PROFILE: Midtown Lunch’er “Niko”
Every Tuesday I turn over the site to a different Midtown Lunch’er for his or her recommendations for the best lunch in Midtown. This week, it’s Niko- a Healthy Promotion Director with a serious sweet tooth.
Name: Niko
Age: 39
Occupation: Day job: Health Promotion Director. Labor of love: Running DessertBuzz.com
Where in Midtown do you Work?: 53rd & Park
Favorite Kind of Food: I view eating real food, including lunch, as simply something that stands in the way of eating dessert. A necessary evil to prevent my body from decaying from too much sugar and butter… but since this is Midtown Lunch, I’ll play along. I really like sushi, soba noodles and most other Japanese as well as a lot of Korean food, especially Bibimbap (it’s best when they burn the rice at the bottom of a cast iron pot). In fact, the ML post about the $7 fancy Bibimbap made my month. And then its on to dessert, where my true heart lies. Its great to see how many of your readers (like myself) are willing to skip a wholesome meal for a full-on, intended-for-after-dinner, dessert. The options for doing this in midtown have really blown up even in the last few months.
Least Favorite Kind of Food: After a few years without much red meat – the thought of steak just makes me want to laugh in technicolor. Also, anything with Chinese eggplant – I had a bad experience once and since I assume many of you are a) eating lunch right now or b) about to eat lunch, I’ll just leave it that.
Favorite Place(s) to Eat Lunch in Midtown: I love Oms/B (on 45th btw. Lex+3rd), Pret a Manger (for the cookies), and I sometimes rock the Ed’s Tofu from Whole Foods that you talked about in a feature- but Whole Foods is a marathon walk for me at lunch. The last 2 months I have hit the Dessert Truck, since it moved to right outside my work.
“Go-To” Lunch Place You and Your Coworkers Eat at Too Often? Dishes. Too expensive but good. Killer baked goods. But definitely will go BROKE eating at this place. You can barely get out of there under the $10 minimum.
Place(s) you discovered thanks to Midtown Lunch? Your feature on Oms/B is the how I first discovered ML. I had a mad craving for a good rice ball and I think I Googled something like “Rice Ball midtown New York” and then I walked there the same day. It’s about a mile round trip. I thought I was the only jackass who walked all over this island in search of palatable food, but then I read that ML is geared for people who were willing to walk to get good value or for a specific craving. I knew I had found a blog I would go to every day. The most important thing I discovered from ML is the Vendys. I was unaware of the event prior to this year and really enjoyed attending and reviewing the dessert trucks so – thanks Zach.
If you could work anywhere (just because of the lunch) where would it be and why? This might be considered “fighting the hypothetical” but I guess I would like to work as food street vendor in Provence because I know I could live a very good life eating lunch every day at their open air markets. They have everything from 200 different cheeses to fish to tapenades, bread vendors…fish etc.
Is there anything you’d like to ask the Midtown Lunch readers? If you had to spend the whole ML budget ($10.00) on a dessert or sweet dish, what would you purchase and where? Also if anyone has a suggestion as to the best chocolate chip cookie in New York that isn’t already on my list I would love to hear about it.
I think I may have the opposite philosophy as you Niko. As much I love desserts (quite frankly, what fat guy doesn’t), I usually eat so much savory food I’m too full for dessert. That whole “stop eating to save room” thing that you dessert freaks have, doesn’t exist in my brain. That being said, a 3pm chocolate chip cookie break has been an on and off part of my repertoire for awhile now… and my favorite cookies may surprise you:
The chocolate chip cookie from Au Bon Pain (also acceptable is the m&m cookie from ABP). Don’t get me wrong… there are some amazing cookies in Midtown, and if given the choice I will patronize the Treats Truck over a soul-less chain any day. It may not hold up to some of the fancy, more expensive options out there- but the simple fact is, Au Bon Pain’s cookies are really freakin’ good.
Feel free to post your resonses in the comments. And as always, if you want to be the next Profiled: Midtown Lunch’er, or you’d like to nominate somebody in your office email me at zach@midtownlunch.com
Posted: 12:45 pm, October 28th, 2008 under PROFILE: Midtown Lunch'er.
