Midtown Lunch

Wednesday I allowed a Midtown Lunch’er to air his grievance against Naples 45 (on 45th btw. Mad+5th), a restaurant that has raised the price of their after 2pm slice special twice in the past year.  The restaurant responded yesterday with an email of their own:

Dear Zach,

The article about Naples 45 posted [Wednesday] on Midtown Lunch saddens us, as the afternoon slice discount has always been a program of goodwill towards the community.The price of flour has gone up four times over the past 12 months, and the dollar is at a record low against the Euro — which means that the Italian ingredients that we import to make our authentic Neopolitan pizza (San Marzano tomatoes, Italian low-gluten wheat flour) have gone up multifold. We have been forced to raise the price of the afternoon special slice to $1.75 from $1.25 (available after 2 PM).

But we are still keeping the price at under $2 — whereas elsewhere in the city slices have similarly gone up and many charge up to $3 (see a recent article in The New York Times here.)

Patina Restaurant Group

It’s all fun and games until somebody gets saddened.  All Some kidding aside though, as much as I’d like to get sarcastic and tear this email to shreds, I do feel bad for these restaurants who are forced to find a balance between the rising cost of goods on one side, and cheapo bastards with blogs on the other side.  It also helps to know that commenters will probably do it for me. 

I try my best not to be too negative on this site, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t be able to vent. Every once in awhile I’ll share some of the more angry useful emails I get in a post called “Airing of Grievances”. (If the Eater Complaints Dept. would like royalties, I’ll be happy to pay up…)

Naples 45 Pizza Deal. Photo taken (what seems like) 17 years ago. 

While Z Deli was rolling back the prices on their slice, it appears as if Naples 45 was doing the opposite. Originally you could get a $1.25 slice after 2pm at Naples 45.  At some point it was raised to $1.50, but now it appears as if the price has increased again.  And this guy sounds super pissed: 

“Needed a quick pizza fix and remembered your mention of this late lunch special. Guess what?? The price was $1.70… $1.90 with tax. True, it was tasty… but the ‘magic’ is definitely gone. And I’m sorry, the price of oil to blame is bogus.. they are just milking the attention your site gave ‘em. That’s my opinion. Even worse, I’m still hungry. Grrrrr.”

Dude… don’t blame this shit on me. It *is* probably this country’s dependence on foreign oil. Yeah, that sounds right.

Woorijip’s new sushi subterfuge, after the jump…  Read more »

I try my best not to be too negative on this site, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t be able to vent. Every once in awhile I’ll share some of the more angry useful emails I get in a post called “Airing of Grievances”. (If the Eater Complaints Dept. would like royalties, I’ll be happy to pay up…) As a former Los Angelino I can relate to this one (although I don’t know if authentic is the word I’d use for Baja Fresh and Wahoo’s.)

Tried the new Qdoba today. More like Qdon’tbother. Blech! More Mexican food for people who’ve never been west of New Jersey. It’s like a Subway with tortillas and beans instead of lettuce and bread with big knives baked into it. I went for the “hot “ salsa and couldn’t even taste it. Also opted for the “3 Cheese Queso” burrito. I thought it would be three actual cheeses like a real Mexican place might provide… It was pump cheese. Pump cheese! Pump cheese belongs on your 2am, 7-11 nachos not on a friggin burrito!

Upside? The massive, albeit bland, burrito was only 5 bucks and it came with a sweet “I heart Qdoba” t-shirt and a fancy customer loyalty card. I don’t heart Qdoba but I do heart a big-ass, $5 dollar lunch on 50th St. (btw. 6+7th)

But wait, there’s more (not alot, but some things need to go after the jump to protect the children)  Read more »

Oftentimes people will get angry and upset, and for some reason choose to email me to complain it.  The good ones, I put up in a post called “Airing of Grievances.”  Usually the emails will complain about how a Lunch’er was wronged by some restaurant in Midtown- but my favorite emails are the ones that come from people who are too stupid to realize that they are not emailing the restaurant directly.  This email arrived in the ole inbox yesterday.  It’s not a complaint, but I still thought it’s worth posting:

 

From: Y. Rodriguez
To: zach@midtownlunch.com
Date: Tue, Jul 8, 2008 at 12:49 PM
Subject: Past Due Balance Sugo Restaurant

Your account has a past due balance, please call me at [removed] ext 18.

Thank you for your business

Ms. Y. Rodriguez
Accounting Department
[Removed]

Really? Seriously? Are there actually people out there that know so little about using the interwebs that they would mistaken this page for a restaurant website? Well since you were kind enough to email, I will be kind enough to reply. (It’s the nice thing to do, right?)

