Midtown Lunch

Ok, just had lunch from Boi Noodles and here are my initial thoughts:

1. The Space/service: totally sterile and bland space a la Chipotle. Not a deal-breaker as there are plenty of sterile spots in midtown serving good food (Maoz, Crisp, etc). Perhaps because they just opened it hasn’t been lived in enough but here is a palpable soullessness to the space. As previously stated the line system there is absurdly convoluted and confusing. Even the staff seemed a bit confused/overwhelmed. Confusing ordering system aside the staff did seem pretty friendly with the exception of the very loud and overly-aggressive woman, who I am assuming is either the manager or owner.
2. The Food: I ordered the beef pho to go. At $8 it is definitely over-priced but this isn’t Mott St so I can’t really complain. First offense, and this is a BIG no-no, they didn’t include a side of bean sprouts, basil, lime, etc. Instead the threw a few measly sprouts into the soup itself. This really gets my goat. I like a lot of bean sprouts and basil in my pho not to mention that by the time I got back to my office the few bean sprouts that they did include were pretty limp, robbing the soup of the crunch component. Secondly the noodles were WHACK. They looked like Lipton. The beef was pretty scarce and that’s a good thing as it tasted like perhaps it was cooked last week. The only saving grace of this train wreck of a soup was the broth. Nice balance of fatty beefiness and cinnamon.

My overall impression is that they are young and maybe will get it together after a bit of time. Of course they could also slip quietly into the night of mediocrity that is Midtown dining…