33 New England Foods You Need To Try Once

New England is home to breathtaking views, honest people, and a diverse landscape of cities, towns, and oceanside boroughs. But the only thing better than hiking the Green Mountains of Vermont or watching a Red Sox game at Fenway Park is the food you'll find nestled into the culture of the six small New England states. 

Although New England is a comparatively small region (at roughly one-fourth the size of Texas in terms of square miles), there is an impressive diversity of food and food culture. You can drive a few hours and sample Connecticut's best pizza, Rhode Island's coffee milk, and Massachusetts' baked beans and brown bread within a day. And with the sheer amount of food options in such a small region, you might just have to take a couple of trips to sample all of it. So here are some of our favorite New England foods that everyone needs to try. 

Sugar-on-snow is as much of an eating experience as it is a sweet treat. This confection is made by pouring hot, boiling maple syrup on freshly fallen snow. The chill of the snow makes the syrup seize up into a taffy. Then, the sugar is rolled onto a popsicle stick and served. This treat is popular in northern New England, like in Maine, Vermont, and New Hampshire during the spring sugaring season. It's a must-try for anyone who loves maple syrup.

Boston cream pie may have been a spinoff of the Washington Pie, but it is a dessert equally loved by Boston and New England residents. The Boston cream pie was first invented in Boston by French chef M. Sanzian at the Parker House in Boston. 

Chef Sanzian introduced the dessert — a two-layer French sponge cake filled with custard and topped with chocolate ganache — in 1856. Although there is some clear French influence on the cake (notably the sponge and the cream), the dessert is considered uniquely New England and found in the states around Massachusetts, too.

You can get lemonade outside New England, but there isn't a brand quite like Del's. Del's Lemonade is a staple in the Ocean State of Rhode Island and is often served frozen from trucks parked near beaches or popular tourist destinations. 

The summer beverage was originally brought to the United States from Italy in the 1840s and has since grown into nothing short of a lemonade empire. Although you can find Del's Lemonade bottled and sold in stores, there's nothing like a frozen one right from the truck.

Cider donuts are a fall staple for anyone living in New England, particularly in the Northern states of Maine, Vermont, and New Hampshire. Although you can find a cider donut at the grocery store, the best ones are made by local cideries. Plus, you can get a side of hot spiced cider or our personal favorite — a cider slushie. 

Apple cider donuts are cake donuts that don't taste too much like apple cider, apart from a slightly acidic undertone. After these donuts are fried, they are covered in cinnamon sugar and served single or by the dozen. We recommend the dozen, of course, since you probably won't be able to stop eating them. 

We should first start out by saying frappes and frappuccinos are not the same thing. Frappes (pronounced "frap") are Massachusetts beverages that are essentially made with ice cream, milk, and syrup. But isn't that a milkshake? For people outside of Massachusetts, yes. But in the Bay State, a milkshake does not include ice cream. So order a milkshake if you want shaken, frothy milk and syrup served ice cold. Like other New England foods, the vernacular is important here. 

Johnnycakes are cornmeal pancakes with a mysterious origin. They're made of cornmeal, water, and salt and cooked like a pancake on a griddle. The cakes are then topped with butter or syrup and served in the New England states — most notably in Rhode Island. 

Johnnycakes were originally made by Indigenous tribes living in New England, who were able to cultivate corn plentifully. The climate was much more hospitable to corn than to wheat, which meant the settlers had to transform many of their recipes — including pancakes — to include ingredients like corn and rye. 

If you live in the state of Vermont, you know there's no such thing as soft-serve ice cream. It's creemee territory.

Creemees are merely soft-serve ice creams — just with a uniquely Vermont name. It has been suggested that Vermonters used to make their soft serve ice cream with a higher butterfat content, thus making it more creamy, and that's where the name comes from (or someone just called a plain soft serve "creamy" and the name stuck). Don't ask us about the spelling, though, because there's no answer there. 

Vermont has many different creemee flavors, including standard chocolate and vanilla. But, we recommend the ultimate Vermont dessert — a maple creemee — served at a roadside stand.