Dear Ms. Rodriguez,

Sugo! e Basilico has been closed since April. I’m sure they appreciated all the cleaning and fire prevention services your company provided, but I’m guessing you are probably not going to get paid.

Sincerely,
Zach “I have nothing to do with Sugo! e Basilico beyond stuffing my face with their Italian burritos and writing about it on my stupid blog” Brooks

Well, that solves that problem. If you actually have something you’d like to complain about to Midtown Lunch (and not the restaurants themselves) feel free to send your emails to zach@midtownlunch.com

I try my best not to be too negative on this site, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t be able to vent. Every once in awhile I’ll share some of the more angry useful emails I get in a post called “Airing of Grievances”. (If the Eater Complaints Dept. would like royalties, I’ll be happy to pay up…)  These are both a week or two old, so apologies to both places if they’ve managed to miraculously fix their issues since these emails were sent.  I’m guessing they haven’t.

Please warn fellow Midtown Lunchers [about John’s Shanghai on 46th btw. 6+7th).] Here’s the review I posted on MenuPages: “I’ve ordered here many many times before and have never been so disappointed. Sure, restaurants have their off days, but today’s food was a complete insult. I had 6 orders in total, none came close to mediocre. General Tso’s chicken was just a pile of red chicken, no broccoli on the side or anything. Chicken and Brocolli was sweet. Double Sauteed Pork was sweet rather than spicy, and pork slices were too thick. Thought that was bad, here’s the icing on the cake. Soy Sauce Chicken over rice, they had the nerve to give us re-cooked chicken. I’m Chinese, I know! It looks like leftover soy sauce chicken reheated in the steamer. The skin on the chicken had shrunken a bit and the color from the soy sauce had come off already. Why would you dare serve something like that to a customer?!!?!?!??!?!!! I will NEVER order from them again!” Thanks, Lily.

Wow… I don’t even know what to say to that.  Luckily, John’s Shanghai has never really been considered a Midtown Lunch, so I don’t even really need to waste any time trying to interpret that rant.  The email I got about Ambrosia was a little more upsetting.  Why the generic deli (that became a ML favorite by adding Korean food) might have me re-thinking my “Best Bi Bim Bap in Midtown” claim- after the jump…   Read more »

I love free food, but not enough to eat at McDonalds (notice how I got Andre Mika to blog about their chicken sandwich for me), and even posting about their southern style fried chicken sandwich promotion this morning made me feel dirty.  Luckily I get to redeem myself by posting this email from Midtown Lunch’er “Shauna“:

I saw the slightly tantalizing image you posted when McD’s first announced the Southern Style Chicken Sandwich, but lookie here at what my coworker returned to the office with today [from the McDonalds on Broadway & 51st]…

Are they KIDDING?!?!?! Maybe that’s how they’re saving $$ during the giveaway today.  Pretty pathetic.

I didn’t hear too many complaints from commenters, so I’m guessing this was just one stray breakfast biscuit patty, served as a lunch sandwich… but even so, it makes me feel good to post it.

I don’t want you to take all that pent up anger into the weekend, so every week I provide a space for people to complain about stuff.  (Eater Complaints Dept., your royalty check is in the mail).  Again this week, the complaint revolves around something that was supposed to be free.  Isn’t it funny how so many of these are about free food?  In some ways it doesn’t make any sense. I mean it’s free… what’s there to complain about?  But on the other hand, nobody likes being screwed out of what has rightfully been promised to them by well paid public relations companies.  A lot of free ice cream was given out this week.  And yet one company, may have done more harm then good…

I’m a regular reader of Midtown Lunch and I wanted to let you know that Carvel’s promotion today for free arctic and coffee blenders was a complete scam. I went to the only 2 Carvel stores in Midtown and was told at both locations that they were not giving away anything today. Actually, the douchebag working in Times Square didn’t even have the decency to say anything to me. When I asked him about the promotion he wagged his finger at me and then moved on to the next customer with no further acknowledgment or apology. The two bumbling idiots working in Penn Station claimed that they were not giving away any of the frozen drinks because they didn’t have any of the ingredients for them. I don’t know what’s going over there at Carvel but they better get their act straight or they’ll be a relic of the good ol’ days in the not too distant future. Ben & Jerry’s and Baskin Robbins pulled off their promotions without a hitch and probably won a lot of customers in the process. Carvel’s antics will only drive more customers to their clearly more competent (and honest) competitors. Sorry for the rant. I just wanted to let you know so that perhaps you could inform our fellow Midtown Lunchers of Carvel’s deceitful sales tactics.

