Midtown Lunch

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.)

Fuleen Seafood is located on Division street, in the heart of Chinatown. Upon entering you’ll usually find the place packed- people love the food here, from the locals to the adventurous tourist. I used to eat here every once in awhile because I loved the chicken curry… that and a few of the shrimp dishes. They have 70 lunch specials for $5.50. I think if the price has changed in the past few years it’s only gone up 50 cents or so.

For lunch you get an extremely generous serving of your main dish, rice, and the complimentary “house” soup. I always try to eat the soup (it’s free after all), but I just can’t get myself to like it. It has a very potent taste and a bit of rank odor if you ask me. I believe when I asked about it they said there was pork, vegetables, and a cantonese herb called Harbor? Never heard of it… and I probably misunderstood. Maybe she was just saying “herbs”??

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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.)  I don’t know what’s up with Daniel lately.  Last week he wrote about a salad (shameful) and this week he’s found an $11 burger.  You know how I feel about lunch that costs more than $10.  This better be good…

My encyclopedic girlfriend said I will lack context if I don’t mention the history of Jerry Joseph–the pioneer behind Jerry’s Cafe, a newly reopened Tribeca restaurant dealing in comfort food. I didn’t know the background story of this early Soho settler, but read all about him with a quick google search.

So I no longer lack context now… just tact, basic personal hygiene, and friends (any applicants?).

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Every Friday we check in with Daniel Krieger for a column called “Downtown Lunch”. After all, why should we Midtowners have all the fun? Daniel’s column is a chance to make us jealous of what office workers are eating in the lower half of the island. This week, Daniel is home sick- so I’m taking over! Which works out, because this week I have jury duty… and despite reading Daniel’s column every Friday, nothing works better to create jealousy than spending two days “working” a few blocks away from Chinatown. (The photos won’t be as good, but the eatin’ was mighty fine.)

When I first posted about my jury duty, you guys came through with a ton of great recommendations near the courthouse (I was summoned to 111 Court Street.) Cheap sit down restaurants, great dim sum (my favorite), and bakeries (can’t forget the bakeries!) Some even suggested I go south, into the true heart of Downtown Lunch’ing. But naturally, the pull of Chinatown was just too much to resist, and in true Midtown Lunch fashion I shunned the close recommendations for something that required a few minutes of walking for a big time (and borderline scary) payoff. Tripe from a cart. 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.)

I chipped my tooth on a bagel I bought from Fairway earlier this week. The bagel was a little bit stale but I didn’t actually chip it on the bagel, it was the action of my bite missing the bagel and crunching my teeth together. Cosmetically you can’t see anything and I’m still handsome as the devil but I can feel a little rough patch when I run my tooth over it.

What does this have to do with pizza? Nothing. I just like to up date you guys as to how I’m doing. Ok now for the post. 

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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 (insuring 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.)

With the closing of May May (formerly located at the end of Pell street) I was left with a hole in my heart (but more-so in my stomach) for tasty cheap finger foods in Chinatown. Luckily there are still like 20 places you can purchase these tasty cheap eats (but May May was pretty damn good). Sanur Restaurant serves Malaysian/Indonesian food in a cubbie hole near the corner of Doyers street in Chinatown, probably my favorite street in all of NYC. You can get a cheap breakfast, lunch, or just snack on one of the curry puffs, a crunchy fried fold of dough filled with a perfectly spiced chicken/potato/veggie mixture.

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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 (insuring 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.)

Mama’s Eatery is definitely a change of pace for this area of Chinatown. Located across from Columbus park on Mulberry street, Mama Eatery (not sure if they go with Mama as written on the menu or Mama’s as the manager said it) serves up great sandwiches at good prices. The menu features an eclectic range of food, from Pistachio Toast with maple syrup for breakfast, to Pumpkin Soup. I haven’t sampled either though… I go for the sandwiches.    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 (insuring 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.)

Unfortunately I don’t speak Chinese, so I didn’t know the name of the noodle shop on 144 East Broadway which doesn’t have any English words on the front. Fortunately though other parts of my body (nose and tummy) could care less if the words were written in Swahili or Hebrew. The language of love for me this week was found in the narrow quarters of 144 East Broadway, home to good cheap hand pulled noodles and dumplings.  (I found out later alot of people call it Lan Zhou, although that’s really just the region where this style of noodle comes from.)

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