Moxie is the state soft drink brand of Maine and was one of the first sodas invented in 1884. The beverage's taste is very distinct; some equate it to a carbonated mixture of wintergreen and licorice flavors.  The odd flavor of Moxie was attributed to the inclusion of gentian root extract, which was first marketed as a cure for ailments and diseases. In fact, the beverage was once sold under the moniker "Moxie Nerve Food" and, at one point, surpassed the sales of growing soft drink giant Coca-Cola. 

Now, it is rare to find the beverage outside of the six New England states. We recommend trying at least one sip — but we can't guarantee you'll like it.

Stuffies, otherwise known as stuffed quahogs, are a clam-based appetizer popular along the New England shoreline — especially in Rhode Island. Although there is no exact storyline for how stuffed quahogs came to be, it is very likely that Portuguese and Italian immigrants to the region used the hard-shell Quahog clam to make a seafood stuffing. Stuffed quahogs are made by chopping the hard clam meat into tiny pieces and incorporating it with onions, peppers, garlic, and bread. 

Indian pudding is the messy dessert you'll only find in New England. The dessert was first introduced to New England by the English colonists, but it evolved to include widely available ingredients like cornmeal and molasses. Indian pudding also goes by Indian Mush, Indian Meal, and Heaven and Hell (topped with ice cream). To make Indian pudding, cornmeal is baked with molasses, brown sugar, butter, and milk into a dessert with a profoundly buttery, sweet, and complex dessert. 

Ben & Jerry's is called "Vermont's Finest" for a reason. This ice cream brand embodies the reason why New England-style ice cream is so unique — the texture of the ice cream is chewy, dense, and filled with tons of mix-ins. In addition, brands like Ben & Jerry's utilize a higher milk fat in their ice cream and incorporate less air, which creates an ice cream you can bite into and cover with your favorite toppings. If you're lucky enough to visit central Vermont, visit the Ben & Jerry's factory in Waterbury. And remember to treat yourself to ice cream afterward. 

Steamers are soft-shelled clams perfect for serving alongside melted butter and other seafood items. Steamers are plentiful in New England and get their name from how they are prepared. 

Steamers are often allowed to sit in salty water to rinse off grit before being boiled in water for five to 10 minutes. After the clams are adequately cooked, you can pull them out by their phallic-looking siphon (it's how the mollusk eats), swirl the clam in the steaming broth to remove the grit, and dip them in the melted butter. 

Without the split-top hot dog roll, there would be no Fenway Franks or lobster rolls. The New England-style hot dog rolls were originally split along the top as a serving vessel for fried clams. The roll was originally created by Massachusetts hotel and restaurant chain Howard Johnson's, who contracted a bakery in Maine to create a roll that could be easily stuffed with fried clams. The bakery made a special pan to bake these rolls, and the traditional bake stuck around. 

You probably don't think of other ways to prepare cheeseburgers than cooking them in a pan or on the grill. But the town of Meriden, Connecticut has an interesting way of preparing this classic American food: steaming. 

Steamed cheeseburgers have a storied history. The first burgers were made in Middletown, Connecticut in the 1890s and spread in reach to surrounding towns like Meriden. The steamed cheeseburger, or "hamburg," is made by placing ground meat into a rectangular tin, steaming it for about 10 minutes, and topping it with a gooey layer of cheese. Although the hamburg was initially created as a cheap, calorie-dense fuel for the working class in Connecticut, it has remained one of the region's greatest culinary inventions. 

New England-style beef tips are made with sirloin steak marinated and seared over high heat to develop a crispy exterior. In New England, beef tips are often served as a main course at a cookout, as an appetizer, or as an easy weeknight meal with mashed potatoes or a side of macaroni and cheese. The proliferation of the New England steak tips was likely a result of economics. A cheap cut of sirloin could be given new life with a great marinade and a good sear. 

New England has long been home to the United States' oldest candy: Necco wafers. Necco wafers, which were produced by the New England Confectionary Company (NECCO), are chalky wafer candies that eventually gave rise to Smarties and conversation hearts. The candy was first created in 1847 and eventually ceased production in 2018. However, after the Spangler Candy scooped up the product, Necco wafers returned triumphantly to stores in 2020.

The Necco wafer recipe has remained relatively unchanged since the confection was made and still comes in the eight traditional flavors of lemon, lime, orange, clove, cinnamon, wintergreen, licorice, and chocolate.