You would think that a company that could figure out how to mold ice cream into the shape of a killer whale would be able to handle a free milkshake promotion.  Got your own grievance to air?  Email it to zach@midtownlunch.com

I try my best not to be too negative on this site, but that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t be able to complain. Here’s a new space dedicated to anything you’d like to vent about. (If the Eater Complaints Dept. would like royalties, I’ll be happy to pay up…)

First up is Jamba Juice, who was giving away free food this past Monday until 10am (or so they claimed). This was posted in the comments:

I showed up at Jamba Juice at 9:55am (Times Sq. location). The manager there was such a prick. He told me free breakfast was over. I mentioned to him it wasn’t even 10:00am yet, and he got in my face and yelled “FREE BREAKFAST IS OVER” and walked away. Asshole. I’ll never go to Jamba again.

Apparently this soup nazi treatment wasn’t limited to just one customer. Brownie from the website Blondie & Brownie had the same experience at the location on 47th & Broadway:

I had the exact same experience at the exact same Jamba (47th and B’way, yes?) I got there at 9:58 by my cell. Apparently in the land of Jamba it was already 10:03. The place wasn’t even overwhelmed with people. I’ve worked in food service and um, this was not good service. Oh well, saved me 200 mostly empty calories.

When will companies learn that you can’t fuck around when comes to free food. We are a cheap and vengeful group and being denied makes us very very angry…
Moving right along… my favorite kind of complaints are the ones that come from people thinking they are contacting the restaurant directly. I guess people find a Midtown Lunch write up, and think they are on the restaurant website? Either way I always find them hilarious, and while I shouldn’t be giving coverage to stupid people who can’t tell the difference between a blog and a restaurant website- I just can’t resist.
A pretty angry (and misdirected) Sophie’s Cuban email that hit the ML inbox, after the jump… Read more »

With my hosting company in full meltdown mode this week, and Midtown Lunch’s server on the fritz I realize that one cannot underestimate the restorative power of venting.  If only I could have complained to somebody at my hosting company (or punched one of their employees in the face) it would have made me feel so much better.  In that spirit, I’ve decided to post two emails I received this week.  (If the Eater Complaints Dept. would like royalties, I’ll be happy to pay up…)

First up is Yushi, the upscale Japanese healthy bento place on 47th btw. Park+Lex:

Zach- I wanted to give you a rundown of today’s Yushi encounter… I know, it’s super expensive and kinda on the healthy yet measly side. But I met my boyfriend there for lunch… he got a seared salmon salad and I got a seared tuna nicoise salad. The salads were just under $10 each but with drinks I ended up plunking down $25.67 (number burned on my brain and in my credit). Grumbling at the fact that my $9.95 tuna salad only had four TINY slabs of tuna in it, I sat down, prepared to savor every last morsel of that shit.

Anyway, today they had several girls walking around with trays of samples.  Don’t know if this is a regular occurrence, but snaps for freebies. Boo and I finagled two prime beef/shiitake mini meatballs with teriyaki sauce each from one candy striper (delish and more filling than an entire $10 salad), then we were also given shot glasses of their tasty firecracker miso from another girl. All seemed well… until I noticed a third long-haired minx of an employee strolling the aisles with what appeared to be coupons in her hands. She seemed to be silently judging the inhabitants of each table she passed, while tapping the pile of coupons against her fingertips. Iactually WATCHED this girl hand coupons to table after table after table of males, explaining with a smile the complimentary miso they’d receive upon their return, yet she skipped two tables of women in between!! To add insult to injury, the chick glided past our table unfazed, offering little more than a selective sideways glance and a slight sneer. As we put on our jackets to leave, I was determined to give her the benefit of the doubt. Perhaps it wasn’t blatant discrimination or an aversion to her own gender, but maybe she was planning on gifting us with a coupon at the door, or maybe she was legally blind in her left eye.

Either way, the minx was camped out near the door with her stack of discounts, so I beelined straight toward her with an inviting”where’s the candy” look on my face. Don’t you know it, but this girl smiles cattily (perhaps my over keen female sensory picked up on this?) while continuing to click the pile against her fingertips, taunting us, and said smugly, “buh bye now.” And that was it. No coupon?! No thanks for my $25.67 and ten-block trek? I’m still appalled. I knew Yushi was bourgy and too leather-laden for its own good, but this sheer disregard for me as a return customer worthy of a free cup of soup really just chafes me. Thought it pertinent that you know. And if nothing else, perhaps you find this little rant amusing.  Cheers, Profiled Midtown Lunch’er “Shauna”

I don’t find anything amusing about missing out on free stuff, Shauna.  Hope that the public display of your rant will solace you as much as that free coupon would have. 

A 100% true Treats Truck complaint/public service announcement that everyone needs to read, after the jump… Read more »