George Washington Once Dined At This NYC Restaurant You Can Still Visit Today - Chowhound

"Maybe it's I Sodi for the city's best Italian cuisine or Le Bernardin for an ultra-fancy night out. But if you're a history nerd with a love for the American Revolution, then head to Fraunces Tavern. It may just be the oldest restaurant in Manhattan, and one of the only spots that claim to have once served George Washington. It even has an attached museum that gives an overview of the tavern's revolutionary history."

"Washington visited the tavern multiple times. The first visit was in April 1776 while he was on a visit to New York. Only a few months later, the tavern hosted a banquet for Washington and his staff, who were then known as the Provincial Congress, as a thank-you to Washington for his defense efforts. He stopped there again in 1783, shortly after the last of the British troops finally left New York City and during the week of then-governor George Clinton's "Evacuation Day" celebration."

"Sure, Fraunces Tavern's age doesn't hold a candle to some of the oldest restaurants in the world, but it's rich in American history. Today, the tavern still holds much of its revolutionary atmosphere. It's a bit of a maze, so if you're ever meeting friends there, good luck finding them without proper direction. Most revolutionary-era buildings didn't have open floor plans, so the tavern is filled with small rooms that might have once held different eating and drinking purposes."

Fraunces Tavern occupies 54 Pearl Street in Manhattan's Financial District in a building constructed by the De Lancey family in 1719. Samuel Fraunces opened and operated the original tavern, which by the 1760s included a hotel and at times served as a private home. George Washington visited multiple times, including April 1776, a banquet for the Provincial Congress a few months later, and again in 1783 around Evacuation Day. The site functions as both a restaurant and a museum, preserving Revolutionary-era rooms and atmosphere with a maze-like layout of small period dining and drinking spaces.

Read at Chowhound