Bryant Park Pond is Now Open With More Food Than Ever Before
The free ice skating rink in Bryant Park opened for the season on Friday, and while that might be exciting news in and of itself for some of you, I’m more interested in the food available in the also open Holiday Market. In past years the food kiosks have been limited to mostly sweets, and nothing to get too excited about. But according to Lunch’er MychaelS, there are more savory options than ever before (including dumpling soup!?) So I headed over late yesterday afternoon to check it out.
Hello boreks! If you’re a fan of Turkish pastries, but don’t have the time to walk all the way to 2nd Ave. for some Gulluoglu, Eat & Go Istanbul has got you covered. They’re got spinach or beef boreks ($5), plus five different kinds of golzeme, this Turkish quesadilla/crepe looking thing ($6.)
It all looked pretty tasty, and they even had Gulluoglu brand baklava. If you’ve ever flown to Istanbul from JFK you may have noticed them in the terminal, and they plan on opening a store in Manhattan on 1st Ave soon. But in the meantime, we’ve got the Bryant Park Holiday Market. Definitely on my list to try.
Not nearly as exciting was this flautas stand. Normally I’d be pumped for more fried Mexican food action, but at $4 for a single flauta I will most certainly pass.
A Taste of Venice features little white bread sandwiches stuffed with mayo based salad (think tuna, chicken, egg) that apparently are a popular food item in Venice. Not bad looking if you like this kind of thing, and they will be adding hot pressed panini very soon. ($3 for half, $5.50 for a whole).
Of all the savory items, the most interesting to Midtown Lunch’ers will probably be the Dumpling Soup House- featuring steamed and pan fried dumplings that you can order with or without soup. The prices are not too bad (especially when compared to spots like Richshaw) so it might worth a try. (Although I don’t have high hopes.)
As far as sweets go, the hot apple cider stand returns as does Augustin’s Waffles (the pre packaged waffle company that figured prominently in wafflegate a few years back). There’s also a cookie place that I’m sure will have some fans. But the biggest addition is the gigantic Max Brenner kiosk, which features hot chocolate, chocolate pizza (!?), and chocolate filled syringes… you know, for the kids (?)
Laugh if you like, but the guy behind the counter actually touted the chocolate as being so much fun for kids to walk around with. Amazing.
I have highest hopes for the Turkish pastries (and maybe the dumplings), but we’ll see. In any case, if you work around Bryant Park and you’re bored of all your lunch options, this year’s market is certainly the best food year yet. It’s not as good as the Madison Square Park pop up market that ended last week (uh, hello Fatty Crab!) but it’s all we’ve got.
The food stands are mostly in the NE corner of the park (near the entrance on 42nd btw. 5+6th.) Get more details here.
Posted by Zach Brooks at 10:15 am, November 10th, 2009 under Bryant Park.
18 Comments | RSS comments feed for this post
18 Comments
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@Steve – Hmmm… didn’t see those two. I wonder if they were in a different area.
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they are listed on the website, but no info posted yet.
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crepe sounds good. Midtown needs a nice crepe take out joint like the ones in Paris. Cheap and delicious. Or is there one?
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@mkim – Madeliene at the Cyber Cafe
She’s actually from Brittany. amazing!
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i’ll second Madeliene’s crepes. light, crispy in the right places, delish~
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Thanks Zach. I’d love to have her as my grandma.
too bad it’s abit too far from my office. -
I actually had the dumpling soup yesterday. Wasn’t bad…although for the small dumpling soup you only got 2 dumplings (boo!) and the broth was really only a clear broth. But, the dumplings were delicious. I don’t know if I would eat just this for lunch, but it does make a nice snack!
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What’ll they think of next?
Huffing Pop Rocks?
Free-basing cotton candy?
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1st pic….he has eat & go….over his happy place.
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I went skating there yesterday (any MLer’s want to skate sometime this week?) and happened to walk by “food alley” as I’m calling it and was shocked. There were almost no food vendors last year and a ton this year!
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Nothing better than good food, and being able to skate for free!
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I skated yesterday!!! So much fun. Did not eat food tho. But did play ping pong afterwards.
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Pan-fried chicken dumplings I got were way better than expected but the girl did not seem interesting in serving at all, spinach burek was mostly unexceptional but the lady was extremely nice, oh, and as for the third interesting-sounding thing I got…
If you were planning to get the chocolate pizza just because you were curious what it would taste like, I will save you the money. This coming from someone who mostly enjoys the desserts at the real Max Brenner’s. You know how when you microwave Pizza Hut pan pizza, the crust will change from soft and chewy to spongy and extremely chewy? Well, guess what they do here, or at least did for me. When I asked for the chocolate pizza slice, they took it out of a pizza box and, without asking, incomprehensibly MICROWAVED it for a full 30 seconds. Sure, that lets the chocolate sauce (literally just melted plain milk chocolate and a small bit of melted marshmallows, nothing too fancy) melt further, but it also makes the thick Pizza Hut-like crust – you guessed it – spongy and extremely chewy. The super-sticky melted chocolate+marshmallow exploded in the microwave, and it somehow ended up even on the bottom of the crust, so this is probably one of the messiest foods I’ve ever eaten, and not at all in a good way. I’m not going to say it tasted bad, because chocolate on any random thing is still better than that random thing by itself, but of all the $5 pizza slices in Manhattan, that has gotta be one of the worst values.
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Hey all! Thanks for visiting both The Holiday Shops and The Pond at Bryant Park. We are happy to know that you are enjoying our tasty delights this year and having fun skating in this great weather. We have a couple more food vendors that weren’t featured including:
– The Sweet Shop (with amazing candied apples and chocolate covered marshmallows). Located at Booth I04.– Crepe Cafe (savory sweet and food crepes). Located at Booth B05
– Lovin’ Eat (delicious cookie sandwiches). Located at Booth H07.
– Kettle Corn (already a big hit!). Located at Booth C16-17.
– Choco Loco (scrumptious brownies, cookies and a chocolate fountain). Located at Booth D15.
– Unique Pretzels (wonderful chocolate and jalapeno flavored pretzels like nothing else you’ve tasted). Located at Booth D12.
Try them out! You’ll be glad you did! And visit us at: http://www.TheHolidayShopsatBryantPark.com for more!
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And don’t forget:
-Teriyaki Bar. Located at Booth A08.– Yummy Bites. Located at Booth A09.
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I went for the Dumplings today. I got the soup combo. The dumplings were cold. I got the sweet potato soup and was excited to try it. NOT impressed. I had such high hopes too. Oh well, maybe I’ll try the Teriyaki Bar next.
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Has anyone mentioned MmmEnfes yet at corner of 42nd & 6th? Delicious. And the Kettle Corn is ridiculous.
also listed is Crepe Cafe and Teriyaki Bar.
could be good.