Midtown Lunch

Ever since the $8.99 Rangole Indian Buffet closed, I’ve been searching for a replacement in Midtown.  Sure, I could spend $12.95 and up for a fancy Indian Buffet (there are plenty of them)- but I really wanted to find something under $10.  Sukhadia, the vegetarian Indian buffet is really good, but it’s $10.95, and there’s no meat- so it doesn’t really qualify as a full fledged replacement.  When I posted about that place, a few people recommended Curry Dream.

Curry Dream is a middle of the road Indian restaurant on 39th btw. 5th & 6th with a lunchtime buffet that costs $9.95.  (Anything under $10 is very exciting to me!!!)  Overall the food was better than Rangole (not too difficult), and for the price it is easily the best Indian buffet deal in Midtown.

What’s on the buffet, pictures and a +/- after the jump… Read more »

Ever since Rangole closed last month I have been searching for an under $10 Indian Buffet in Midtown.  After weeks of searching (and asking for suggestions) I have come up with the conclusion that it just doesn’t exist.  There is one on 9th Ave. and one on 2nd Ave., but these are both out of my eating range… And while I have been known to travel very far distances for the face stuffing that only a buffet can provide, my goal is to find a cheap Indian Buffet in Midtown proper.  There is no question that there are some great Indian buffets in Midtown if you are willing to fork over $15+ bucks… but I’m not quite at that level of desperation. 

But, I am still a little bit desperate- so with no $10 buffets left, I decided to up my price to $10.95 and check out Sukhadia’s, a Vegetarian Indian Buffet on 45th btw. 5th & 6th Ave.  Now, I am not an Indian food expert, and I am not exactly sure what kind of Indian food Sukhadia serves- but I can say this… if you are looking for Tandoori Chicken, or some sort of Tikka Masala with Naan- you are going to be very disappointed.  In fact, if you are looking for meat at all, or even any of the standard Northern Indian dishes you find at most American Indian restaurants, you are going to be disappointed.  I believe the cuisine is mostly from the area of Rājasthān, but you can find Northern and Southern Indian food at the restaurant, in addition to Jain dishes (a religion/philosophy from Ancient India whose followers are vegetarian).

Now, I know what you’re thinking.  You show up at an Indian Buffet, and it costs $10.95 and they got no meat, it’s going to make you say “Yo Goober! Where’s the meat?”  Well, here’s my theory…  With most Indian Buffets, you get what you pay for.  If a buffet costs $15 or more, chances are it’s going to be of decent quality.  Pay $9 (i.e. Rangole), and there may be meat dishes, but the curry it’s covered in is probably going to be watery- and the veggie dishes are usually crap too.  If you are charging $11, and serving NO meat, than you are probably going to take extra special care to make sure that your veggie dishes are pretty tasty.  So, as much as I love lamb, and beef and Tandoori Chicken- I headed over to this Vegetarian Indian buffet to fork over my $11 and check it out.

What they had, a picture of my first plate and the +/- after the jump…

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Here we go again.  I love the buffets… and on Friday I visited another one (with my wife and a few of her co-workers).  I had actually been to this buffet back in March for my brother’s birthday- when it was known as Minado.  We went for dinner, and it was pretty good.  Decent sushi, some good hot things, not too crowded- but things were still fresh, and a huge selection.  A couple of months later, I had read that it was sold to Todai, a Japanese buffet chain with locations mostly in the west coast, Texas, Illinois, Virginia & New York.  My one previous visit to a Todai (in Los Angeles) left me with a bad taste in my mouth (literally).  The rice they used to make the sushi was disgusting, and the warm food was not so great either.

With that in mind, we went to the New York Todai, hoping that some of the Minado goodness was held over in the transition.  Todai is what is known by buffet aficionados as a “Super Buffet”.  It’s a very technical term, and might be difficult to understand for the buffet lay-person.  “Super” refers to the awesome size and nature of the buffet in question.  Most Super Buffets have many stations, and at least 50 items (I just made that up… I don’t think there is any real measure). 

Super Buffets also require a totally different technique from your small scale and regular size buffets.  With the small buffets it is easy to load your plate up with the 10-20 items they have available… but with a Super Buffet you need to be more cautious.  I like to take small bits of as many items as possible, scope out the real winners and then return for larger portions of the 3 or 4 things that I really loved.

Tackling Minado, the food porn, and the +/- after the jump…

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I just wanted to say a quick thank you for all the emails I’ve gotten, many of them with some great suggestions.  A lot of those suggestions urge me to branch out farther and farther from the places I have already reviewed.  9th avenue, the high 30s, Koreatown.  Someone even suggested I go to Chinatown if I wanted “real authentic Chinese food“.  Apparently she didn’t fully grasp the meaning of my blog’s very complex title.  It is very confusing…

I kid, I kid.  Although every day I struggle with where to draw the boundaries with this blog.  I could say 8th ave. on the west, and 42nd St. to the south.  But what if there’s a great place to eat on 41st.  Am I really not going to walk the extra block?  So the truth is, I’m not going to set any boundaries.  And the reason is simple…  No boundaries means I have an excuse to go all the way down to 32nd st. in Koreantown to write about my favorite all you can eat buffet… Arang.

One of my favorite styles of eating is the all you can eat buffet.  The variety, the concept, the trying to beat the game by pushing your personal eating limits as far as they can go.  What’s there not to like?  (Besides how you feel afterwards).  And nothing is going to get me to travel 16 blocks away from work like a $9.95 face stuffing Korean and Sushi extravaganza.  Which is precisely what you get at Arang.

For those who work on the southern part of Midtown 32nd St. btw. Broadway and 5th Ave. is no big deal.  But for those of us a little farther north, here’s the way I see it.  There’s no ordering, and you start eating immediately… so- 20 minutes down, 20 minutes to eat, and 20 minutes back.  It’s a full proof scheme. 

Arang is what I refer to as a “small scale” buffet.  Don’t expect Minado (the gigantic Japanese buffet on 32nd btw. 5+Madison, which sadely has been bought out by Todai) or some sort of Super Buffet.  This is one of those small places with fewer items… but because it is small- you hope the few things they do have are done well.

What they have, the pictures and +/- after the jump… Read more »

 ******UPDATE:   THIS RESTAURANT IS NOW CLOSED******

Who says you can’t eat Indian food when it’s 97 degrees and disgusting out?  It’s 92 degrees at Indira Ghandi National Airport in India today.  Where do you think they’re eating?  At a deli/salad bar? (Do they have Metro in India?)  If they can eat Indian food in that kind of heat, so can I- and isn’t there something about spicy food helping you cool down by making you sweat?  I’m not even going to look that one up… just going to assume it’s true.

If there is one thing there’s plenty of in Midtown- it’s Indian Restaurants.  Cheap, expensive, eat in or take out…  And, most of the nice, expensive Indian Restaurants choose to do buffets at lunch ranging in price (usually $10.95 and up).  I’ve gotten a lot of emails asking me to write about some of the Indian Buffets in Midtown- so I’ve decided to start with the cheapest one I know of- Rangole.

Let me start of by saying, it’s not the best Indian food in Midtown, and it’s not even the best buffet… but there’s one thing you can’t argue about- if you like Buffets (and I do) this one is cheap, and for the price it’s totally worth it.

What they serve, some more pictures, and the +/- after the jump… Read more »