Midtown Lunch

We here at Midtown Lunch like to harsh on generic delis a lot, especially if they are of the chain variety. Usually when I see that a place serves the holy trinity of paninis, create your own salads and steam table pasta I run the other way (or at least turn and walk out the door). A while back, though, I got an e-mail from lunch’er Lou asking if I’d tried Lane Cafe & Deli on Maiden Lane (btw. William & Gold). I’d walked by a thousand times and dismissed it as the weird deli that had fake hot dogs and boxes of crackers in its window, and served an interesting lunch special. Here’s his argument for the place:

Have you tried Lane Deli and Catering? Actual homemade food, usually have 3-4 meats, a few pastas, and some veggies/rices. That’s in the back. They also have a typical deli/panini counter, but the back section has the best selection in the place. I usually get flank steak over vegetables with a sweet potato. 10 bucks might be a little steep for an every day meal, but I’d rather have food made in the back of the house than the paninis shipped in from a production shop. Let me know if you get a chance to review it, interested to see what you think.

Lou also talked up the roast chicken and plantains. Wait, plantains? You can’t find that at Europa!  Read more »

As is customary here on Midtown Lunch, every Tuesday we’ll profile a different lunch’er and get their recommendations for places to eat in Downtown NYC. This week, we have Charlene who is a lunch’er by day and dancer/blogger of deals at www.nychar.blogspot.com by night. She, like so many others, works by the Holland Tunnel but still manages to find decent lunches. In fact, she just made me want a pork chop sandwich!

Name: Charlene W.

Occupation: Account exec at an experiential marketing agency during the day, competitive ballroom dancer at night, and NY adventure blogger whenever I see something fun to do!

Where you work: Tribeca

Age: 25 and a half (I recently celebrated my half b-day with a few friends at Ice Fire Land in Flushing = the best hot pot/shaved ice place!).

Favorite Kinds of Food: Hearty, fresh, and colorful – food should look and taste good too!  Since moving to NY from GA, I’ve become more of a soup and salad girl, but I enjoy a variety and always shoot to try as many things as I can (I’m a sharer).

Least Favorite Foods: Anything with peppers!

Favorite Lunches Downtown: I’m right next to the Holland Tunnel which is near the upper boundaries of the downtown area, and I’ve worked in this area on and off for a total of a year and a half or so.  Overall, this area has proven to be more of a lunch challenge, but I’ve recently found some new co-lunchers who for now will remain nameless as the Actor, Musician, and Pizza Lover. We’re slowly but surely discovering the gems in this area such as: Tresanti on Watts (at Thompson), the newly opened Italian restaurant that gave out free personal pizzas last week, and Tauro on Hudson (nr. Dominick), a Spanish-American spot that has good oxtail stew. Of course there are the food trucks that ML knows all the latest on: Taim Mobile (just tried it last week = good falafels), The Sweetery Truck (yes, whoopie pies count as lunch too), Calexico carts (Multiple Locations), Schnitzel & Things.  I often make the 10 minute walk to Chinatown to meet up with my close friend Jen at Nyonya on Grand St. (btw. Mott & Mulberry) as well.  Other places I’ve been to are Café Habana on Prince (at Elizabeth), Grey Dog’s Coffee (Multiple Locations), and Peep on Prince (btw. Sullivan & Thompson), and I hope to try the Hawaiian place Lani Kai on Broome (btw. Thompson & Sullivan) soon – quite a few diverse options.  Read more »

I had occasion to go up by City Hall the other day and on a desolate stretch of Reade St. between Broadway & Church streets saw two Japanese restaurants essentially right next to each other. The lunch menu at Sun Cafe looked better so I went inside to eat. The place was packed and they put me at the table always reserved for the solo diner, right next to the bathroom. After looking over the lunch menu I was trying to decide between gyoza and roast pork when I spotted the house special udon soup ($8) which contained both of these items. How could anything with roast pork and gyoza be bad? Read more »

Adding vegetables makes this healthy, right? Courtesy of The Girl Who Ate Everything.

• At least one other person agrees fried squid should be eaten every day. [Girl Who Ate Everything]
• Finally, a place to eat with ML price range where you can watch the SI Ferry dock. [Grub St.]
• We’re No. 2! (in dirty restaurants) [AM NY]
• Aside from the name, Golden Steamer sounds pretty great. [Fork in the Road]
• More people need to write poems about Chinatown desserts. [Food in Mouth]