The Gramercy Table

Almost every Italian restaurant Gramercy keeps inside our map is built around dinner, which leaves the neighborhood with a lunch problem that is really a timing problem. A fair number of kitchens here do not open until 5:00, and the ones that do serve lunch often run a narrow window that closes at 2:30. If you work near Park Avenue South or you are coming out of Gramercy Park with an hour to spend, knowing which door is open at 12:40 on a Wednesday matters more than knowing which restaurant is best. Here is what is actually open, when, and how long it takes to walk there.

The quick answer

For a sit down lunch between noon and 2:30 on a weekday, Rezdôra on East 20th Street and Scarpetta on Madison Avenue both serve one. For lunch outside that window, Tarallucci e Vino near Union Square and Paul & Jimmy’s on East 18th Street are open through the afternoon, and Eataly on Fifth Avenue runs from 7am to 11pm.

At a glance

• Paul & Jimmy’s, 123 East 18th Street. Opens at noon every day.
• Tarallucci e Vino, 15 East 18th Street. Opens at 8am weekdays, 9am Saturday, 11am Sunday.
• Rezdôra, 27 East 20th Street. Lunch Tuesday to Friday, noon to 2:30. Weekends from 11:30.
• Isabelle’s Osteria, 245 Park Avenue South. Weekday lunch service during Restaurant Week, 11:30am to 4pm.
• Scarpetta, 88 Madison Avenue. Lunch Monday to Friday, 11:30 to 2:30.
• Eataly NYC Flatiron, 200 Fifth Avenue. Daily, 7am to 11pm.

The 18th Street block

Two of the most useful lunch doors in the neighborhood sit on the same street, five minutes apart on foot.

Paul & Jimmy’s has been at 123 East 18th Street since 1950, which in this neighborhood makes it furniture. Southern Italian and Italian-American cooking, handmade pasta, open from noon seven days a week. It closes at 10:00 Tuesday through Saturday and 9:00 on Sunday and Monday. The practical value at lunch is that it does not close between services, so a 2:45 arrival is not a problem. Walk east from the 14th Street Union Square station and it is about six minutes.

Tarallucci e Vino at 15 East 18th Street is half a block from Union Square and opens at 8am Monday through Friday, which makes it the answer for an early meeting or a lunch that has to happen at 11:15. Pastries in the morning, a full menu through the day, and a happy hour from 3 to 6 in the bar and the outdoor seating. If you are coming out of the Greenmarket with a bag of tomatoes, this is the closest place to sit down with them.

The 20th Street corridor

Rezdôra at 27 East 20th Street serves lunch Tuesday through Friday from noon to 2:30, and weekends from 11:30. The kitchen cooks Emilia-Romagna, and the lunch service is the least difficult way to eat there, since the dinner reservations go quickly. The walk from the 6 at 23rd Street is about five minutes south, and about the same from Union Square going north.

One block east, Isabelle’s Osteria sits at 245 Park Avenue South at 20th Street. The dining room normally runs dinner and weekend brunch, but there is a weekday lunch on right now, covered in the next section.

Restaurant Week lunch, through August 16

NYC Restaurant Week Summer 2026 runs July 20 through August 16, with prix fixe menus at $30, $45 and $60 across lunch and dinner. Saturdays are excluded from the program and Sunday participation varies by restaurant.

For this neighborhood the practical effect is that a few kitchens that do not usually serve weekday lunch are serving one until mid August. Isabelle’s in Gramercy Park is running a two course Restaurant Week lunch Monday through Friday from 11:30am to 4pm at the $30 tier, with a zucchini focaccia, a gazpacho and a tomato and watermelon salad among the starters, and mafaldine, a chicken panini and a spicy Italian sausage with lentils among the mains.

Why this fits a Gramercy weekday specifically: the 11:30 to 4 window is unusually wide for this neighborhood, which solves the 2:30 cutoff problem that closes most of the other rooms. It suits a working lunch where you cannot control what time you get out of a meeting, or a longer lunch with someone visiting the neighborhood. The dining room seats 150 with a bar along one side, so a table of four on short notice is more realistic than at the smaller rooms nearby. Reservations open 30 days ahead on OpenTable and Resy for parties up to ten, and the full lunch and dinner menus are posted on their site. If you are going, go before August 16.

Just outside the neighborhood

Two more worth the extra five minutes.

Scarpetta at 88 Madison Avenue is technically NoMad rather than Gramercy, about a twelve minute walk north from Gramercy Park. Lunch runs 11:30 to 2:30 Monday through Friday. It is the most formal lunch on this list and the right pick when the meal is doing a job.

Eataly NYC Flatiron at 200 Fifth Avenue is open 7am to 11pm daily, which makes it the fallback that is always open. It is a market with counters rather than a single restaurant, so it works better for a solo lunch or a group that cannot agree than for a conversation you need to hear. It also sits on Madison Square Park, and there is a separate rundown of everything walkable from the park’s four corners if you are coming from that direction.

Getting around at lunch

The 6 at 23rd Street and Park Avenue South is the most useful stop for the 20th Street corridor. The 14th Street Union Square station puts the 4, 5, 6, L, N, Q, R and W within a six minute walk of everything on 18th Street. For Eataly and Madison Square Park, the 23rd Street stop on the N and R at Broadway is closer than the 6.

Walking times from Gramercy Park itself: 18th Street between Irving Place and Union Square is five to seven minutes, East 20th Street is about six minutes northwest, and Fifth Avenue at 23rd is about twelve.

Lunch is the easy meal here. Evenings get harder, because the same blocks fill up with people eating before something at Irving Plaza, which is its own timing problem covered in a guide to eating before a Union Square event.

Frequently Asked Question

Which Gramercy restaurants can I walk into at lunch without a reservation?

The all day rooms are your best chance. Tarallucci e Vino, Paul & Jimmy’s and Eataly all serve continuously through the afternoon, so arriving at an odd hour like 2:45 works in your favor rather than against it. The narrow window services are harder. Rezdôra and Scarpetta both stop lunch at 2:30, which concentrates everyone into a ninety minute rush, and a walk in at 12:30 is optimistic. If you have a specific place in mind and a fixed hour, book it the morning of. If you have a fixed hour and no specific place, walk east on 18th Street and take whichever door is open.

Before you go

Lunch hours in this neighborhood change more often than dinner hours, and August is when kitchens quietly adjust them. Everything above came from each restaurant’s own website in late July 2026. Check the current menu and hours before you walk over, particularly if you are counting on a Restaurant Week menu after mid August.

The rest of the map — openings, closings and the blocks we walk — sits on the front page.

Editor’s note: Isabelle’s Osteria is affiliated with this publication. Restaurants were selected using the criteria described above.