Midtown Lunch

I probably wasn’t the only one surprised by the Twitter announcement on Tuesday of another food truck lot spawning downtown. The lot’s called the Lent Space Food Truck Court at Hudson Square, located at 70 Varick (at Grand) next to Duarte Park, and it’s another one involving the NYC Food Truck Association’s members, like the collection at the World Financial Center five days a week.

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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 the president of the Alliance for Downtown NY, Liz Berger, who not only works in lower Manhattan, but has also lived there for 30 years.

Name: Liz Berger

Occupation: President, Alliance for Downtown New York

Where you work: Broadway between Cedar and Pine streets

Age: 51

Favorite kinds of food: Anything delicious, fresh and not too sweet, from Shaun Hergatt’s take on haute cuisine to the fantastic new food trucks at the World Financial Center.  Right now, I’m craving crunchy, Asian home style and fusion, Italian or anything grilled, but I’m easily entranced by other flavors and cuisines.  I love to eat, am fascinated by foodways, and co-authored a book about food many years ago in which I interviewed Julia Child, among other great cooks, chefs and food writers.  I’ll never forget what she said her favorite dessert was:  a perfectly ripe pear.

Least favorite foods: I’m embarrassed to say that I don’t like yogurt, a staple of so many cuisines and a really versatile lunch.  I’m also not so fond of dishes that gild the lily – lobster mac and cheese, brownie hot fudge sundae, anything “supersized”; while I’m happy to redefine authenticity, sometimes more is too much!

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I’m sure a lot of you were saddened when the Bistro Truck went on hiatus over some winter months. Now that they’re birthing a brick and mortar location on the Lower East Side, the truck has returned to the streets this week and said on Twitter that the truck will be in the Financial District at Old Slip & Water on Wednesdays (is there even parking spots left in that area?), and according to their Web site, in Soho on Tuesdays. They’ll be at Hudson & King today filming something for a U.K. Food Network show, so smile while you’re ordering that lamb burger.

Everyone moans about how terrible the burritos are in NYC, which perhaps explains why there’s a line out the door at every Chipotle come lunch time. There are some decent burritos, in my opinion, but I’m no expert. Lupe’s East L.A. Kitchen has been selling Mexican food on Sixth Ave. (at Watts) for 20 years according to their Web site, and I’d heard good things about their burritos so I decided it was time to give them a shot. Would I find the burrito of my dreams a short subway ride away?

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