48 Comments | RSS comments feed for this post
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48 Comments
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Despite fervent searching by a team of searchers, no evidence of even a scrap of manliness can be found in this week’s profile
Red polka dot boxers on display because the ‘Tuesday’ panties were in the wash
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From one of the bakeries in Grand Central Market i had an awesome chocolate/chocolate Cupcake. Not nearly $10, but i’d imagine after the $2 for that i could probably spend another $8 on some fresh bread and cheese.
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What are you talking about? Those bangs and that red belt scream masculinity.. Au Bon Pain used to offer 1/2 price pastries after 3pm until they realized my office was driving them to bankruptcy..
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I think I’ll use this as a challenge to go outside and spend $10 on dessert. Will report back post-haste!
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Shoot wayne, I didn’t need to notice those boxers.. really I had tried my best to skim that whole profile after this line:
“After a few years without much red meat – the thought of steak just makes me want to laugh in technicolor”
Only Elton john is allowed to use the word technicolor in public.
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And I’m willing to bet on the cellular level that chinese eggplant is pretty much the same as italian eggplant. I’m just saying, if you’re gonna go there, i ain’t gonna like you.
I actually was gonna make a cookie suggestion but I’m too busy drinking haterade.
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My dearest “Niko”
I am retired “educator” and an esteemed Freemason. I have made a career AND an avocation out of advising impressionable young men such as yourself.
I have one bit of rather critical advice for you: BUTCH UP.
Going through life with whispy bangs, a taste for sweets and a name like “Niko” is an ironclad guarantee of failure with the ladies. Should you be so inclined.
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wow – i hadn’t noticed those boxers either. is that a mistake or a “look”?
anyway, this post isn’t for me. i’d rather eat a french fry over a dessert any day
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I am not sure how much it is, but the Lemon Cake at Del Frisco’s is probably the greatest piece of cake I have ever had in my entire life.
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@fedthefish: Why choose when you can dip your fries in a chocolate milk shake and have both? Seriously, milk shake fries are awesome.
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well, theoretically I think someone who doesn’t give a sh** that his pants are falling down in a pic that’s going to be so public is probably a hopelessly guy guy.
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Ewww Tom! Nope, fries with malt vinegar or mustard if that is not available. If in North Carolina: chips in ranch sauce.
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$10 on an all-dessert lunch? Easy!
A large 40 carrots frozen yogurt from Bloomingdale’s, with maybe the chocolate bread pudding from the dessert truck.
Mmm.
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I second Dave’s comment. The lemon cake from Del Frisco’s is insanely huge and delicious. and the chocolate cake from Patsy’s (on 56th street) is divine.
Levain gets my vote for best chocolate chip cookie.My personal motto: Dessert after every meal.
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mmm Levain. I’d have a regular and chocolate chocolate chip for lunch once a week if I could.
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@tom: no…do not mix the salty and the sweet. sacrilegious!
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That is so limited Mamacita. I suppose you don’t like Poutine either? I mean come on, it is hard to find something that fried potatoes don’t go well with.
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I just dropped $9.50 on two cupcakes in Grand Central Market, one from Corrado, one from Zaro’s.
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Oh man I love poutine! I’m just not into a fry dipped in a shake. I do enjoy my orange chicken or sesame chicken, so there are exceptions to the sweets thing.
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Just need to add that 40 carrots is the [only] froyo, and that Lemon Cake from Del Friscos is damn good. Never would order such a thing until I had it there. Their cheesecake is good too.
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i’m gonna focus not on the boxers but on the $10 dessert question…
take the 7 to sunnyside. get a (pricy but awesome) $8 paht bing soo at starberry. follow up with the ($1ish?) french cruller to end all french crulls across the blvd. at alpha donut. tack on three-for-$1 guava paste bocadillos sweets wrapped in corn husk from miracali bakery on 46th st. BAM!
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umm, laugh in technicolor..? Annoying. Oh, and DocChuck, those aren’t bangs…in the common parlance, it’s called a combover.
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Comment from Rudy McBagel
Time: October 9, 2008, 2:03 pmSamwich,All veggies should have their balls dipped in hot oil.
