Midtown Lunch

I can’t even tell you how many times in the last couple of years I’ve devoured every bite of my Downtown Lunch and immediately regretted that decision as the food coma crept up on me. Last Friday was one of those days. After learning that the awaited Saluggi’s Sandwich Shop – an offshoot of pizza shop Saluggi’s a couple doors away – was finally open in the old Sea World space at Church St. & Lispenard, I headed up to order myself a deli sandwich and some waffle fries.

Read more »

Pane Panelle opened last September as a sandwich counter offshoot of the nicer Italian restaurant Stuzzicheria on Church St. (at Walker). Then the whole restaurant became a bit more casual and although the separate entrance for sandwiches remain, the day I went there you had to order yours at the bar so the restaurant and sandwich shop seem to have absorbed each other. The sandwiches were tasty enough, but the size-to-price ratio seemed to be skewed the wrong way and I haven’t been back since then. The other day I was in the area and the place I intended to eat at wasn’t open so instead I headed over to Pane Panelle to give them a second shot and see if the sandwiches had changed since that opening visit.

Read more »

Once the temperatures hit 80 degrees or higher, my lunchtime thoughts turn from lamb over rice to what I can eat that won’t make me feel even hotter and disgusting. I guess eating ice cream for lunch everyday isn’t a feasible option, but a sandwich with cold ingredients is. Zucker’s Bagels on Chambers St. (btw. W. Broadway & Greenwich) is one of those places that’s  little off the radar come lunch time, but wouldn’t you know they have a lot of sandwich options involving smoked fish, and some of them are less than $10. When the heat got to me late last week I headed over for some gravlax eaten between bagel halves. Read more »

There are days that some specific food sounds really good, and it becomes a mission to find exactly what I’m craving. The other day this happened and it was falafel that sounded good, but I also wanted to go for a little bit of a walk since it wasn’t raining outside for once. Baba Ghanouge popped into my head because I remembered a sign in their window for a $3.99 falafel sandwich. When I took a glance at the menu, though, something else caught my eye: The man-ushi sandwich section. How had I missed this before?

Read more »

There are two new restaurants in the city serving food from the Yunnan region of China, and one of them happens to be in Tribeca. Lotus Blue opened on Reade St. (at W. Broadway) to little fanfare and I initially dismissed it because there wasn’t anything on the dinner menu for $10 or less. When I looked at the lunch menu, though, I was happy to see three items within our cheap budget including a smoked tofu with rice dish and two different kinds of buns. The latter sounded the most intriguing and I think you’ll want to check these out if you work nearby.

Read more »

There are now two cheap eats spots on a grimy stretch of Canal St., with a branch of $1 pizza spot Roll And Go and the recent addition of Black Burger right next to each other at the corner of West Broadway. Both places were clogged with high school students and because Black Burger is little more than a counter with a couple of stools for eating, it doesn’t take much for the line to stretch out the door. Inside, you’ll find a simple menu of either single or double hamburgers or cheeseburgers (fresh, never frozen!), fries and shakes with a grilled cheese and calamari fries thrown in for good measure. And beware the warning on the wall: “Once you go Black, you never go back.”

Read more »

Tribeca isn’t exactly teeming with crappy Chinese takeout restaurants, although if you want a slightly alarming by-the-pound buffet experience, that can be had. A generic deli on Chambers St. (btw. Broadway & Church) with a buffet morphed into Sunny One restaurant recently and a look at their menu showed that they have a pretty sweet lunch special for $6. You not only get to choose from a wide array of Americanized Chinese dishes, but you get rice (fried or plain), and your choice of soup or a soda. Another bonus is it’s not scooped off a steam table, but made to order. I was sold. Read more »