Midtown Lunch

Every Friday our man UltraClay goes south of the ML boundaries in search of a delicious lunch. Sometimes it’s Murray Hill south or the Flatiron District, sometimes Gramercy and everything in between- but we just like to call it Flatiron Lunch.

Earlier this week when I saw the news that the new section of The Highline had opened, I darted from my desk, took a long lunch and headed west to get a good look. When I was there, I got the news that The Lot On Tap (30th Street at 10th Avenue), the food truck park and beer garden from Tom Colicchio would be open the next day and I knew that I’d be making the trip west again. I stopped in Wednesday just as they were opening up to see what it was all about.

At the entry to The Lot, an orange box of a ticket booth sells tickets for the food and drink inside. Like FoodParc, none of the vendors accept cash, but this isn’t exactly explicit when you walk in. I ended up standing in line and ordering food and having to run back to the booth to get the appropriate number of tickets. This obviously leads to a bit of a bottleneck, as the booth only has two windows. Hopefully, they’ll have additional ticket sellers soon.

Once you have your tickets, which seem to only come in $7 and $1 increments, you head to the truck and order. Not nearly as smooth as the old Food Gallery 32 system and, well, that wasn’t particularly great.

Among the regular trucks that will be serving lunch fare is the Red Hook Lobster Pound truck. They’ve got their full menu of lobster and shrimp rolls on hand.

What caught my attention, though, was this new addition to the New York scene – The Taco Truck is a New Jersey based truck that I haven’t seen in town up until now. The tacos are $5 for a pair, which is a pretty reasonable price. I definitely want to check those out eventually, but given my fondness for tortas, I couldn’t resist

The torta ($8 +$1 for queso oaxaca) was packed tight with shredded beef, beans, crema, avocado, smokey chipotle salsa and fiery pickled jalapeños. It was pretty wonderful and quite filling. A little too filling in fact, because I didn’t have much room to check out the dessert trucks on my way out.

I was there for lunch, but they’ve also got a bar on hand serving five localish beers including a new brew from Brooklyn Brewery (who’s also providing beer at the Midtown Lunch 5th Birthday Party, by the way). There were also a few wines on tap. All the drinks were around $7, which is sadly becoming a common price for beer in Midtown.

I’d be remiss if I didn’t mention the giant “Rainbow City” art installation, right next to The Lot. It’s huge and a little odd, but it has nothing to do with the food, so moving right along…

The dessert trucks, Coolhaus and Kelvin Slush were on the other side of Rainbow City. I still haven’t been to Coolhaus, but given the reports from Blondie and Brownie, I really need to check it out.

Food trucks are everywhere these days, you certainly don’t need to go to the west side to get nearly anything that’s available at The Lot. Still, if you’re like me and drawn to The Highline’s creative space and want to enjoy it on the lunch break, The Lot offers a good meal to go with it. I know I’ll be back.

The + (What somebody who likes this place would say)

• It’s the best meal available on 10th Ave for a mile.
• I can grab a bite before or after hanging out on The Highline
• A torta, a beer and an ice cream sandwich, what else do I need?

The – (What somebody who doesn’t like this place would say)

• It’s way to hot to walk a mile for a food truck.
• The ticket system is annoying.
• The Highline is overrated.

The Lot on Tap, 30th & 10th Ave. on the Highline