Midtown Lunch

If you like to eat, chances are you like to drink (read: a lot of you are freakin’ lushes), so I thought maybe it was time to introduce a happy hour column to the site. Every week, our Happy Hour Correspondent “Mamacita” will post about a different bar in Midtown that fits the Midtown Lunch mentality: unhealthy food, not lame (unless it’s lame in a cool way), and most importantly… cheap.

Time has passed since Hallo Berlin Express opened in 2008 extending the sausage empire created by the dearly departed Rolf Babiel. Though HBE lacks space and the Biergarten atmosphere of its predecessor on 10th Avenue it still offers a full selection of juicy, plump wursts and German draft beers. You might think, “Well big deal, I can go to the midtown cart for my sausage fix, why should I head over to the Express?” HBE offers more selection like schnitzel, spaetzle, peirogis and herring plus the main event: German Beer!

Their happy hour deal is perfect for those cold days when you need a sit down meal and a swig of ale. Additionally, the special runs all day. So if you’re a carnivore and you like a cold one to help diffuse the Hallo Berlin’s grease bomb then this is right up your alley.

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Midtown continues to be a magnet for weird new chains (i.e. Kolache Mama, Danku, & 4Food). Eater reports that “Freshii, a Toronto health chain serving salads, wraps, and burritos” and “Roll’d, a “quick service restaurant concept focused on introducing ‘kimbap’ to the United States on a grand scale,” are both looking for locations in the high density area of Midtown.  Can you guess which of the two sound more interesting to me? [Eater NY]

So… as much as it saddens me to say, next week will be my last week of full time lunching in Midtown. It’s not really goodbye, and I will definitely be back for Street Meat Palooza, Choice Eats, the Vendy Awards, and some random lunching, but after next Friday I won’t be the full time voice of Midtown Lunch anymore. Since I announced a few weeks ago that I was moving to L.A. there have been some “sky is falling” comments and emails saying that things won’t be the same.  Not that many… but a few.  And I just want to assure those 7 concerned people that nothing is going to change on Midtown Lunch when I leave.  Not just because I’ll still be overseeing the site, and would never let that happen- but also because the site has never really been about me.  It’s always been about finding lunch.

In just under four years Midtown Lunch has grown into an enormous community of like-minded eaters, converging in one place to share news, tips, and opinions about the best hour of our lousy work day. Everything I write about on this site originates from you, whether it’s an email, a photo, a comment on a review, or a post in the forums.  Nothing comes out of thin air… everything comes from you guys. What I’m trying to say is, on Feburary 1st I’ll just be handing over the site to the people who have always run it… you guys.

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Now that Downtown has its very own section of the site, what are we going to post on Fridays at 10am? Answer… how about a new column devoted to those lunches just south of the ML boundaries. Please give a warm welcome to Jason Lam from the blog Me So Hungry.  Every Friday at 10am he’ll post about lunches in Murray Hill south, Grammercy, Flatiron, and everything in between… or as we’ll call it from now on: Flatiron Lunch.

First off, I’d like to thank Zach for this opportunity to share my lunch eating experience with you guys. I hope to share some of my favorite spots, try new things, learn some stuff and eat good food. Enjoy and salivate. Recently I stopped in at Curry in a Hurry in Murray (Curry) Hill (that’s a mouthful.) Amongst the many other Indian restaurants in this area, this place has a wackier facade. Slanted blue wall and a neon sign with twisty Bauhaus-style font. On the inside, you’ll see a steam tray counter with a full array of curries. To the side, a tandoor oven and tava (griddle) in plain view where you can watch them cook naan and other breads to order. I was pretty confident I did the right thing by getting just a dosa, but I was dead wrong.

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• Looking for gluten free lunch in Midtown… [Midtown Eating]
• Where should you take a Marine before he ships out? [Eating in Other Areas of NY]
• It’s outside the ML price range, but Ippudo makes a good subway lunch [Midtown Eating]
• Hale & Hearty’s chicken pot pie soup is disappointing [Midtown Eating]
• What carts are open on the weekends? [Midtown Eating]

The new Midtown location of Korean fried chicken chain Bon Chon is opening right now on 38th St. btw. 7+8th. It’s a soft opening, so they don’t have a full menu… but they are serving fried chicken w/ french fries, roll, or rice. There’s a large seating area upstairs, which will be open to anybody during lunch, but after 5pm the place will turn into a sit down restaurant with waiter service upstairs. It sounds like they’ve been giving out free chicken wing samples for a few hours, but that might end once they are officially open for business at 2:30pm. (In other words, if you’re looking for a free wing I’m not guaranteeing anything.)

UPDATE: Before you rush out… drumsticks are at least a 20 minute wait, and they haven’t figured out the ordering system yet. So you might want to give these guys a few days to get settled. Or not.

Check out more photos and the menu, after the jump…

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