Midtown Lunch

The Qdoba on 53rd St. & 3rd Ave. opened for business yesterday.  Chipotle, you were forewarned.  Let the McBurrito wars begin!

There are two other Qdobas in New York City (one on 34th btw. 2+3rd), but according to the NY Sun the new one is the first to actually be owned by the parent company (the other two are franchises).  Full report coming soon…

No offense to the sombrero cart on 50th St. btw. 6+7th, but for the most part the Mexican Food in Midtown sucks.  For the best Mexican food in the U.S., the closer you get to the source, like L.A. or Texas, the better the food is going to be.  So it should be no surprise that the best Mexican food in Midtown can be found right in front of the Mexican Embassy, on 39th St. btw. Park + Madison.

 Just like the ballfields in Red Hook, supply follows demand.  Want to serve pupusas from El Salvador?  Go to where the Salvadoreans play futbol on the weekends.  Homemade tamales?  Head to the Mexican Embassy, where a lady sits out front all day long selling tamales and hot drinks (cold in the summertime) to those waiting outside.

A big bag o tamales, and a +/- after the jump… Read more »

A few weeks ago I was in the Bay Area and had the greatest torta of all time at this little place called La Casita Chilanga in Redwood City.  What I wouldn’t give to have this lunch available in Midtown.  I’ve had the torta at Pampano Taqueria, but it doesn’t compare to this.   

I had “La Cubana” torta, and wrote about it on Serious Eats.  You can read about it here: http://www.seriouseats.com/eating_out/2007/11/serious-sandwiches-la-cubana-torta-from-la-ca.html

And if you have any NYC torta suggestions, please post them below.  (Seriously, please.)

Poor Chipotle.  It’s not the only McBurrito on the block anymore…

Qdoba, the fast food burrito place owned by Jack in the Box, is planning on a December 1st opening for their a new 53rd St. & 3rd Ave location.  Anybody ever tried this place?  I know there is one on 34th btw. 2+3rd, but I haven’t been able to make it there yet.  I’m guessing it’s just going to make me miss Baja Fresh more than I already do, but the Chicken Mole Burrito looks mildly intriguing… thoughts?

So, yesterday was the big day.  I returned to Chipotle, after a yearlong, self imposed absence- and had a burrito.  It was not terrible, but it was not worth waiting in a 20 minute line for- and in the end it just reinforced my Ultimate Burrito Theory, which I will now share with you.

Burritos are the perfect food.  That’s it, perfectly constructed, with a brilliant balance of ingredients.  You start with a soft, and very large tortilla to hold it all together, steam it with cheese, and add your starch (rice and beans).  Top it with your choice of meat, which adds a salty and fatty flavor, and add pico de gallo for your tomato, onion, lime and cilantro, all covered in sour cream or guacamole for creaminess.  If you like it spicy or smoky you have plenty of salsa choices, whether it be green tomatillo, or fiery hot red salsa.  It all comes together to form a nugget of goodness, that you can pick up with two hands and eat (none of this fork and knife crap you get at most Mexican places in NYC).

That’s it.  Simple, easy and anybody can do it?  Right?  Well, apparently not.  Chipotle does everything you see above, and yet for some reason their burrito doesn’t quite make the grade.  Well, here’s why.  They flavor every ingredient unnecessarily, so you end up with a big overspiced mess.  You don’t need to add cilantro and lime to your rice, it’s already in the salsa.  They add their special “adobo” to many of the meats, and then add alot of the same spices to the black beans.  Totally unnecessary.  And then of course they add too much salt to everything.

Don’t believe me?  Check out the “Ingredients Page” on their website.  Mouse over each item they offer and look at the pride they take in how many ingredients go into each of their fillings.  I’m sure each thing tastes delicious on its own.  Cilantro and lime rice, that’s been lightly salted?  Mmmmm!  Black Beans seasoned with “cumin, garlic and other spices”?  Bring it on!  Mixed together with meat that’s been marinated and slow braised in cumin and garlic, and topped with salsa that has cilantro & lime- it’s a little too much.  It’s like adding tomato flavored cheese to pizza. It’s just stupid.  The food is already a perfect combo of ingredients.  Why mess with it? 

I’m not saying don’t spice things, I’m saying the burrito is about balance.  Don’t spice each element to taste good on its own.  The best burrito places spice each element with the knowledge that it will be added to other elements that have their own spices and flavor.

