Midtown Lunch

The newest branch of AQ Kafe (on 10th Ave btw. 36+37th) opened yesterday morning and to celebrate they’re giving away free stuff every day for the rest of the week.  Today they’ll be giving away sandwiches from 11am to 3pm, tomorrow (Thursday) there will be free cinnamon buns from 3-6pm, and on Friday it’s free coffee all day long.  It’s about time something great happened to the poor lunchers in the technically-out-of-bounds SW corner of the ML universe. Enjoy!

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…)

First up is Flavors, the generic deli in the passageway at the bottom of the Fox News Building (on 47th btw. 6+7th).  It looks like they’ve responded to the first grievance that was aired against them by shrinking the size of the plastic containers their salads come in.  Clearly, though, not everybody is happy about it.

“We all just trekked over to Flavors over on 47th as we normally do and found they reduced the salad bowl sizes to half the size of what we’re used to. They’re normally pretty awesome salads. Kind of like a bait and switch that radio stations do when they launch. They play all good music and then voila, one day it’s all commercials once they have their loyal listener base. All good, but prices didn’t reduce. So we decided to trek elsewhere, no biggy, but on the way out I asked the manager why they have decided to go with salad bowls half the size of the original ones. Their answer – Corporate says it’s to reduce our carbon footprint, but it still holds the same amount. We all failed to see how a bowl visually half the size could hold the same amount. Wish your team could have been there – priceless”

First people complain that you don’t fill your salad containers all the way up.  Then you shrink the container to fit the salad, and people complain about that.  Even I have a bit of sympathy for you on this one.  Clearly you can’t win Flavors. Maybe you should just give up on the whole generic deli thing and become a… I don’t know… Chinese buffet? (Just a thought…)

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It’s over now, but if this photo is any indication, it was complete pandemonium at AQ Kafe today during their free food giveaway.  Danny from Food in Mouth sent us the photo and had this to say: “Insane in the membrane…yo i couldn’t get in that line, it wasn’t moving and it was LONG. so no idea how good it was…”  A few reports of the scene and food were posted as comments to yesterday’s post (if such a thing interests you, they’re after the jump- along with another photo of the madness.)

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Thanks to all the lunchers who emailed me about this one. Free coffee is nice, but free sandwiches is like hitting the jackpot. The new AQ Kafe on Broadway btw. 58+59th will give out free sandwiches on Friday from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m. Available for eat in or take out, you’ll get a choice between their Turkey (w/ jarlsberg, lingonberry jam, and lettuce on wheat), Vine Ripened Tomato (w/ cucumber, farmer’s cheese, and sprouts on wheat), or the Tuna Salad (with tomato, pickled onions, and celery on wheat). Bummer that one of the choices isn’t from the hot sandwich menu (swedish meatballs anybody!?!) and the gravlax club probably would be too much to ask for- but whatever. You won’t hear me complaining about free food. Plus, the manager told me they plan on doing more of these kinds of giveaways in the coming weeks, so stay tuned…

The new AQ Kafe opened today on Broadway btw. 58th Street and Central Park, and as promised they were giving out free coffee to anybody willing to wait in the line and order it from the cashier.  I didn’t feel like waiting for coffee (free food, now that would have been a different story) but I did take a look at the menu. 

The menu was posted awhile back (without prices) and as expected everything is more expensive than it was at the original location.  Old favorites make a return, like the gravlax club (although it’s now $12) and the smorgasbord (which is now $13), but there are 3 sandwiches all for under $10 which sound pretty great to me- like the meatball on a potato roll with lingonberries.  And for those who were worried that the “Nordic Cuban” is gone, it’s not- they’re just calling it a “Ham & Cheese” sandwich now. 

Links to the menu, plus your first look inside, after the jump…  Read more »

Originally they thought it may open today, but it looks like tomorrow will be the big day for AQ Kafe, Marcus Samuelsson’s casual Scandinavian cafe (on Broadway and 58th St.) To celebrate the grand opening, they’ll be giving away free coffee all day long. So if there was any doubt as to whether or not they’d be going after FIKA Espresso Bar’s customers- this answers that. If you haven’t been following closely, the original version of AQ Cafe, located in the Scandinavian House on Park Ave., closed a few weeks ago, and was replaced by another Smorgaschef.

Surprisingly, even though the new location hasn’t opened yet, the shilling has already started…    Read more »

Just in the nick of time… TONY is reporting that the new AQ Kafe (on Broadway and 58th St.) is opening “this week”, and a quick call to the store yielded this info:  they are planning to open on Monday morning. Of course, as you know “plans” don’t always work out as… uh… planned.