There’s something special about rooting for your team surrounded by its players’ compatriots—especially when you’re eating well.
This summer’s World Cup season in New York City will be a magical time for both visitors and locals, and if you’re looking to immerse yourself in the culture beyond the well-trodden hot spots, head to a neighborhood when a favorite international team is playing and get ready for a party. Expect roaring cheers from high-rise apartments and chairs set up on the sidewalk to watch matches through restaurant windows. In this city of immigrants, restaurants and bars with good TVs are sure to draw even larger crowds for World Cup matches than they do for local teams’ games.
This year, New York and New Jersey host World Cup matches starting June 13, but if you can’t make it to the stadium—or you want to watch the games alongside the world’s most intense fans at a local bar—this guide is for you. We’ve assembled a roster of beloved international restaurants, bars, bakeries and cafés in culturally rich neighborhoods across the City. While you’ll have a good time watching the World Cup anywhere, there’s something special about rooting for your favorite team surrounded by its players’ compatriots.
Use these recommendations as a starting point, then follow your nose and check out the neighborhood to see where the biggest watch parties are happening. Those might be in restaurants, but people also gather in bodegas, laundromats, coffee shops, furniture stores and parks. We’ve selected spots that represent the ethnic makeup of their surroundings, and by match day, you won’t have to travel far to find a good time.
Sabry’s Seafood. Photo: Jordana Bermúdez
Africa
Upper Manhattan and the Bronx are home to large West African populations, and the energy in these areas come World Cup time is infectious. Check out Senegal matches at Des Ambassades, a chic Harlem café and bakery known for its oniony chicken or fish yassa, peanutty lamb maffe and mango custard danish. A few blocks away you’ll find Le Baobab, a cozy spot with rotating daily specials. Thiébou djeun, Senegal’s national dish, which Le Baobab prepares with fish, jollof rice and eggplant, is available every day of the week for good reason.
There are commonalities in the cuisines of Ghana and neighboring Côte d’Ivoire, and Papaye in the Bronx and Accra in the Bronx and Harlem offer excellent tastes of each. People love Accra for its rich okra soup and savory egusi stew served with tender starchy fufu for dipping and scooping. Papaye has a steam table with rotating specials, so ask the counter staff what’s good that day.
If you’re watching the North African teams play, head to Astoria and Long Island City. A hookah-bar-and-falafel-dotted stretch of Steinway Street there is called Little Egypt, and by summer you’ll encounter old-timers playing backgammon at sidewalk tables, sipping strong mint tea. Check out Hamido Seafood and Sabry’s Seafood for the Egypt match; at both you can order from the menu or pick out your own fish and preferred cooking method. If you’re rooting for Morocco, Merguez and Frites is a lively Steinway spot for warmly spiced lamb sausage sandwiches and neighborhood gossip. On Astoria’s more residential streets you can visit Dar Lbahja, a homestyle place known for its weekend-only handmade couscous. There’s also excellent couscous and braised meat dishes at The Kasbah Café, a rare representative of food from Algeria.
Asia
There are only a few Asian teams playing in this year’s World Cup, but they hail from countries with excellent culinary representatives in New York City. Koreatown is a two-block stretch centered on 32nd Street between Fifth and Sixth Avenues in Manhattan with restaurants, spas and skincare boutiques that climb several stories high. Check out South Korea’s matches at Turntable Chicken & Jazz, an industrial bar with excellent Korean fried chicken and a satisfying bulgogi burger. Night owls will dig Bangia, a K-town staple known for free-flowing soju and sizzling platters of organ meats.
Uzbekistan’s team has strong fanbases in southern Brooklyn and eastern Queens, with enclaves of restaurants and grocery stores around the neighborhoods of Sheepshead Bay and Rego Park. Try tender steamed manti (dumplings) and spiced-rice plov at the elegant Nargis Cafe in Brooklyn, or check out the more casual Tandir Rokhat, where cooks bake fluffy breads and flaky hand pies in a traditional tandoor pit oven. Over in Queens, Cheburechnaya is a Bukharan Jewish favorite for grilled kebabs and herb-flecked green plov, a less commonly found version of rice pilaf than the carrot-and-onion style served at most Uzbek restaurants.
Tacos El Bronco. Photo: Jordana Bermúdez
Central America and the Caribbean
Mexico fans go hard during the World Cup, especially in Corona, Jackson Heights and Sunset Park. During the summertime you can expect to find the streets alive with shaved ice vendors, taco trucks and groups hunched over portable TVs. In Sunset Park we recommend Tacos El Bronco and Tacos Matamoros, two neighborhood fixtures with tender braised birria, vibrant salsa and (at Matamoros) a mean frozen margarita. Visit Aqui en Bella Puebla in Jackson Heights for guisados (richly spiced meat braises) and Juquila for one of the City’s best bowls of pozole.
For Panamanian culture, Michelle’s Cocktail Lounge offers a convivial place to gather. This Flatbush bar is a longtime anchor for Brooklyn’s Panamanian community, so the World Cup is sure to bring a party. Come for the strong drinks (and grapefruit Ting!; if you know you know). Saturdays are your best bet for crisply fried empanadas, tostones, fish and fatty pork. Also in Flatbush, Pana’s Kitchen has a larger menu including stewed chicken and arroz con pollo.
