Midtown Lunch

2008 Vendy Award winners The Calexico Cart were featured in the New York Daily News today, and when asked to name their favorite food carts in the city, gave a list made up almost entirely of former Vendy Award nominees.  That list included the Kwik Meal Cart (on 45th & 6th) and the Biryani Cart (on 46th and 6th), who both lost to the Calexico cart at this year’s competition, and the Hallo Berlin Cart (on 54th and 5th), who won the very first Vendy Awards (the event that served as inspiration for the Vendley brothers to start the Calexico Cart.)  Also mentioned was the news that they are working on “a potential alliance with the Treat Truck dessert cart for a best-of-the-street catering service.”  Very interesting…

In other Vendy related news, one of the Vendy Award board members defended Daisy Martinez against the lighthearted “accusation” that as a Judge at this year’s Vendy Awards she didn’t try the food from the Biryani Cart.

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Chef Daisy… does any of this look familiar?

Chef Daisy Martinez gives New York Magazine’s Grub Street a list of all the food she’s eaten this week, and her list of Vendy Awards grub from last Saturday (where she was one of the judges who awarded the cup to the Calexico boys) has one glaring omission:

“I walked over to the Vendys and I had what everybody there had: those delicious little fresh tacos that those boys from Calexico were making, pupusas from Soler, and braised chicken, falafel, and I had a lamb wrap that was incredible. And I had some delicious organic vanilla ice cream and a chocolate bread pudding”

No mention of the biryani, chicken tikka masala, or the chicken kati rolls served by the Biryani Cart!  I’m going to give her the benefit of the doubt and say she must have just forgotten to include it in the list she submitted to Grub Street.  But truthfully, it would make much more sense that she didn’t even try it… because if she had, the Biryani Cart (which won the Peoples Choice Vote) would have definitely won the cup!

Related: Biryani Cart & Treats Truck Are People’s Choice At 2008 Vendy Awards

5 vendors battled it out at the Fourth Annual Vendy Awards on Saturday night, and for the second year in a row, a Midtown cart was the crowd favorite, but failed to take home the Vendy Cup. Last year it was Kwik Meal… this year the Biryani Cart. Despite putting forward an amazing effort, and getting the most votes from the largest Vendy Award crowd ever, the Biryani Cart lost to the Soho based Calexico Cart- who were awarded the Vendy Cup by the tastebud-less distinguished judges. Kwik Meal was the judges’ pick for runner up.

I don’t want to say Meru and the Biryani Cart were robbed… but I kind of think the people’s choice award says it all. Don’t get me wrong, I love the Calexico Cart- and if they ever decide to move their burrito cart from 25th & Park into Midtown proper, I will be the first one in line for one of their awesome carne asada burritos. But man did I want the Biryani Cart to take the whole thing… and based on the plate of food they served- they really should have.

Food porn, dessert award and more, after the jump…  Read more »

My favorite event of the year has finally arrived!  http://streetvendor.org/vendys/“>The 2008 Vendy Awards are tomorrow from 3-7 p.m. in Dumbo, and it’s no secret who I want to take home the coveted Vendy Cup: Meru and the Biryani Cart on 46th and 6th Ave. I’d be happy with a keep-it-in-midtown Kwik Meal victory as well (they’re on 45th and 6th), but that cart has already gotten their fair share of accolades.  I’d like to see the Biryani Cart get their day in the sun.

Over at Serious Eats: New York we set odds for the event, and put the Biryani Cart’s chances at about the middle of the pack.  If the cart is putting their best food forward, I’d pick his Kati Rolls, biryani, and chicken tikka masala over anything the other four carts are serving.  But as we all know, the cart can be inconsistent- and the event will be packed, so the potential for being overwhelmed is there.

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Every day this week Serious Eats: New York is posting about a different Vendy Award finalist, and today I contributed a full post about our beloved Biryani Cart (on 46th btw. 6+7th.)  It includes amazing photos by Robyn Lee (the food never looked so good) including a photo of the newly added PWCD roll.  Plus, I realize that we may have done a grave disservice to the cart by entering their standard chicken over rice in the Street Meat Palooza competition.  If we had judged the Biryani Cart based on their chicken tikka masala (which is much more like street meat than the traditional Indian version of the dish) I think they would have scored much higher.  The dish is totally rockin’.  I guess I’ll have to make up for it in Street Meat Palooza 2!

