackson Heights food tour. I lead a experiential learning project on culture with 7-12 graders from the Renaissance Charter School, every year. The students learn so much from Jeff. He is good with kids, personable, and knows all of the owners of the restaurants we go to. He can even pronounce all of the difficult names of the foods! I highly recommend that you participate in this food tour if you are looking to try amazing foods you have never heard of!
Great experience! An absolut must for everyone who wants to see more of New York than Manhatten or cueing in front of sightseeing spots.
Jeff guides you with his experience thru Queens and its very different Midnight Street Food offers. We had very different sorts of food and beverages coming from Mexican, Ecuadorian, Dominican and Colombian cuisine.
We would never had gone to Queens alone, because we wouldn't know where to go.
Jeff and his food tour was a highlight of our NYC trip... Jeff adds a personal touch along with some great food delights !! I highly
recommend Jeff....
Thanks, Jeff, for this great and unique experience: it's such a very special way to discover the Queens. And the opportunity of meeting people in NYC, and a very nice person (you, the guide).
Thanks, Jeff, for this great and unique experience: it's such a very special way to discover the Queens. And the opportunity of meeting people in NYC, and a very nice person (you, the guide).
We had a great time on this tour. Jeff's knowledge of the area and our collective curiosity of new things allowed for a laid back, unstructured evening full of great food and surprises. Jeff says no two tours are alike, and it's easy to see that he approaches his tours on a personalized level.
I'd definitely recommend this tour to any NYC area residents and visitors alike. By the end of the evening, we were completely stuffed, satisfied, and had a much better understanding of this great neighborhood.
Reviews by Jeff Tastes
The other week I had the opportunity to join Michael on his tour of the Counter-Culture of New York. The history he shows you, the behind the scenes and the back-stories, is unending. Michael is a true local, with a deep connection to Occupy Wall Street. It's great to walk around with him and get his point of view of the current state of the union, with a firm grasp of our nation's roots, told and untold. This is a great tour for anyone interested in politics and history, especially the underbelly of it all, in NYC.
Emily does a great tour of the street food around Playa del Carmen. She's knowledgeable, friendly, and a professional chef. She brought us to some great spots, explained the dishes, went to some market, and talked the Yucatan food ways. Definitely needed for touring QROO.
Michael took us on a tour through the Upper East Side. Even though I live in Queens and work in Manhattan, I neeeever go to the UES. It was cool to see all the historic buildings and houses, see where the richest of the rich bought houses for their children's wedding present (which they never even lived in). Michael lives in the neighborhood, so having a local is great for guideship.
Scott is the King of pizza tours, and tours in general. Definitely a must-go for locals and visitors to NYC.
This tour was a dream come true for me. Underground cultures always intrigue me, and this is literally as far underground as NYC gets. Heidi is a member of this culture and has been doing it for around a decade. She is super nice and a great guide. I even made some busker friends. Dream come true.
This was a great tour, just what I needed. DC is great for all the museums and monuments, but at night time, the activities aren't as apparent. Peter took me to some of the places where the locals go and showed me the sections where to get great, real food. I wish there was a tour like this in every city I went to. Thanks !
Linda is awesome. She has worked in the area in the courts for a while and took an interest, so now she is showing it off. My favorite part was going into the courtroom and watching the cases - Linda dissected to me what was going on. I have always wanted to go there, so glad it was on the tour. Thanks!