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Boy, every time I think about submitting myself for a profile (mostly because I have so many burning questions I want you guys to answer) the haters come out and remind me that my self-esteem could never take such a hit. Come on, guys, of COURSE the boxers are a fashion statement. Geez. I think Niko looks fun, like someone I’d actually enjoy hanging out with — and that’s more than I can say for some of the other profiled lunch’ers!
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geez, you guys are a tough crowd.
mamacita, how does this make you feel: i used to pour half a bottle of 7up into my bowl of cooked instant noodles (with broth).
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AHHHHH! Noooooes! MFC!
hee hee!
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“Going through life with whispy bangs, a taste for sweets and a name like “Niko” is an ironclad guarantee of failure with the ladies. Should you be so inclined.”
I am pretty sure, being that he is a health coordinator with a sweet tooth who hates steak and mocks it openly and loves to show off his red boxers with dots means he is NOT inclined….though I bet many other men who hate steak, have a sweet tooth, and love to show off their underwear in public photos are inclined to meet Niko…
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do people think it’s cool to insult someone by suggesting that he’s gay. that’s pretty much hate speech.
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ooooh. I forgot. The cheesecake from Carnegie Deli is SO the bomb.
Best. Cheesecake. Ever. -
BUTCH UP! EAT RED MEAT!
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@codenamekaren: ooooohhhhh!! Ice cold!
word to ya mother
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Have you ever tried Malt Vinegar on a sugared Doughnut(note the correct spelling)?
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Need I say more about “Chinese Restaurants,” so-called?
HAMBURG, N.Y.—Health officials shut down a suburban Buffalo restaurant after an inspector found employees butchering a dead deer inside the business. Erie County Health Department officials said they got a tip Friday about a dead deer in the China King restaurant in the town of Hamburg, just south of Buffalo.
An inspector soon arrived and saw the deer being butchered in the kitchen.
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I’d totally eat freshly killed bambi!
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Deer is a step up from what many of those establishments allow to masquerade as “meat”.
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Beats the USDA ‘prime beef’ chucky professes to enjoy.
He and his pig wife live off roadkill…. so his constant slamming of anything non american is a joke.
Bit like themselves.
Texas and Arkansas also has the highest instances of paedophilia in the USA.
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Believe me, when the “Doc” as he calls himself isn’t busy being incarcerated, you can find him stuffing his face at the local Chinese Palace buffet. The only thing he won’t shovel in for some reason is their excellent crab rangoon.
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I thought this was a good profile…people are mean! Oh by the way in Japanese “Niko” means cat.
Also, does anyone know where to get a good lemon bar…I remember the first time i had one. My mom’s friend made it…i ate so many…they were so awesome…never had another one like it. Mind you, I don’t have a sweet tooth.
Lemon bars…let me know????
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Sigh, ABRAIN
Are you calling Niko a pussy??Thats messed up. seriously, we don’t need that sort of commentary on here.
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Abrain, you fail at Japanese. ねこ (neko) is cat.
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Wow you are all really mean, and I don’t mean to say that to sound like a whiny 5th grader but geeze. I had some great ideas and even half filled out the questions for the profile but who wants to open themselves up to this kind of criticism? Ridiculous. I’d suggest that some kind of moderation be done in these sections because this is a little ridiculous! Implying someone is gay based on an extremely small look at their life and discussing their personal wardrobe choices has nothing to do with their lunching, etc. How about a little class here people.
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DocChuck is too stupid to realize that problems at *one* chinese restaurant does not mean the same problem exists at *all* chinese restaurants; more or less along the same lines of him being a foul-smelling inbred retard married to a manatee of a wife does not mean that all people from Arkansas are foul smelling inbred retards with manatee-sized spouses.
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@fedthefish: I think you mean sacrilicious
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Jeeze Anon, don’t take it so seriously. In Nikos defense, his blog looks pretty good and I like the glasses.
Zach, can you throw the gals a bone and profile the hot asian Dessert Truck guy??
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i’m a fan of any man who can discuss NYC’s dessert options. The boys are just jealous that Niko can eat so much and yet stay so thin.
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Niko/Neko…..or Nikko…have seen several variations of it in anime….got a trust something. :)
Nothing about a good lemon bar? :(
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Hah, no worries. Niko means nobody in Croatian, but Niko is famous now so it doesn’t really work.
I never will get my fat grumpy cab driver from Queens will I?