One commenter said something about “authenticity”, but I want to make it clear it has nothing to do with that.  A burrito is a burrito.  Rice, beans, cheese, tortilla, salsa.  I would hardly claim that Baja Fresh is the picture of authentic Mexican food, and yet I love that place.  Why?  Because it’s clean flavors.  They don’t fuck with the formula.  Their Baja Burrito is perfect.  Tortilla, charbroilled chicken topped with pico de gallo, cheese and guacamole.  A great combo.  They don’t add smoky ingredients to the chicken, because if you want it smoky, you’ll add the smoky salsa. 

What I ended up getting at Chipotle (from your recommendations), after the jump… Read more »

I have a love hate relationship with the burritos at Chipotle.  It works like this.  I love burritos.  I hate Chipotle.  It’s been a full year since I stepped foot in a Chipotle, and it was a year ago this week that I vowed not to return for complete year.  I’m addicted to burritos, and I knew that unless I forced myself into some kind of challenge, I would end up giving in to my burrito craving, and going back to Chipotle- knowing full well that it just sucks.  Or I should say, it always disappoints.

Here’s part of the problem.  I spent the two years before moving to New York, living in Los Angeles.  No shortage of good burritos in that city.  Every little tiny hole in the wall on every corner made an amazing burrito.  And so cheap too.  None of this $1.75 to add guacamole to your burrito buuuuullshit.  It’s a crime against humanity. 

Before that I lived in Boston, where you could depend on places like Boca Grande or Anna’s Taqueria…almost as good as the greatest burrito I’ve ever had (which was at Garcia’s, a little bit south of San Francisco, btw).  What have I done to deserve being stuck in the most Burrito challenged city in the country???  We have figured out how to serve Jerk Chicken from a sidewalk, Pizza from a truck and Korean food from everywhere… and yet making a good, cheap burrito seems to elude this city.

It’s not that Chipotle is a chain either.  I often revelled in the joy of a Baja Chicken Burrito from Baja Fresh, easily my goto lunch while working in L.A.  That burrito, which was the same price as the cheapest burrito at Chipotle (i.e. the one with no meat), came with guac already in it.  And they had a free salsa bar.  But you know what?  This isn’t about Baja Fresh.  This is about Chipotle.  I have my theory on burritos, and why Chipotle’s aren’t that good- but I’m going to give it one more chance.  Obviously there are alot of you who love Chipotle.  The lines, especially at the one at the bottom of my building (49th btw. 6+7th), border on ridiculous.  So here’s your chance to convince me.

I’m going to eat at Chipotle for the first time in a year, and I want to know what to get.  I love carnitas, but the first two times I ate there, I got carnitas and I didn’t like my burrito.  I thought, “Maybe carnitas isn’t their thing” and switched it up to chicken the next time.  Still no good.  What’s your secret?  Is the Fajita burrito the way to go?  Which kind of beans do you get?  Which salsa?  Do you have to suck it up, and pay for the $1.75 guacamole for the burrito to be good?  Cheese?  Sour cream?  What’s the magical combo that causes a person to be willing to wait in line for 30 minutes, just for the privilege of buying an overpriced burrito that couldn’t hold a candle to anything you’d get in California.

Let’s hear it.  Post your recommendation as a comment below.  You have to understand, I desperately want (and need) Chipotle to be good.  It’s like a drug addict wishing that methodone made him feel the same way as heroin.  Please help me.  I need to figure out a way to shoot up Chipotle, and make it feel like I’m eating a burrito that doesn’t taste like crap.  If not, I may end up in some gutter mumbling about “Carnitas Super Burritos”, and $1.75 guacamole.

It takes alot for me to eat at a Midtown Deli.  There are so many of them, and they offer so little.  They breed laziness in every Midtown worker- and if they weren’t right outside your office, you would never eat there.  Just admit it.  But, every once in awhile, one of these delis offers something extraordinary… something that sets it apart.  Variety Cafe, with their fat guy salad bar (I stopped eating there after it was closed by the health dept.), Cafe Duke and their Korean food station, or the one location of Europa Cafe with a make your own burrito bar.

Well, last week, I hit the motherload.  Not only did I find a deli with something beyond the norm- they may have invented a new and unbelievably delicious food!  The burrito, stuffed with fried plantains.  That’s right.  And the place to get it is the Bread Market Cafe (on 52nd btw. 5+6th).  A generic make your own burrito bar, distinguished by one add-on ingredient.  The sweet, fried plantain.  It makes sense if you think about it… at Margon, you eat a meat, rice, beans, and fried plantains.  Why not wrap the whole thing up in burrito form???  It’s genius.

See the pics, and the +/- after the jump….

