Thanks to the Belmont Improvement District, Arthur Avenue’s Little Italy in the Bronx is now a maze of al fresco dining, many with umbrellas and overhead protection. This red-sauced Italian restaurant has a menu dotted with southern Italian and Sicilian classics, including pasta fagioli soup, clams oreganata, panelle chickpea fritters, and veal marsala. A patio in the backyard offers ample rain protection and is heated.

All of the classics of the Parisian boulevard cafe are here reproduced, including steak tartare, French onion soup, moules frites, and raw oysters. A lengthy row of outdoor tables offers protection from the rain with heat lamps recently installed.

On a rainy day, huddle up with comforting spreads of grilled meats and mezze at Ovelia, a Greek mainstay in Astoria that offers seating under a well-covered roadside patio.

From beneath this bright pink outdoor dining set-up, Queens newcomer Ruta Oaxaca is serving a variety of Mexican moles that are just as vibrant. The selection of sauces changes from day to day, but past menus have included orange, green, red, and brown moles blanketed over bunuelos and enchiladas.

Longrunning Mexican restaurant La Espiga — known for its tacos, tortas, and fresh, housemade tortillas — has a sheltered curbside structure set up with three to four tables underneath that are well-protected from the rain.

The well-decorated outdoor dining set-up at Hao Noodle is also functional: The structure is partially enclosed and is outfitted with heaters for dining in any weather. This original branch of a Chinese chain that revels in its citified food from Shanghai and Beijing, including shrimp scallion noodles, flame grilled brochettes, and three kinds of soup dumplings.

The outdoor setup at this modern Korean restaurant has evolved considerably during the pandemic, as seasonal weather and shifting pandemic guidelines forced its owners to renovate and reinvent. The latest iteration is a series of seven enclosed outdoor dining rooms, which can accommodate between two to four people each. 

Chez Ma Tante duo Aidan O’Neal and Jake Leiber’s Williamsburg brasserie has an expansive outdoor seating area that can be covered and heated during inclement weather. There’s a sheltered outdoor setup along the sidewalk as well, where diners can cozy up with French fare — herby escargot and three varieties of paté — that earned the restaurant three stars from the New York Times prior to the pandemic.

Overnight, Dr. Clark almost immediately became a hotspot during the pandemic: People flocked to the Chinatown restaurant for Hokkaido-style cuisine, tabletop-grilling, it’s Monday karaoke party, and people-watching. Thankfully, the rain doesn’t have to stop the fun when dining outside at the Japanese spot. The osturdy outside structure has a slanted roof that allows the rain to slide off its back, while guests — seated on the ground — can stay cozy thanks to the kotatsu-style set up where the tablecloth doubles as a blanket. Reservations are recommended.

The sizable outdoor structure in front Tonii’s Fresh Rice Noodle makes for an excellent rainy day meetup outdoors. There’s over a dozen variations of the restaurant’s namesake rice rolls available, including those made with chicken, roast duck, and crab meat and egg. For dessert, order one of the restaurant’s pillowy sponge cakes, which come from famed Chinatown bakery Kam Hing.

Warm up with mouth-numbing Sichuan fare at this Williamsburg restaurant from the team behind the once-Michelin-starred Cafe China. An enclosed outdoor dining structure in front of the restaurant doesn’t consist of much more than plywood, plastic, and dangling lights, but sometimes simple is best when it comes to staying dry.

Hunkered behind this Bed-Stuy dive bar is a year-round food truck slinging tacos and tortas with a variety of fillings. On a rainy day, it’s tough to beat an order of the restaurant’s duck and carnitas tacos in this covered backyard. Additional seating is available at covered tables in front of the bar.

Oxalis’s sheltered outdoor cabin is blessedly located off the street, tucked in a quiet alleyway behind the restaurant. Keep in mind that the restaurant only offers brunch and its a la carte menu outdoors. (Diners looking to order the $105 tasting menu will have to head inside.) Dishes rotate regularly, and the current lineup includes grilled monkfish and bluefin tuna with salted husk cherries.

This venerable Italian-American spot has always had two big outdoor areas, one uncovered right in front, and another on the side with a red canvas overhead covering. When it rains, head to the latter area to feast on hero sandwiches, sheet pizzas, and a broad range of classic pastas. Top it off with a crinkled paper cup of spumoni.