The Best of Midtown Lunch 2006 (and my dreams for 2007)
Midtown Lunch is taking the week off between Christmas and New Year’s (back on Jan. 2nd) so this is the last post of 2006. I thought about making a Best of 2006 list, but then I thought, why bother? Every place I’ve ever eaten lunch at in Midtown is in this blog- so some list isn’t going to tell you anything you wouldn’t find out from reading the archives. But I can tell you the most read post of 2006. And that is hands down Kati Roll.
More people have read the Kati Roll piece than anything else I have written, and it is still the most searched for lunch on the site. (And it’s delicious to boot). I feel like the purpose of Midtown Lunch is summed up by a place like Kati Roll (well, that and so you can see pictures of people lined up for a free burrito at a Chipotle grand opening).
For 2007 I have a few dreams for Midtown Lunch’ing. And here they are:
-
We need a Momofuku Ssam Bar in Midtown. Are you listening David Chang????? Have you seen the lines of people paying $8 for crappy Mexican burritos. These are the people who will pay $8 for your delicious pork buns and Korean/Chinese burritos!
-
Somebody open a cheap/take out Vietnamese place in Midtown. So much Indian food. So much Chinese. Koreatown is very close. A few places for Thai (although there could be more)… but no cheap Vietnamese!
-
We need a good Chinese All You Can Eat Buffet (for under $10). There is one on 8th Ave. in the 40s, but even I’m scared of that one. Come on people. Actually, we need more buffets all around… and not the $13.95 Indian buffets. I’m talking about under $10, all you can eat buffets! I have a dream, people!
-
And finally I have a New Year’s Resolution for everbody. Forget about exercise… eat more. And do it at lunch time. And don’t settle. We work too damn hard in Midtown Manhattan to run down to the nearest crappy deli, for some garbage sandwich that costs $9, just to run back upstairs and eat at our desk. You get an hour. Take it. There’s plenty of good Midtown Lunch’ing if you’re willing to walk 5-10 minutes in any direction from your office. You need a break!
That’s it for this year. Midtown Lunch will be back on January 2nd with a whole week of Profiled Midtown Lunch’ers, and their dreams for Midtown Lunch’ing. If you are interested in being profiled, email me at zach@midtownlunch.com
Finally, a special treat. Midtown Lunch 2006 a year in thumbnails, after the the jump. Looking at everything in one long photo makes me sort of embarassed I ate all that. It’s a doozy… click on the link (and see why my wife is disgusted by me). Read more »
Posted by Zach at 9:51 am, December 22nd, 2006 under Uncategorized.
I should probably have my head examined trying to eat lunch near Rockefeller Center in December… but I found out that Dean & Deluca has Sullivan St. Bakery Pizza- and had to check it out. The actual Sullivan St. Bakery is on 47th st. btw. 10th & 11th, right around the corner from where I live. (The name comes from the original storefront on Sullivan St. in the West Village). The current location on 47th is where they make all their bread… and delicious flat bread pizzas. Unfortunately, 10th ave. is a little far to walk for lunch- so when I found out they’ve got the pizza at Dean & Deluca I was pretty excited.
Unfortunately, the closest and best known Dean & Deluca is smack dab in the middle of Rock Center (in clear view of the Christmas Tree). Ah… the wonderful tree. You find me someone who works in Midtown, that doesn’t hate that tree… and I’ll prove to you that that person doesn’t work in Midtown. It’s almost like the tree has this magnetic force that only pulls at “I Love NY” sweatshirts, and really bad fanny packs. Lucky for me, I found a hidden Dean & Deluca, for those of you who work on the West Side of Midtown, far enough away from the tree to get your Sullivan St. bakery pizza fix in December.
Name: Julia
It’s Chanukah everyone! And in honor of the Holiday, I decided on Friday to go out in search of some Latkes (or potato pancakes) for lunch. I had gotten a few emails from people over the past week asking me where they could find these delicious fried patties of potatoey goodness in Midtown- but I was embarrassed to admit that I didn’t really know. The last time I had latkes in Midtown was a billion years ago at the Stage Deli, and I don’t really remember them being that good. But even if I had fond memories of those touristy, over-priced potato pancakes- I don’t think I’d be caught dead eating at the Stage Deli this time of year. The same goes for the Carnegie Deli. 
There are very few things I won’t eat. In fact, I’ll pretty much eat anything that a culture deems worthy of eating. And to prove it, I present to you this story involving a very strange dish at a Midtown Deli. I was walking by the Bagelfeller Cafe on 48th btw. 5th & 6th on Wednesday. For those of you who have never heard of this particular place, it is a standard Midtown “Deli” with a salad bar, sandwiches, Burrito/Taco bar, sushi station and, as you can imagine, a bagel bar. (I’m also pretty sure it’s owned by Asians… but that doesn’t mean they can’t have good bagels!)
I’ve gotten a few recommendations from people suggesting I check out this place, so I decided to pop in and see what they had. Nothing really caught my fancy- until I noticed something very strange in the Sushi fridge. A weird looking, nut covered sushi log/roll that was labeled “Banana Roll” $4.95. I immediately asked the Sushi chef what is was. His reply… “It’s a banana roll.” My reply to that… “Oh… is it stuffed with banana tempura?” Because in my fat guy mind, a slice of banana would have to be breaded and deep fried to belong in a sushi roll (that’s just my logic).
There are many reasons I choose to write about particular places in Midtown. First is obviously the food. If a place has great food (and is cheap), I’m going to write about it. Unfortunately, we work in Midtown- so if I limited myself to only places with great food, my blog would be about 7 entries long (see My Favorite links in the right hand column)… and even some of those are just great “for Midtown”. Barring great food, some places get written about because they are serving something out of the ordinary (
I got an 