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I love burritos, and have often lamented about the fact that there is not a good one in Midtown (here, here, here and here).  More than anything that comes from past experience, and experiences.  I have had some truly great burritos over the years, that hold special places in my heart…  the Carnitas Super Burrito at Anna’s Taqueria (Boston), the Chicken Mole Burrito at Casa Diaz in Los Feliz (Los Angeles), the Baja Chicken Burrito at Baja Fresh (locations everywhere in the U.S. except Manahattan!), the Huarache I had two weeks ago at the Ballfields in Red Hook, and finally, the gigantor Carnitas Burrito at La Costena (Mountain View California)… it’s what all carnitas burritos aspire to be.

Erasing all of those delicious burritos out of your mind, there is another category of Mexican food, or tex-mex, or whatever you want to call it that is a decent meal as long as you don’t compare it to the top of the heap.  For example, the Chicken Gordita Supreme at Taco Bell.  A tasty concoction that is perfectly good, and with none of the “side effects” commonly associated with eating at a place like Taco Bell.  It’s a deliciously soft and squishy pita type tortilla, with plain grilled chicken, lettuce, tomato, cheese and sour cream on top.  No fake ground beef, no weird refried beans that send you to the toilet 15 minutes later.  I wouldn’t call it “great Mexican food”, but it’s a decent meal if you have to eat fast food.

A few months ago I discovered the world of Midtown “Taco” Carts when I ate at the Sombrero topped cart on 50th btw. 6+7th.  A world where nacho cheese reigns supreme, and ground beef and stewed chicken are your only two meat choices.  Soft corn tortillas are nowhere to be found, replaced by those crunchy yellow things that I’ve only seen at Taco bell, and in Ortega boxes in the Supermarket.  There are a lot of burritos and tacos I would choose above this type of place… but that doesn’t take away from the fact that if you are into hard shell tacos, and ground beef and nacho cheese- than this kind of place is going to be perfectly satisfying.

Thanks to an email tip, I discovered another Taco Cart (sadly, with no sombrero) for eastsiders looking for a lunch of nacho cheese and ground beef… with a surprisingly decent “chicken burrito”.  Pics and the +/- after the jump….

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It’s been a few months since I last ate at Chipotle, and the craving for a burrito is back in full force.  “I could really use a burrito.  I’m sure Chipotle is not as bad as I remember it!  Look at the gigantic lines!  Everybody loves Chipotle… i’m sure it will be delicious!”  Luckily my original post serves as a reminder of how I feel (“Free Chipotle is the only good Chipotle“), and I decided instead to hit up Burritoville with a friend from work.

I tried Burritoville once before (the one on 9th ave.), when I first moved here from L.A.  Seeking a substitute for the burritos I could get on the west coast, I knew I wasn’t going to replace the real deal authentic burritos- but I was at least hoping to find a replacement for Baja Fresh (My go-to work lunch in L.A.  There was one across the street from my office, and I probably ate there 2-3 times a week). 

At the one on 9th ave. I got the “Holy Mole” burrito, and was pretty underwhelmed.  It wasn’t terrible, but it wasn’t great.  I probably should have known that I wasn’t going to get a great mole from a place that felt the need to add funny names to their burritos.  I remember thinking “This place isn’t that bad.  I probably am disappointed because I just moved here, and I’m used to the good stuff.”

With that in mind, I returned to Burritoville- hoping to find a Chipotle substitute for when my Burrito addiction rears it’s ugly head.  Pictures, and the +/- after the jump…

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When Chipotle opened up in the bottom of my building I spent a full week lamenting how bad Midtown (and even New York in general) had become for finding good Mexican food.  Of course, “Good Mexican food” can mean alot of things to alot of different people.  For me, it means there are a) no good burritos (hold the “cilantro and lime rice” please), and b) no good authentic tacos.

If you need an example of what I’m talking about, go to Tehuitzingo on 10th Ave. (btw. 47th & 48th) after work one night.  It’s far west, but worth the trip.  It’s a tiny bodega that happens to have a small window in the back, where these two women turn out some of the best tacos I’ve ever had.  And by “best” I mean done the way they do them on every street corner in L.A. (where I spent the two years before I moved to NYC).  Nothing fancy… just good.  Two soft corn tortillas, some delicious meat (roast pork, delicious stringy beef, stewed chicken, etc), onions, cilantro and some salsa verde on the side.  Delicious!  No hard shell tacos served from a cart with a sombrero.  No fancy rice or grilled vegetables.  The real deal.

When I wrote these things a month ago, I got a number of suggestions for good Mexican food in Midtown- and they all pointed me to the same place:  Pampano Taqueria.  It was recommended to me as a great place, with delicious tacos and burritos, in the basement of this building on 3rd Ave. btw. 49th & 50th.  With visions of Tehuitzingo East running through my head… I ventured cross town in search of some decent Midtown Mexican!

My disappointment, happy surprise, pictures, and the +/- all after the jump…

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