Midtown Lunch

Sometimes I get a premonition when I walk into a place that looks like it hasn’t been renovated in 20 years that they’re going to feed me good food. This happened at Rockwell’s last week. The handful of times I’ve walked past the deli on Broad St. (at Water), I’ve made a mental note that they have a $5.95 burger, fries and soda deal advertised in the window but never got around to actually trying it. A craving for greasy food hit so I finally went to see what $6 gets you. The answer: A fair amount of food, a surprisingly decent burger (that you definitely need to customize) and mediocre fries.

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Normally we keep this site focused on lunch, but an event featuring $1 slices of pizza happening downtown after work cannot be ignored. Slice Out Hunger is happening on Wednesday from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m. at St. Anthony’s Church which is in Soho at Sullivan St. & W. Houston. A bunch of pizzerias donate pies, you buy tokens at the door for $1 slices, and all of the proceeds go to City Harvest. A bunch of Downtown Lunch favorites will be there like Prince St. Pizza, Da Mikele, Farinella, Ben’s of Soho and Rubirosa as well as others from pizza places all over the city. You can find all of the information on it here and maybe want to save some room at lunch tomorrow.

As is customary here on Midtown Lunch: Downtown, every Tuesday we’ll profile a different lunch’er and get their recommendations for places to eat in Downtown NYC. This week, we have Alex who is loving the new Indian food truck on Whitehall St.

Name: Alex Bogdan

Occupation: Lawyer

Where you work: State St. & Pearl St.

Age: 34

Favorite kinds of food: Italian, Indian, pretty much anything from a truck or cart.

Least favorite foods: Most cheeses, salmon, olives.

Favorite lunches downtown: When I’m trying to eat healthy, Variety Cafe on Broadway (at Rector) is the best of the numerous places downtown where you can get a custom-made salad. Best variety of ingredients and value.  When I’m not, I usually get roast pork with rice and beans from Sophie’s Cuban on New Street or chicken and rice from the halal chicken truck on the corner of Beaver and Whitehall.

The “go-to” lunch place you and your co-workers eat at too often: Definitely Variety Cafe.  The salad guy apologizes to me before I can order when they’re out of Cajun shrimp.

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Yet another source of coffee is coming to the upper part of the Financial District as Oren’s Daily Roast announced it will open its 12th location at William St. & Fulton. The shop won’t be caffeinating us until the end of the year, but a look at their Web site shows that they focus on the coffee and tea and it’s not really a lunch destination (unless you consider coffee lunch).

How a Thai restaurant does wings. Via Lunch Studio.

• Saha Thai has good wings. [Lunch Studio]
• Oh god, there’s a juicery coming to Fulton St. [DNAinfo]
• Cocoron’s opened a larger spot in Nolita. [SENY]
• You can now order Dirty Bird‘s food online. [Tribeca Citizen]