Midtown Lunch

Tickets for my favorite event of the year have just gone on sale today… the Village Voice’s Choice Eats. This year’s bash will be on March 22nd at the 69th Armory (on Lex btw. 25+26th) and tickets are $45 for general admission, and $75 for VIP… although there are limited number of early bird tickets available now for $10 less. 23 of the restaurants have been announced, and even though only two three are from Midtown (Xie Xie, Mantao Chinese Sandwiches, and Toloache) it’s already shaping up to be a stellar lineup. To purchase the discounted early bird tickets before they run out, click here>>

Related:
Margon Does Midtown Proud at Choice Eats
Margon Does Us Proud at Choice Eats (Again)

If you wanted to read more about my kid’s first taste of tea smoked duck, the Village Voice’s Robert Sietsama has a great write up of a sit down lunch we shared last week at Wu Liang Ye (on 48th btw. 5+6th).  Sadly, none of what we ate is in the Midtown Lunch price range- with the exception of the dan dan noodles and the wontons in hot oil. Both were delicious, but neither are big enough to make a complete lunch.  Wu Liang Ye’s takeout menu does have a list of $8 lunch specials- but very few of their “Szechuan Specialties” are on it (unlike Szechuan Gourmet, which has a number of their specialties available as lunch specials.)  Either way, it was still a really tasty lunch- and worth checking out the write up if you love Szechuan food. [Fork in the Road]

For the second year in a row Midtown lunching was woefully underrepresented at Choice Eats, but Margon-the Cuban/Dominican diner on 46th btw. 6+7th- did us proud with a huge spread of some of their best stuff.

A plate of my three favorites is after the jump…

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With less than a month to go until the big day, the line-up for the Village Voice’s Choice Eats event is almost completely solidified- and if you haven’t gotten your tickets yet, what are you waiting for?!?! A Midtown Lunchers dream, the event features over 50 (not too fancy) restaurants from all five boroughs, hand picked by Robert Sietsema & Sarah DiGregorio.  Just like last year, Midtown Lunch is only represented by Margon (sadly none of the chaat places written about in the Voice are participating), but there are a few honorary out of bounds ML favorites like Baoguette and Tiffin Wallah. (Not to mention a bunch of places I’m personally excited for, like Momofuku Bakery & Milk Bar, Motorino, Porchetta, Barbao, Fette Sau, Nicky’s, Pinche Taqueria, and Salumeria Rosi.)

Tickets are a pretty cheap $35, and I’m sure it will sell out.  It all goes down Tuesday, March 31st from 6:30 to 9:30pm at the Armory on 26th and Lexington.  See the whole list of participating restaraunts, plus buy tickets at http://choiceeats.villagevoice.com.  Plus you can read last year’s coverage here.

The Village Voice’s Choice Eats event is back again for a second year, featuring over 50 restaurants hand selected by Robert Sietsema and Sarah DiGregorio.  Unlike other tasting events, which often cost hundreds of dollars, and feature bits of food from expensive restaurants- Choice Eats is a very cheap $35, and features the kind of places we like to eat at: cheap, interesting, and from all 5 boroughs. Last year, Margon represented Midtown (along with honorary Midtown Lunches Tiffin Wallah & Albert’s Mofongo House) but as of now there are no Midtown restaurants on the list.  I’m guessing by the time it is finalized we’ll get a little chaat action though, since Sarah DiGregorio wrote up Taj Delhi Chat, Sukhadia and Indus Express this past year.  Even just one would be a welcomed addition!

Even if no Midtown Lunches end up getting added to the event, it’s still pretty awesome and worthwhile.  It all goes down on March 31st at The Armory on 69th & Lex. from 6:30 to 9:30pm.  Tickets are on sale now, and cost $35.

Related:
Margon Does Midtown Proud at Choice Eats

Margon (46th btw. 5+6th) didn’t let us down last night at the Village Voice’s Choice Eats event, representing with a nice selection, featuring roast chicken, fried chicken wings, and slices of their famous Cuban sandwiches.  But the real prize, was their seafood salad- both shrimp and the famous octopus version, which I think may have flown under the radar for most of the event. 

On a night where beef and pork made the biggest splash at the Puck Building, the seafood salad turned out to be one of my favorite things.  The not so small “tasting”, in all its glory, plus a round-up of some of my favorites, after the jump… Read more »

The Village Voice doesn’t branch out into Midtown too often (and quite frankly, do you blame them?), but I still love their blog Eat For Victory, and -of course- Robert Sietsema’s “Counter Culture” column.  They always have great recs, especially for inexpensive and authentic eats, and we’re clearly not the only ones who think so.  Last week, in response to a challenge from the owner of Casa Havana, Eat for Victory launched a best Cuban sandwich contest- and Comedian Aziz Ansari from Human Giant, posted this nominee in the comments:

My favorite cubano in the city hands down is at Margon on 46th btw 6th and 7th ave. They throw in a slice of salami that takes the whole thing to another level. I’m not sure that raw garlic can compete with that as far as genius.

Midtown represent! That piece of salami actually makes it more of a Dominican style “Cuban” sandwich- but why bother getting technical?  It’s freakin’ Aziz Ansari!  (Sorry, I’m a huge Human Giant fan.  That dude is freakin’ hilarious.)  You may remember Human Giant from such informative films as this K.C. Rib Ticklers video I posted a link to a few months ago.

To nominate your favorite Cuban Sandwich, go to Eat For Victory.  You have until tomorrow.

Finally, we cheap-eats hounds have a tasting event we can call our own!  Counter Culture columnist, hidden food gem guru and Midtown Lunch hero Robert Sietsema from the Village Voice, has hand picked a ton of eclectic restaurants from all 5 boroughs, for a new tasting event called Choice Eats.  Sponsored by the Village Voice, it all goes down on March 11th at the Puck Building downtown, and costs an unbelievably cheap $25 in advance for the opportunity to sample food from over 30 different ethnic restaurants.

Margon(Midtown Lunch Readers’ Poll Choice for Best Latin Food) will be in attendance, as will honorary Midtown Lunch, Tiffin Wallah (if only it was a few blocks farther North).  Plus, I’m pretty sure Albert’s Mofongo House, located in Inwood, is connected in some way to the International Food House Buffet on 35th btw. 7+8th.

A complete list of participating restaurants, after the jump… Read more »

It’s not a big surprise that Midtown food goes largely unnoticed by The Voice.  They are named after the OG hipster hood, and Midtown is the least cool part of New York City (if you choose to totally ignore the Upper East Side, which I do).  Their Best of NYC 2007 issue, which hit the stands yesterday, highlights a pretty large list of eats around the city, forgoing the boring “Best blah blah blah” entries, in favor of a much more eclectic listing method in which they pretend it’s the last night on earth and list the supposed last meal of various celebrities (alive and dead).  Some of the entries are pretty funny, but a few choices call into question whether or not they chose places because the food is good, or so they could exploit the place for a joke. 

Even if you expand the Midtown Lunch boundaries, we only got five recs- including one for Troy, a pretty mediocre Middle Eastern cheap eats place on 9th Ave., that I’m pretty convinced they used just so they could say it was Brad Pitt’s last meal.

We did, however, get what I thought was the funniest, and best overall entry.  Check it out after the jump… Read more »