Where we'd eat, drink, and walk if we had three days and nothing to prove. Map at the bottom.

New York is the most written-about city in the world. It's also the most wrongly written-about. Most guides hand you the same ten things. A Times Square steakhouse. A Broadway show. A "best bagel" from a chain. A photo on the Brooklyn Bridge. That's a tourist day. That isn't New York.

The actual New York has a rhythm. You find a coffee shop you like and go back to it three times. You walk fifty blocks because the weather is good. You eat lunch standing up. You drink martinis in a bar with no sign on the door. You eat dinner late. You take the train home, always.

Here's how we'd spend three days in it.

Things to do

One disclaimer first: Mr Katz is a food and adventure brand. Museums and galleries, we leave to the experts.

So walk. Start the morning at Abraço on East 7th for coffee standing up. They've been doing it longer than the neighborhood has been cool. A block away, C&B on the same street is the longer-sit version, thirteen menu items built off seasonal local ingredients and the best egg sandwich in the East Village for the price.

From there, the whole of downtown is yours on foot, east side to west and back again. End the day at Overstory, on the 64th floor of 70 Pine, currently one of the best bars in the world and, quietly, the best view in the city. No glass walls, no crowd, just a martini and the skyline.

And one visit to Katz's Delicatessen. The name on the door is the only reason you'd expect us to send you there. The pastrami is the reason you'll go back.

Where to eat

Sushi. Sushi Nakazawa is, yes, the best omakase outside of Tokyo. The chef trained under Jiro. It also costs enough that you could fly to Tokyo and eat at a counter there for less, so our honest advice is to skip it. Go to KazuNori for hand rolls at a counter, standing, in and out in twenty minutes. Go to SUGARFISH for the clean, always-reservable version.

Pizza. If you're willing to wait in line, make it L'industrie in Williamsburg. The burrata slice is the one. Otherwise, we used to live a block from Cello's on St Mark's and that's the quieter, smarter play. Our rule: if you have to wait, it isn't a slice. Roberta's in Bushwick is still the reason wood-fired pizza took over the country, but that one's a sit-down night.

Steak. Peter Luger, because Brooklyn. The Grill in the Seagram Building for the New York power-lunch fantasy, served in the only landmarked dining room in the United States. They carve the prime rib tableside off a gleaming cart. It's absurd. It's also correct.

Breakfast and the rest. Cafe Mogador in the East Village for the kind of breakfast you have to book ahead. Malawach, sabich, the Moroccan Benedict, the tagine if you stay for lunch. Fradei in Fort Greene for weekend Italian brunch that feels like a small wine bar in Rome. Los Mariscos for tacos inside Chelsea Market. Sobaya in the East Village for soba done the way Tokyo would recognise. Win Son Bakery in East Williamsburg for Taiwanese pastry you can't get anywhere else in the city. L'Appartement 4F in Brooklyn Heights for the Le Framboise raspberry-almond croissant, which has a line out the door for a reason.

Wine and cocktails. Our actual favourite restaurant in the city is Rosella in the East Village. Natural wine, which we could take or leave, but the sushi is extraordinary and the $150 omakase is the best-value fifteen-course meal in New York. Aldo Sohm Wine Bar, run by Le Bernardin's wine director, who was named the best sommelier in the world in 2008. Temperance and Terroir for the looser downtown version. PDT for the speakeasy that started every other speakeasy. The Dead Rabbit for the Irish cocktail bar that rewrote the category. Old Mates Pub when you want an Australian beer with Americans who don't know what they're drinking.

On Michelin

Most of New York's Michelin-starred dining rooms are overrated. The bars attached to them are not.

Walk into Le Bernardin at lunch. The lounge takes walk-ins and runs the full menu at a fraction of the dining-room commitment. Walk into Eleven Madison Park, sit at the bar, and order the duck, which is back on the menu after a four-year detour. You get Daniel Humm's kitchen without the twelve-course reservation.

Need to know

Book the things you care about two weeks out, minimum. New York restaurants aren't shy about dropping unconfirmed reservations.

The subway is faster than a cab below 59th. Always.

And don't try to do Manhattan and Brooklyn in the same day. Pick one, stay there, have dinner, have a drink. The bridge isn't going anywhere.

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