Midtown Lunch

5 Guys did a stellar job providing burgers on the cheap for the Market East area. When it closed, another burger spot, the semi chain Bareburger,  stepped in to ensure burger cravings would still be taken care of. Unlike 5 Guys, burgers are all over $10 (except the bean burger but that doesn’t count). This made me skeptical. In exchange for your money, Bareburger provides free-range, organic meat of various animals.

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You know I like lunch a lot, but did you also know I like beer a lot? If you follow me on Twitter or Untappd, you may know this. Next week (Oct 22), the East Passyunk Ave District is putting on a fun beer crawl for the 5th year in a row from 5:30-9:30pm . Tickets are on sale now for $6.66, which gets you access to $3 craft beers at 13 different bars, access to special firkins, a witch hat, and a Witch CRAFT stamp card (5 stamps enters you into a raffle for lots of prizes). Costumes are encouraged, with prizes for the best ones. Almost as tempting as $3 craft beers all night- NOORD eetcafe  will have an outdoor Bitterballen (a meatball croquette) stand.

Get yourself a pair of free tickets (and use the money to buy 2 extra beers for each of you) here by posting your favorite beer in the comments. (Winner picked on Monday)

21 and over, naturally. And although I don’t look a day over 19, I am legal to drink and plan on doing so on East Passyunk Avenue on the 22nd.

I was told I was too early  and the food wasn’t ready at  the new Vietnamese place in that weird food court that exists in the basement of the Bellevue.  In my sulk, I went in a completely different direction for my (early) lunch time hunger, Italian from Soprano’s. I hadn’t really noticed Soprano’s before, it very well could be newer to the basement space, who knows what goes on down there.

The sandwich list cheered me up a bit- an Italian hoagie, mozz and prosciutto, meatballs, roast pork, and all that comforting Italian jazz that works in between bread.

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• A brie french dip sandwich must just be the incentive I need to get me in to Diamond Row’s Coco’s [Zagat]
• Filling fish tacos, but “not phenomenal” crabcakes from Chef Johnny Bravos [Philly Lunch Hour]
• Foobooz/Philly Mag have put together some roundups of ethnic eats around the city  including African, Latin American, Middle Eastern, and Russian. Hey, I thought that was my thing! Just kidding, these are great lists! Don’t forget, you can always play around with Midtown Lunch categories to find pictures and reviews. I cover: African, Afghani, Burmese, Cambodian, Caribbean, Central American, Chinese, Dominican, French, German, Greek, Haitian, Indian, Indonesian, Italian, Jamaican, Japanese, Korean, Malaysian, Mediterranean, Mexican, Middle Eastern, Moldovian, Pakistani, Peruvian, Polish, Puerto Rican, Russian, Southern, Taiwanese, Thai, Trinidadian, Turkish, Uzbeki, Venezuelan, and Vietnamese

When AmeriThai opened in South Philly, I was perplexed by the menu; cheap curry and Thai noodles, but also hot dogs, cheesesteaks, and turkey sandwiches. For my inaugural trip, I stuck to the Thai section of the menu.

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Last week, I snuck away and took a solo expedition to Mexico City. Besides seeing the sites and drinking mezcal, my main goal was sampling the street food.

This first picture was taken before I bit in to my very first Mexican taco. It was made in Mercado de la Merced, a gigantic semi-covered market with everything from clothes, vegetables, and Halloween costumes, to live animals, and lots of food stalls. The taco man, probably seeing my excitement, asked to take a picture with me, so I too captured the happy, anticipatory pre taco moment on my camera.  Pictures of that taco, and much much more after the jump…

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• Blue Duck Sandwich Co is opening in NorthEast Philly with a$10  signature duck confit and chard sandwich and, general tso’s wings, and duck mac and cheese [The Insider]
• College kids like the Roman style pizza at High Street [Penn Appetit]
• And Sicilian style pizza is coming to Queen Village to replace Blue Belly BBQ [The Insider]
• What a 7 week Olive Garden binge looks like [Eater]