Midtown Lunch

As is customary at Philly Lunch, every Tuesday we turn over the site to a different lunch’er for his or her recommendations for the best lunch in Philadelphia. This week it’s Hawk, from Drawing for Food. I absolutely love his hot dog drawings, sooo cute! I am seriously considering a print for my bedroom. Hawk’s loves include durian popsicles (really?) but he dislikes artichokes (boo!).

Name: Hawk

Age: 32

Occupation: Illustrator

Where in Philly do you Work?: Center City West / Graduate Hospital

Favorite Kind of Food: Sandwiches of all kinds. Hoagies, cheesesteaks (whiz), roast pork, braised tripe with longhots from 9th street, tortas, cubans, puerto rican pressed sandwiches filled with shredded pork. Jewish Deli sandwiches, po boys. Real BBQ and southern food, fried chicken. Pretty much anything pickled, smoked or cured. Indonesian, Vietnamese, Szechuan tongue & tripe salad. Durian popsicles. Meatballs. Tomato Pie. Frisee salad, anything with an egg on top. Creamed chipped beef on toast. Biscuits & Gravy.

Least Favorite Kind of Food: artichokes, muenster cheese, cupcakes

Favorite Place(s) to Eat Lunch in Philly: Savoy (now Mexico On The Square) tacos; Little Pete’s Reuben, Hot sausage w / pepper hash from 25th & Passyunk truck, Cheesesteak from Philips (24th & Passyunk), Hoagie from Cosmi’s, Fried Green tomato and bacon hoagie at Chickie’s, Pretzel Dog from Reading Terminal. RTM in general is just a great place for lunch in Philly, at one point I ate there 2 or 3 times a week. Everybody loves Dinic’s and I have to agree, roast pork, pulled pork, they are all terrific. There’s another Dinic’s in the Navy Yard, great breakfast sandwiches and amazing chicken cutlet. Anything from LaRosa Pizza on Broad & Snyder. Fish cake combo at Moe’s Hot Dogs on Washington or Gus’s cart on 5th & South. Anything from Village Whiskey, or pretty much any Garces restaurant. Fried Oysters with Chicken Salad at Sansom Oyster House is out of this world. Also Su Xing House near 15th & Sansom, awesome vegetarian Chinese, for maybe 5 or 6 dollars you get the whole 9 yards, soup, egg roll, rice, tea, and a giant entree. Their Chinese cabbage (kale or something very close to it) with chilis is terrific.

“Go-To” Lunch Place You and Your Coworkers Eat at Too Often? Lazaros Pizza.

Place you discovered thanks to Philly Lunch (if any) Temple food trucks. I haven’t gotten up there yet but looks like some good stuff going on.

If you could work anywhere (just because of the lunch) where would it be and why? Anything that involved traveling to every city in South America so I could try all the different sandwiches and crazy hot dogs.

Is there anything you’d like to ask the Philly Lunch readers? Please tell me where to get great creamed chip beef on toast in the city. I’ve had amazing SOS in the burbs and further out in Amish country. Hard to find here. Hawthorne’s is pretty damn good, haven’t tried 10arts yet (hope it’s still on the menu) but would love to find a diner that does it really well.

Some local sh*t on a shingle…What about Down Home Diner in RTM?

P.S. I am rather intrigued by that Fried Oyster with Chicken Salad- nice suggestion, Hawk!

If you would like to be next week’s Profiled Philly Lunch’er (or know somebody you’d like to nominate), email me at jamie@midtownlunch.com