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LONG ISLAND CITY, QUEENS

Maiella

Handmade pasta under the Pepsi-Cola sign, with the midtown skyline across the water.

Maiella opened on the Hunters Point waterfront in 2015, from the family behind Astoria's long-running Trattoria L'incontro, and it holds one of the best dinner positions in Queens: directly on Center Boulevard at Gantry Plaza State Park, beneath the landmarked Pepsi-Cola sign, with midtown Manhattan stacked across the river.

The kitchen keeps it classic Italian — handmade pastas, a serious antipasti spread, fish done simply — and the terrace turns the skyline into table-side scenery in warm months. It reads special-occasion from the window seats, but weeknights it still serves the towers of Long Island City as the neighborhood Italian they walk downstairs to.

Editor’s tip

Book the terrace an hour before sunset — the Pepsi sign lights up as the skyline does, and you're under both.

Make an evening of it — beautiful stops nearby

Also in the neighborhood

Editorial draft — core details last reviewed October 12, 2026. Confirm practical details with the official site before you go.