Eating in New York City: Restaurant basics

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• Do I need cash?

A number of restaurants in New York do not take credit cards, particularly smaller establishments, and especially restaurants in Chinatown. Still, others maintain minimum purchase amounts for credit/debit purchases. Most establishments will prominently display this requirement, so keep your eyes open if you typically pay for meals with plastic.

• What should I tip?

New Yorkers often calculate the base tip by doubling the tax. Since tax is 8.875%, if you double this, 17-18% approximates the tipping customs elsewhere in the US. Most New Yorkers tip 20% and above if they feel they were treated well. Many restaurants include a mandatory service charge for large parties, and if this charge is shown on your bill, you may be stuck tipping at least that much, but you don't need to tip more. (If service is horrible, you can choose to refuse to pay the service charge and so inform the manager, but never do that unless something really terrible happened.) If you receive poor service and tip less than customary, the waiter may confront you and ask for a normal-sized tip. This isn't totally uncommon and might happen because the waiter's accustomed to European tourists who accidentally give low tips because they don't understand the US custom. A confrontation is different from an included service charge. Remember that while it is expected for you to tip normally for adequate service, you are never obligated to tip and owe the waiter no argument if your service was truly awful.

When paying cash (without a tab) in a bar, tipping a dollar or two per drink is common in bars where drinks cost $5 - $15. But 20% is a good rule. Though this custom is looser than restaurant tipping, you're likely to blend in a bit better if you do it.

• What should I wear?

Restaurants with entrees under $20 are unlikely to have any preference about what their customers wear. If you're from elsewhere in the US and wish to "pass" as a local within Manhattan, pay attention to your shoes and coat, though it's hard for travelers to arrive at consensus on fashion. Most local exclusiveness is pretty understated, but where it exists it's to the B&T crowd or "bridge and tunnel people," nightlife commuters from New Jersey and Long Island that supposedly threaten to rob bar-filled neighborhoods of their local color, so if your style doesn't fit in but is obviously from outside the US, you may find yourself as welcomed as graciously as any local, if not more so. And New Yorkers are mostly underdressed compared to Sydney, London, or Paris.

Like most major cities, New York has some expensive, extremely fashionable restaurants that care about, and enforce, a certain level of dress among their customers - but "jackets only" restaurants are very uncommon nowadays.