Midtown Lunch

There aren’t too many options for Latin food downtown other than Sophie’s Cuban and a few other places that are mostly out of ML price territory. West Side Coffee Shop on Church (at Canal) at first looks like a regular diner or coffee shop like the Roxy, but it is so much more. And even if you’re completely starving, I guarantee you can get enough food here in a single lunch to feed a small family. Read more »

I was wandering way down in the FiDi yesterday and spotted a truck called Cook House parked on Hanover at Water. A guy out front was handing out samples of (wait for it) vegan empanadas. Oh yeah, did I mention they serve “Latin Vegan food”?  Check out the menu after the jump. Read more »

Midtown workers shouldn’t have all the fun, so to even the score, I’ve brought on Daniel Krieger as an official Downtown Lunch Correspondent to write up some of the tasty stuff you can get in the lower half of Manhattan. He’s a great photographer (ensuring good food porn), but more importantly he is a lover of cheap, unique and delicious eats (or as I like to call it- Midtown Lunch’ish food.) This week Daniel hits up the Downtown location of a place we are all familiar with in Midtown: Sophie’s Cuban.

Sometimes all ya gotta do is ask. I have to admit that I’ve been quite jealous the past month or so, watching all these great new sandwiches go through the pages of Midtown Lunch. That duck pastrami sandwich made me insanely jealous and then when I saw the Pernil with a Twist, I knew I had to do something. I called up the downtown location of Sophie’s Cuban and asked if they made it… to which they obviously had no clue because Downtown gets no love!

That was about to change.

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Midtown workers shouldn’t have all the fun, so to even the score, I’ve brought on Daniel Krieger as an official Downtown Lunch Correspondent to write up some of the tasty stuff you can get in the lower half of Manhattan. He’s a great photographer (ensuring good food porn), but more importantly he is a lover of cheap, unique and delicious eats (or as I like to call it- Midtown Lunch’ish food.)

About a month ago I was at a party in Brooklyn (represent!) and a guest from the East Village picked up a huge bag of empanadas from the East Village location of Ruben’s Empanadas. I was skeptical at first thinking they were going to taste more like fast food empanadas (aka Hot Pockets), but figured I would give them a shot. After warming them up in the oven we added them to our impromptu dinner party and I tried two different kinds. I particularly remember the spinach and tofu one with whole wheat crust. It was a perfect blend of a crunchy/doughy crust and had a nice heavy mixture of spinach and tofu on the inside. Damn they were good.

I’m always hesitant when a restaurant claims “authentic” or “original” or “best”

I remembered all this after the Empanada Joe hooplah earlier this week and decided to head out to one of Ruben’s six downtown locations for lunch.

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Midtown workers shouldn’t have all the fun, so to even the score, I’ve brought on Daniel Krieger as an official Downtown Lunch Correspondent to write up some of the tasty stuff you can get in the lower half of Manhattan. He’s a great photographer (ensuring good food porn), but more importantly he is a lover of cheap, unique and delicious eats (or as I like to call it- Midtown Lunch’ish food.)

La Nueva Conquista Restaurant has been in the same spot for 50 years and although ownership has changed hands over that time, the food and atmosphere have stayed pretty much the same. And almost as important, the prices have held steady as well.

Located on Lafayette street near the corner of Broome, you will find a long ass line during lunchtime containing mostly a latino population. When I first moved to NYC I lived in Washington Heights for 4 years and got quite sick of eating the same food all the time, as back then there wasn’t much variety uptown (not sure how much the hood has changed since I left). On occasion though, I get that craving of a hearty meal of yellow rice and beans; the kinda lunch that sticks to your ribs.

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