Midtown Lunch

Milanesa Cemita. Photo courtesy of Katie Robbins/Serious Eats

I still haven’t made it through L.A. Magazine’s sandwich list from last year, and here comes some more…  last week Serious Eats posted this great list of 14 sandwiches under $6.  Some are as far west as San Gabriel, and one is in Van Nuys- but there are a bunch right in my lunch’ing wheelhouse (the area between Downtown L.A. and Santa Monica). I’m already a big fan of the churrasco sandwich at Rincon Chileno, and the beef dip at Philippe’s.  But how did I miss the lebni at Falafel Arax!  Also need to try the wada pav at India Sweets and Spices, the basturma from Sahag’s, and the tuna from Larchmont Wine.  But the sandwich that has now vaulted to the top of my wishlist is the milanesa cemita from Angelica’s Cemita Truck on Venice in Culver City. Hot damn that looks good!

Check out the whole list here>>

Being the cheap bastard that I am means not spending more than $10 on lunch.  That’s why I spend so much time sussing out Thai Town, Koreatown, dirty sushi holes, and food trucks.  But I also get excited when an otherwise expensive restaurant provides some kind of Midtown Lunch loophole.  A way for super cheap fatsos to get a “quality” lunch (whatever that means) but still only spend under $10.  You wouldn’t think Bottega Louie, the famously gigantic white marble Italian restaurant with a French patisserie (?) on the corner of 7th and Grand, would fit the bill.  And yet, with some savvy ordering even a fat guy like me can leave satisfied and less than $10 in the hole.

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As you may or may not know I am a big fan of putting fries on gyros, on falafel sandwiches, or in burritos.  So it’s not to hard to imagine that I would also like a sandwich with… say… onion rings on top.  Makes sense, right?  And if I liked french fries and onion rings on a sandwich, it would also stand to reason that chicken fingers or mozzarella sticks would also be a welcome addition.  I didn’t lose you did I?  Because that’s precisely what you get at the grease trucks, a Rutgers institution that has been serving up over the top, appetizer-samplers-as-a-gigantic-sandwich for almost 15 years.  It doesn’t take much of an imagination to know why a chicken finger + mozzarella stick + french fries + marinara sandwich would appeal to a college student at 2 in the morning, but I don’t see why this can’t be enjoyed during daylight hours!

So when I heard that Fat Sal’s in Westwood was serving up their version of the sandwiches you get at the famous Rutgers grease trucks, I was pretty freakin’ excited.

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When I first read that there was a Chilean bakery serving sandwiches on Melrose in East Hollywood I got pretty excited.  Ever since visiting Chile in 2008 I’ve been a big fan of their food.  Mote con huesillos, chorrillana (steak and egg topped french fries), their sandwiches (churrasco FTW!) and their egg and olive filled empanadas de pino will forever be embedded in that part of my brain where good things are stored.  After a bigtime lunch fail a couple of months ago (they’re one of those places that are closed on Mondays!) I finally made it over to Rincon Chileno to see if their sandwiches and empanadas would live up to my fond memories of Chile.

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There seems to be no shortage of newish, fancy pants, $10 sandwich shops in the Beverly Center/Melrose area of Mid City West, and all of them seem to have chosen a non-sandwich item to distinguish themselves from the fray.  Potato Chips is an ok option (although I wish they made their own potato chips), and I’ve always been intrigued by the steak bomb at Soda Pop’s.  But the latest entry into the “are these sandwiches really worth the money” sweepstakes has completely upped the ante.  In fact, they may have won the game by virtue of their name alone: Simplethings Sandwich and Pie Shop.  Because, quite frankly, how can soda or chips compete with pie.  Answer: they don’t.

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There’s no doubt that fusion tacos are the most ubiquitous item found on food trucks these days (thanks for that, Kogi!) but if you were forced to pick a runner up, you wouldn’t be wrong to think banh mi. Nom Nom Truck is undoubtedly the most famous, thanks to their nearly undefeated record on the Food Network’s Great Food Truck Race, and the Phamish Truck was named one of L.A.’s ten best food trucks by Los Angeles Magazine. On paper Mandoline Grill is an easy pick for 3rd place (they’re vegan friendly and don’t even have pate and Vietnamese cold cuts!?!) and yet their grilled pork banh mi might be the best version from a food truck in the city.

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If you work Downtown or on the west side you are probably well aware of how amazing Mendocino Farms is.  What you may not be aware of is that every month they have a different off-the-menu “secret sandwich” that you only find out about if you sign up to receive their emails.  I got on this train months ago, but there hasn’t been a special sandwich yet that sounded good enough to unseat my go to order: the pork belly banh mi.  That is until this month…

Meet “Andrea’s Beef Bourguignon Dip”: Marsala braised short ribs with roasted fall mushrooms, parsnip puree, balsamic onions, sauteed greens, and arugula on toasted ciabatta in jus, served with a horseradish crema.

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