The dirty little secret among some food writers? They’d rather eat in places other than New York right now. Count me among them after spending 11 days there this past August and September, with the daunting goal of putting a dent in a city that counts 45,000 restaurants, 200 cuisines and some of the biggest names in the business. As a serious observer of the scene for more than 25 years, I went in figuring I’d be using up my annual allotment of exclamation points. I left scratching my head and wondering whether New York is resting on its considerable laurels. Seven hundred dollars for an undistinguished omakase at Masa? Nine hundred bucks for dinner for two at Eleven Madison Park, where the most exciting part of the night was watching a sommelier open a rare bottle of wine with heated tongs? The raves lavished on Cosme, a Mexican newcomer, baffled me, and I guess you have to be a native New Yorker to appreciate Peter Luger Steak House, a sad Brooklyn icon that has seen better days. Oh, there were plenty of heady moments, too. Sushi Nakazawa proves a Japanese gem, Le Bernardin remains my favorite four-star, and when I munched on a $3 hot dog at Gray’s Papaya, amid exhaust and a mass of people, all seemed right with the world. And the country bows to the Big Apple for giving it bagels, Craig Claiborne, Mario Batali, fresh takes on food halls and gold-standard hospitality courtesy of Danny Meyer. But sometimes more is just — more.

[The search for America’s best food cities: New York]

Defining moment: Being lectured to not take photographs at the klieg-light-bright Masa – before I even sat down.

Best hybrid: Shalom Japan in Brooklyn specializes in Jewish-Japanese. Okonomiyaki with sauerkraut and pastrami, anyone?

Map: Tom Sietsema’s food tour of New York

Recipe: Katz’s Egg Cream

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