The Biriyani Cart was planning on unleashing a second cart on Midtown long before they were nominated for a Vendy Award, but after all the extra coverage they have decided to park the carts next to each other.  The second cart showed up for the first time this morning (you may recognize it as the “old” Biriyani cart) right next to the main cart on the SW corner of 46th Street and 6th Ave.  The cart on the left will be serving their standard chicken and lamb over rice plates, while the cart on the right plans on selling all the Indian food (kati rolls, biriyani, and chicken tikka masala.)  The owner Meru plans on keeping the carts side by side from now until the Vendy Awards to cope with the long lines… which will probably only get worse today after their coverage in the New York Daily News over the weekend.

 
We Midtown Lunchers have known about the Biriyani/Biryani Cart on 46th and 6th for awhile now, but with its recent Vendy Award nomination it looks like the word is now filtering up to the “real” media.  When I walked by today a New York Daily News reporter was there taking pictures just after Noon as the line began to swell. You could blame the line on the Vendy announcement, but it’s kind of like that every day (although today it was definitely a little crazier than normal.)  You may say the secret ingredient is disorganization.  As much as I love their food, the Biryani Cart may want to rethink their ordering situation.  With four guys in the cart, things would move a lot smoother if each guy took charge of one facet of the operation (i.e taking orders, cooking, packaging up, taking money.) 

I never thought I’d say this, but maybe they should take a cue from the Jamaican Dutchy cart on 51st and 7th.  They were dreadfully slow filling orders at first, until they opened a pick up window on the side of the cart.  Place your order in the front, go to the side to pick up and pay. With the Biryani Cart’s newfound fame, they are clearly going to have to do something.

UPDATE: The Biryani Cart ran out of food today at 2:30pm.  They’re sending out for reinforcements.

The Biriyani Cart on 46th btw. 6+7th., which rose to prominence when they added roti rolls in the wake of Kati Roll’s move to 39th Street, unveiled their new cart on Monday.  The menu and prices are much clearer now, with useful descriptions of all their kati rolls.  This is definitely one of my favorite carts in Midtown, and it just seems to be getting better, with the addition of a few new menu items. Their chapli kebab has been offered for a little while now (it can be ordered as a plate or in a kati roll) but today is the debut of the new PWCD Kati Roll which is described on their new flyers as being “egg layered chapati bread with farm fresh scrambled egg and potato.”  Farm fresh?  On a cart?  Get out of town.  I will definitely be trying this soon.  Sadly though 2 kati rolls is now $6 whether you order chicken or lamb.  (Not sure when this price hike occured, but at some point it was 2 for $5 if you ordered chicken- so it is a price hike.)

The old cart is not going away though.  The owner plans on opening a second location with the old cart on Monday.  He is shooting for 43rd & 6th, but I’m a little skeptical that the Trini-Paki Cart will allow that to happen. I’ll keep an eye on the situation for you.

This wasn’t the only unveiling this week on 46th St.  Moshe’s famous falafel cart got a new look as well… Read more »

Next Thursday (6/7), Midtown Lunch turns 1 year old- and I can honestly say no restaurant, no article, no food or news has has been bigger on this site than Kati Roll.  I wrote about the “Indian Burritos” the first month of the blog, and that page has been read more times than any other piece on this site. 

In a lot of ways Kati Roll sums up the Midtown Lunch experience.  It’s interesting, delicious (obviously), not too expensive, and most importantly it’s only two blocks away from my work, next to one of the more popular places in Midtown (Margon), and yet most of the people I worked with, had never heard of it.  Kati Roll was and still is a testament to the laziness of most Midtown Lunch’ers.  Every day, on the way to boring soups and sandwiches Midtown workers walk blindly past some of the best food in Midtown, without even noticing.

Well- it took a year, but finally Kati Roll has got some competition.  And it comes in the form of a cart!  For a long time this cart toiled annonymously in Midtown, serving up the typical lamb or chicken and rice- just like countless other carts not really worth mentioning.  I first noticed it a little while back, when they hung a hand-made sign on the front that said “Chicken Biriyani Special”.  I made a mental note, but never found time to go back.

Apparently, it has gotten popular- because now the Chicken Biriyani sign is professionally printed, and takes up most of the front of the cart.  In the past few weeks I had started to get emails telling me how good the Wednesday & Friday Chicken Biriyani (or Biryani if you prefer)special is- so this past Friday I headed over to check it out.  Imagine my surprise and delight, when I discovered the even newer sign selling “Chapati Rolls”, clearly a Kati Roll knock off, just a few hundred yards away from the crowd of people waiting for their Kati Rolls to be ready.

Pics of the new Kati Rolls on the block, and a +/- after the jump… Read more »