Culinary Schools in New York City - A Beginner's Guide

If the state of New York is the Mecca of the country's food culture, New York is probably its Masjid al-Haram. Visit the top five enclaves of the city and you can easily identify the different cuisines they specialize in. Manhattan, for instance, is known for world cuisine, while Queens is famed for its Asian specialties. Another testament to the brilliance of the city as a food culture center is the number of top cooking schools in New York.
The three top can be found in the city. At its forefront is the French Culinary Institute (or the FCI) in the SoHo neighborhood of the city. The school, founded in 1984, offers courses in culinary arts and pastry arts, as well as various programs on restaurant management. Unlike other culinary schools, the FCI has courses in food technology, wine studies, and food journalism, making it among the most rounded culinary schools in the city. Dan Barber (Time Most Influential People list in 2009) and Bobby Flay are among its esteemed alumni.
Meanwhile, Institute of Culinary Education is one of the few top culinary schools in New York that offer programs for recreation students (or students who simply want to learn how to cook). It has over 1,000 recreation courses on Asian cuisine, wine education, and pastry techniques, among many others. Besides the usual culinary arts and pastry and baking arts diploma, the school also offers a diploma in culinary management, making it one of few culinary schools that focus a program that concentrates on management.