PROFILE: Midtown Lunch’er “Jason”

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 Jason, a pizza loving Marketing Manager by day, super blogger by night.

Name: Jason

Age: 25

Occupation: Marketing Manager, but my passion is in the blogosphere: I Dream Of Pizza, NYC DAILY DEALS, and RateThisPlateNY

Where in Midtown do you Work?: Park Avenue in the 60s — meaning I must make daily pilgrimages to the Midtown area for some grub. Luckily, I get a full hour to make the round-trip.

Favorite Kind of Food: Pizza. (If beer was eatable it’d be up there too!)

Least Favorite Kind of Food: Fish. For reasons unbeknownst to me, I have an extreme phobia of fish — live fish, dead fish, goldfish, gefilte fish. You name it.

Favorite Place(s) to Eat Lunch in Midtown: I would always look forward to hitting up Baja Fresh when I’d visit my family in suburban Maryland, but now that there’s one in the heart of Midtown (Lex bet. 45th & 46th), I can satisfy my cravings on a weekly basis. Their grilled veggie burrito has been doing it for me lately. Don’t worry, I still give Chipotle some love on occasion (44th bet. 3rd & Lex). I really like the lunch specials at Szechuan Gourmet (39th bet. 5th & Madison), especially the stir fried chicken with roasted chili peanuts. Burger Joint (57th bet. 6th & 7th) is fun to show out of town guests.

“Go-To” Lunch Place You and Your Coworkers Eat at Too Often? All of the above are part of our regular stomping grounds. Also, Kati Roll (39th bet 5th & Madison) is a favorite.

Place(s) you discovered thanks to Midtown Lunch? Lots — but I’ll be the first to admit that I’ve given in to this truck craze. I used to hit up Rafiqi’s (57th & Park) for my street food, but now I wander further south to the La Cense Burger Truck, The Steak Truck, and the Le Gamin Truck among others. I also had Schnitzel & Things recently which was pretty good.

If you could work anywhere (just because of the lunch) where would it be and why? I live down in the East Village, and while I would never want to work close to where I live, there are dozens of amazing cheap eats within a few blocks of each other. Among my favorites are: Caracas Arepa Bar (E. 7th St @ 1st Ave), Aritchoke (14th St. bet. 1st Ave. & 2nd Ave.), Royale (Ave C @ 10th St.), and Pommes Frites (2nd Ave. bet. 7th St. & St Marks). Dessert at Momofuku Milk Bar (13th St. @ 2nd Ave.) would be a must — everyday.

Is there anything you’d like to ask the Midtown Lunch readers? Since pizza is my number one love — I’d like to know your thoughts about pizza in Midtown. I know there are a couple of okay places (i.e. Two Boots @ Grand Central), but how excited would you be if, say, Artichoke opened up a space in Midtown? Or Pizza Veloce? Which New York pizza establishment would you be most excited to see open a slice joint in the area? Where’s the best place to go for pizza in Midtown right now and why has one of the city’s most trafficked areas been missing out on this quintessential New York food?

Uh… DiFara’s?  :-)  (You can take the train to Artichoke, and possibly make it back to Midtown in an hour.)  Post your pizza thoughts in the comments…  And, as always if anybody would like to be next week’s Profiled: Midtown Lunch’er (or know somebody you’d like to nominate), email me at zach@midtownlunch.com.

18 Comments

  • I hate Artichokes line. Whenever I’m stumbling past there I want pizza, but the line is horrendous.

  • Artichoke is a f’ing bust like shake shack–totally overrated and total tourist trap. It is ok, but definitely nothing special nor worth the required wait….

  • c’mon Fred, its your time to shine

  • FREAK OF THE WEEK!

  • Artichoke square slice is great but not worth a wait on that line.

    In midtown, Naples 45 is the best. You can probably to go Patsy’s in East Harlem in under an hour.

  • Artichoke is very good pizza, and for four bucks, a slice of the artichoke is a meal in itself (though the sicilian margherita is a better slice). I’ve encountered a line perhaps once out of my last five trips – it’s probably because I usually wander by around midnight on my way back to Union Square, but still, I’ve never seen a line more than 15 minutes long, which is shorter than the DiFara or Grimaldi line ever is.

  • FREAK OF THE WEEK

  • “Don’t worry, I still give Chipotle some love on occasion”

    Seriously? It’s bad enough that Zach has a thing for Baja Fresh – that doesn’t mean we celebrate chain Mexican.

    Get some real stuff at El Rey – there’s one near you.

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    No comments about a resemblance to Marty Feldman?

  • Jason is “a pizza loving Marketing Manager by day, super blogger by night.”

    No shit??

    What ever Jason is “Marketing”, I certainly would like to add some to my portfolio — LOL!

  • For yabba’s ‘Portfolio’ read the $250 limit on his Wafflehouse Creditcard..

    ….jason where’d you get that nose central casting?

  • Jason, you should try Bombay Eats for Indian Pizza :)

  • Rudy, despite the fact that it “kills” him, so to speak, has already Googled the American Express ‘Black Card’ holders, and knows that DocChuck and his wife, Doctor Elizabeth, has one.

    It’s NOT a big deal to us. But apparently it is eating at the ‘buffalo fucker’ — BIG TIME!

    I mean, most business folks (at least those with which we associate) have a ‘Black Card.’

    So be it. New Yawk city folks are a bit strange, sometimes. It seems that their insane jealousy rules their entire existence.

  • Why do we always reduce ourselves to mocking the physical traits of the Freaks of the Week. As a short, portly, member of the desert people tribe, I feel for all those we mock. Also, he looks so much more like Jeff Goldblum or perhaps a Jewish Milhouse Van Houten, to me.

  • User has not uploaded an avatar

    Hey Doc, did you put the Hyundai on the black card?

    Jason was made to eat pizza…..

    ……….in the rain……

    ……without a hat……

  • Are we really allowed to post language in comments like that used in DocChuck’s comment?

  • No, Bossman, because our Santa Fe is stabled at our condo in North Carolina, and is generally only used when we need it to traverse winter mountainous roads (personal use).

    However, we DID put the wife’s Jag on the black card because it is her “business” vehicle (as reported to the IRS).

    I mean, it helps fulfill our social requirements, along with all of the other perks that you could only imagine.

    Jaguar West Columbia was rather perplexed with our presentation of the black card, used to pay for the vehicle. They had apparently NEVER seen one before.

    But after a phone call to AMEX, they invited us to a complimentary dinner at ANY area restaurant of our choice.

    Do you have any other questions, Mr. ‘Bossman’?

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