Midtown Lunch

Photo courtesy of wonderlustforlife

Throwdown’s obsession with Midtown Lunch continues… via Twitter: “At Schnippers in midtown (on 8th Ave. and 41st) and they’re filming a Sloppy Joe Throwdown with Bobby Flay”  No word on whether or not Bobby Flay is actually throwing down with Schnipper’s (Dessert Truck Style), or getting help from Schnipper’s for a sloppy joe throwdown with somebody else (Jamaican Dutchy style.)  In related news, the falafel Throwdown with Taim, in which Flay gets help from Kwik Meal (on 45th and 6th), is airing tomorrow night (5/20) at 9:30pm EST.

UPDATE via Twitter: “Didn’t get a picture but Bobby Flay won. I got a vanilla milkshake so technically a win for me too!”  Guess it was an actual throwdown…

RELATED:
Schnipper’s May Have the Best Mac & Cheese in Midtown

Another review of Schnipper’s Quality Kitchen focuses on (what everybody agrees are) their mediocre burgers, but surprisingly Serious Eats’ Ed Levine had nicer things to say about them than the Mac & Cheese: “The mac and cheese ($6.99) was pretty standard and wholly unremarkable. The cheeses didn’t stand out and the bread crumbs couldn’t overcome the fact that the unbaked mac and cheese had no significant amount of crunch.” I agree that baked mac and cheese is preferable to unbaked, but sadly this “unremarkable” product is one the only decent versions in Midtown, for a reasonable lunchtime price.  (And I’d take unbaked mac & cheese over a burger they refuse to cook medium rare any day of the week.) [Serious Eats: New York]

Related:
Schnipper’s May Have the Best Mac & Cheese in Midtown

It’s funny how different people can view a restaurant in completely different ways.  Take Schnipper’s Quality Kitchen, the newly opened self serve diner in the New York Times Building (on 8th Ave. & 41st) opened by the original founders of Hale & Hearty Soup.  When Josh Ozersky, Profiled Midtown Lunch’er, burger expert, and editor of the Feedbag, went to Schnipper’s he saw a burger operation trying to be The Shake Shack. When I went to Schnipper’s I saw a fast food/diner concept, where burgers were just a small part of the operation (unlike the Shack, where they are all of the operation.) In fact, I completely ignored the burgers- and why wouldn’t I?  I knew that any place that serves a burger thicker than 1/4 inch, but forces you to get it cooked medium, was not going to replace any of my favorite burgers in Midtown.  So why bother trying it? 

Instead I zeroed in on the real heart and soul of the Schnipper’s menu.  The mac and cheese, and the sloppy joe. There are plenty of people who will go to Schnipper’s for the burgers, or the salads, or the hot dog, or the chicken sandwich.  But the real Midtown Lunchers know there are better and cheaper versions of all of those things to be found in Midtown.  What you can’t find anywhere else is Mac & Joe- the mac and cheese topped sloppy joe that I’ve been wanting to try at Schnipper’s since the first day I saw their menu. After failing on my first visit, I finally got a chance to try this monstrosity… and I wasn’t disappointed.

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Last friday I spotted the “Mac & Joe” creation at Schnipper’s Quality Kitchen, the new self service diner at the bottom of the New York Times Building, but didn’t get a photo because they ran out of sloppy joe before I got to the front of the line.  In my excitement for half mac and cheese/half sloppy joe, I completely missed the “Cheesy Joe” which, based on this photo uploaded to the Midtown Lunch Flickr Photo Pool by Ann Darsh, looks to be a sloppy joe sandwich, topped with cheese.  Considering that the mac and cheese looked to be more cheese than mac, I’m guessing this is pretty much the same as the mac & joe, just in sandwich form.  Either way it looks like a hot mess, in the best possible way, and has reinvigorated me to return to Schnipper’s ASAP to try it out.  You can read more about it on Darsh Eats.

Schnipper’s Quality Kitchen (on 41st and 8th Ave. in the NYT Building) is officially open, and it’s already pretty crowded. Early reports are mixed, and they seem pretty disorganized- but what do you expect on day one? Its only fair to give them a few weeks to work out the kinks.

Most importantly I spotted two ladies partaking in the sloppy joe/mac and cheese combo- and despite looking like brown slop topped with yellow slop in a paper container (no bread), they both said it was
really good! Also looked small for $7 but to be honest I’m not sure how much of this stuff the body could take anyway. Unfortunately by the time I got in line to order (around 1:30pm), they were sold out of Sloppy Joe!  Terrible.  I ended up going to Go Go Curry for their new fish special.

Anybody else sample the Schnipper’s today? Feel free to comment below.

Sent to the ML Inbox at 2pm: “Schnippers in the NY times building is giving away all items for free.  Place is mobbed.”  Call to the restaurant and confirmed… “It wasn’t a promotion, we were testing the kitchen out” by giving away free food to anyone who walked in.  It lasted until 2pm. That’s interesting… the owner didn’t mention anything to me two days ago when he sent over the menu.  Why would they want to deny Midtown Lunch readers the opportunity to “test out the kitchen”.  Don’t they know how angry we get when we are denied free food?!?  Anybody luck into this one today?  How was it?

Also confirmed over the phone: Schnipper’s will officially be open to the public tomorrow (Friday) at 11 a.m.

The New York Times is reporting that Schnipper’s Quality Kitchen, the new venture from the founders of Hale & Hearty Soup, will open this Saturday, January 31st… and according to an email the owner sent me “possibly sooner depending on how the kitchen progresses”. As reported here a few months ago, the restaurant is located on the ground floor of the New York Times Building (on 41st and 8th) and will feature fish tacos, sloppy joe’s, mac and cheese, and a half mac & cheese/half sloppy joe concoction! Also exciting is the news that everything on the menu (except the salads) is under $10. Check out the full menu, after the jump.

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It looks like TONY jumped the gun a bit in reporting the opening of Schnipper’s Quality Kitchen in the New York Times Building (on 41st & 8th).  The owner tells me they hope to open at the end of next week, or early the week after.  The official website says “Another great quick-service restaurant from the founders of Hale & Hearty Soups” so I’m still holding out that their menu- which includes fish tacos and sloppy joes(!!!)- will be in the Midtown Lunch price range.

Related:
Hale & Hearty is Bringing Fish Tacos and More to the NYT Building

Lunch’er Jasmine snapped a photo (above left) of new signage that just went up on the New York Times Building for Schnipper’s Quality Kitchen, a new restaurant concept from the former* owners of Hale & Hearty. According to their website they’ll be serving burgers, salads, fries, sandwiches, fish tacos, mac and cheese, sloppy joe’s, milkshakes, beer and wine. I like sloppy joe’s! I like fish tacos! The website says the place will be opening on 41st and 8th Ave. in December… and that’s about it. No prices, so we’ll have to wait and see if this one falls under the official Midtown Lunch’ing domain.

* This was not included in the original post.  The Schnipper Brothers were the founders and former owners of Hale and Hearty, and this is their latest venture.  (They sold their interest of Hale & Hearty over 2 years ago.)