The Megasite Guide to Dining Middletown Restaurants

The Arrigoni Bridge 1933

Heading north on Route 9 toward Hartford, the first thing that will catch your eye upon entering the aptly named city residing at the geographic center of our state is a panoramic view of the Connecticut River with the Arrigoni Bridge sweeping across it into Middletown.  Switching from north to south down Middletown’s Main Street, you can switch from eye feasting to just plain feasting as you cruise by an array of restaurants like few others in the state.  Natural, Bistro, Mexican, Italian, Chinese, Thai, Japanese, and even Hawaiian, eateries abound on South Main, East Main, as well as not quite plain old Main Street – over thirty in all! Many of the very hip connoisseurs of those restaurants are students and faculty from an institution that has helped define Middletown since 1831, and that is Wesleyan University (originally Wesleyan College).  This leading liberal arts school hosts a series on concerts covering the most sophisticated aspects of classical, jazz, and world music that belies the physical size of both the university and city.  In fact it was a partnership between the Middlesex County Chamber of Commerce, and Wesleyan University that created the investment in Middletown's Main Street that spured the downtown Middletown revival in the 90s that is so evident today.