There is a significant community of people from Haiti in southeast Queens, particularly Cambria Heights, St. Albans and Queens Village—areas best accessed by car. However, on the Lower East Side you’ll find a charming restaurant and bar called Rebel where Haitian dishes like griot (slow braised pork shoulder) and legume d’ayiti (a vegetable stew) are served with djon djon rice, a Haitian rice colored black with mushrooms. Speaking of Djon Djon, there’s a lively Haitian restaurant by that name in Prospect Lefferts Gardens, Brooklyn, that serves upscale spins on traditional favorites alongside cocktails like kremas, a creamy rum and coconut concoction.
Courtesy, Smithfield Hall
Europe
Soccer-type games have been played in England since the eighth century, so the sport is practically baked into the UK. Monro Pub in Park Slope is an official supporter of England’s Liverpool team, with affordable beer on draft. The food is limited to packaged potato chips and ramen, so if you’re looking for a meal, check out fellow-Liverpool-fanbase Carragher’s in Lower Manhattatn. They serve pastry-wrapped sausage rolls, an English comfort food classic, and a sizable burger topped with HP Sauce, a condiment as popular in England as ketchup is here. While there isn’t a French enclave in New York per se, Bar Tabac in Brooklyn sure feels like one with its bistro sandwiches and escargot. The lively Felix Restaurant & Bar in Manhattan's SoHo hosted watch parties for World Cup games all the way back in 1994. For the 2026 games, they'll be adding screens to service the crowds coming to watch and the revelers who often spill outside of the bistro. There’s also a cadre of French football fans that frequent Smithfield Hall in Manhattan's Chelsea neighborhood, a sports bar that’s all about soccer.
A stretch of downtown Manhattan near Greenwich Village used to be called Little Spain for its bevy of Iberian restaurants and bars. La Nacional, a Spanish cultural association with an attached restaurant and bar, is a fitting continuation of that heritage, especially when soccer matches are playing. With a dish of croquettes and pan tumaca—tomato and garlic toast—it’s like a portal to Madrid. If you’re rooting for Portugal’s team, take a trip to Raizes in Greenpoint, a Portuguese bar with a respectable happy hour and nicely grilled sardines. There’s also a slew of older Portuguese bars in Queens, including Jamaica’s O Lavrador, which looks like an old stone villa and is famous for its salt cod and sangria.
New York is home to several German and Austrian beer halls with deep community connections and long beer lists. The Bohemian Hall & Beer Garden in Astoria is beloved for its large outdoor beer garden, which is sure to buzz during the Cup. A grilled sausage long enough to hang over its plate is a draw too. Gottscheer Hall in Ridgewood dates back to 1924, and in addition to their schedule of cultural events, they serve a cheesy spaeztle that’s dynamite with a crisp pilsner. Zum Stammtisch “only” opened in the 1970s, and the Bavarian-style pub draws crowds for big plates of schnitzel, cold beer and good cheer. Book a table for the World Cup at Black Forest Brooklyn, with locations in Fort Greene and Cobble Hill, and watch the games while having a wurstkorb, a German grilled sausage in a pretzel bun that comes with a generous helping of shoestring fries.
Over in Astoria you’ll find a few restaurants to watch Bosnia and Herzegovina’s match. The small but mighty Ukus makes remarkably flaky burek pies filled with spinach, potato or beef. If you want to try Bosnian ćevapi—little ground meat kebabs made smoky on the grill—head over to the nearby Sarajevo Grill.
Courtesy, El Gauchito
South America
Queens hosts a large and diverse South American community. You can get tastes of food and culture from Colombia, Ecuador and Uruguay together in Jackson Heights, where nationalities meld and gather together. Check out Seba Seba for generous Colombian plates and a host of pastries and fried empanadas. Barriles is a Colombian sports bar that’s sure to have a banging crowd through World Cup season. Close by, La Gran Uruguaya and El Chivito d’Oro specialize in Uruguayan classics; bring a big appetite for their mixed grills with skirt steak, ribs and blood sausage. For a more distinctive taste of Ecuador, take the 7 train a few stops to Rincon Melania in Long Island City. You want their ceviche, cooked seafood and ball-shaped bolón, a fried green plantain dumpling mixed with cheese, seafood or meat.
Immigrants from Argentina love to party at El Gauchito, a Corona butcher and steakhouse with some of New York’s most flavorful skirt steaks. Get extra helpings of herb-rich chimichurri to spoon over your steak, cheese and fluffy rolls. The cozy I Love Paraguay in Sunnyside plays an important role in Paraguay’s local culture, with traditional dishes like mbeju, a cheesy yuca flatbread, and adopted Paraguayan favorites like gnocchi, here spelled ñoquis, served with beef or chicken stew.
Brazil takes its futebol seriously, so you won’t want to miss a visit to Little Brazil in Astoria. We recommend Pão de Queijo, a cozy local place known for hefty sandwiches and the namesake cheese bread, and the expansive Villa Brazil Cafe, a buffet spot and churrascaria with juicy grilled meats sold by the pound. Also check out Casa Theodoro in Woodside, a Brazilian-style pizza joint. Brazilians take their pizza almost as seriously as their soccer! Not too far away from Astoria and Woodside is Beija Flor in Long Island City, known for "soccer, samba and good food" so be sure to make a reservation ahead of time for Brazil's World Cup match.