Midtown Lunch

The weather hasn’t exactly been taco cart friendly lately, but this news should get you pumped to hit the streets.  El Rey del Sabor is now serving al pastor, spicy pork with pineapple, cilantro, and chipotle. $2.50 in a taco or $6 in a burrito and available at all three of their locations (43rd and 6th, 60th and 3rd, and the newest on Park and 49th.)  One catch… it’s not on the menu.  You’ve got to ask for it.

• Frustrated Herald Square lunch’er… [Midtown Eating]
• New Jersey Diners > Midtown Diners [Midtown Eating]
• Somebody please help Zach out with an L.A. buffet rec [L.A. Eating]
• The Feb. ML Happy Hour is tonight! [Midtown Connections]

Last week as I was studying the menu at the Healthy Vegetarian Food Cart, I noticed a familiar face–one of the guys from the Famous Halal Guys cart on 52nd and 6th (the former Shendy’s cart) was getting the hook up. I watched as the vegetarian guys topped off the Famous Halal guy’s chicken and rice platter with the “bean of the day” (it happened to be black eyed peas) and some sauteed veggies. Nice. While I can’t take credit for coming up with the Famous Halal Guys and Healthy Vegetarian Cart mashup, I can say that I support the idea and will be hitting up this combo myself soon. If you were to make your own Healthy Vegetarian + Famous Halal guys combo, what would it include?

Related:
How Do You Keep Vegetarians From Getting To Their Lunch? Park a Hot Dog Cart in the Way!

The new DOH street vendor rules took effect on January 1st, and even though they admitted the no seafood rule was a mistake and won’t be enforced, there is another new law that is causing some discomfort (literally.) Last week a Downtown street vendor had his permit confiscated when he left his cart unattended to go to the bathroom- which is now outlawed under the new rules. (The vendor knew he was violating the rule, but he has a tumor in his colon, and couldn’t hold it in any longer.) So this morning the Street Vendor Project held a protest in front of the DOH in an effort to get the new law repealed. No word on if the protest worked, but we wish them luck. Insert urine joke here… or instead, feel bad that a grown man with a tumor will now be out of work for at least a few weeks because he went to the bathroom. (Or you can do both.)

Photo courtesy of the Village Voice

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 Amy, a Kosher journalist who wishes she could eat more food from a cart!

Name: Amy

Age: 20

Occupation: Journalist and Student

Where in Midtown do you Work?: 43rd and Broadway

Favorite Kind of Food: Oh, so many: chicken, Chinese food – of the kosher variety like Eden Wok on 34th, salads, potatoes of every incarnation. And I seem to make dinner by going through my fridge and cabinets and placing everything in a wrap. Of course my one true love is dessert – you can check me out at http://www.bakingandmistaking.com

Least Favorite Kind of Food: Anything fish except tuna, not a big cheese fan (I know, I know blasphemy) except for the -cake kind, hate tomatoes and olives.

Favorite Place(s) to Eat Lunch in Midtown: So with my strict kosher limitations (and incredible laziness), I don’t have a whole lot of options. That said I find myself continually heading to Schnitzel Express (on 39th and Broadway) which I love. For $10 you get a seriously big sandwich, which is pretty cheap for kosher food. I’ve tried the classic, Greek, French, American (corn flakes!) and am still waiting to get the pretzel encrusted version. I also put fried onions and garlic mayo on everything sandwich. Delicious. I’ve been too scared to try the schnitzel sushi or schnitzel bourekas but I’d love to hear from others.

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Photos courtesy of Ultraclay

Here is some more K! Pizzacone madness, which continued late into the day yesterday. The opening got posted about on HuffPo, Eater posted a slideshow of the lunchtime scene, Robert Sietsema likened the stuff to frozen pizza, and our goto pizza experts Slice weighed in on the taste.  Surprisingly the latter was completely un-snarky about this pizza’ish abomination, especially considering how nit-picky they get when reviewing real pizza places.  But the worst post of the day award goes to this person, who put his “original pizzacone packaging from the February 22nd opening day” up on Ebay, as if it was some kind of collectible. Sorry buddy… no amount of “donating the proceeds to Haiti” is going to make that any less stupid.

What’s that?  You still want more!  *Sigh*  More K! Pizzacone photos (including assembly), courtesy of our man Clay, are after the jump…

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Walked past the Comfort Diner yesterday (on 45th btw. 2nd+3rd) and discovered that they lost their lease last week! The just out bounds diner may not have been the destination for many Midtown Lunch’ers but they did make a mean grilled cheese (Lunch’er Liz agrees with me!) and apparently a decent milkshake as well. Thankfully they’ve found a new space on 44th btw. Lex+3rd and will (hopefully) be reopening in a month. Who knows? Maybe their new spot will invigorate them after their 14-year-long grip on the same old, same old!

The teary eyed farewell letter is after the jump…

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