Midtown Lunch

Erik from the website Fancy Fast Food visited the Miss Softee truck on Wednesday to fancify some soft serve, and the whole thing was caught on video.  I don’t know if turning ice cream into chocolate mousse is as impressive as turning McNuggets into Chicken Confit… but the video is still awesome to watch.  You get a “tour” of the truck, plus get to hear Miss Softee’s favorite pick up lines.  Spoiler: Covering her in food from the truck is a common theme.

Check out the video after the jump…

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• The Toasties replacing Rosen’s Deli has finally opened [Midtown Eating]
• $4/lb lobsters are back at Stew Leonards [Eating Outside Midtown]
• Any good Udon noodles from a deli in Midtown West? [Midtown Eating]
• Tulcingo del Valle makes an excellent torta [Midtown Eating]
• Looking for a Midtown Lunch spot that serves breakfast [Midtown Eating]

I can’t even imagine how angry that Greek hot dog vendor must have been today watching you guys clean out the El Rey Del Sabor cart on 43rd & 6th.  According to comments, by 12:45 they were out of tamales, by 1:30 “all they had left was cheese.  They did say that someone was supposed to be bringing more food but wasn’t there yet.”  You people know they have two other carts in Midtown, right? One on 60th & 3rd, and another on 49th & 3rd.

…the very first Profiled Midtown Lunch’er ever (Harry from The Brooklyn Kitchen) is teaming up with butcher extraordinaire Tom Mylan to open a “a food dork megaplex [and butcher shop] on the north side of Williamsburg.” Brooklyn Based broke the news this morning, and the blogs went so crazy… I… well… felt a little left out, and wanted to show how excited I am for the news. They’re good friends of Midtown Lunch, and if you love good food (and meat), which I know you do, you should be as excited as I am. Can’t wait until the opening in October? Tom & the Crew will be hosting a bbq and campout at the Queens Farm this weekend. Smoked beer can chicken, cobbler, and all the Brooklyn Brewery beer you can drink, plus biscuits and gravy in the morning and a Van Halen coverband. How can you not?!? Ticket info is here. We now return to you to your regular scheduled programing… “Fat Man in Midtown Getting Fatter” followed by “Vendor Wars: The How to Caulk Large Concrete Fixtures Episode”.

Photo: Tom Mylan’s butchering class at the Brooklyn Kitchen

It might surprise you to hear me say this, but being forced to work in such a tourist driven part of New York City is not always a bad thing. Sure, a glut of fat mid-westerners means that Midtown will never have a shortage of TGI Friday’s, Sbarro’s and shrimp restaurants based on Tom Hanks movies. But an abundance of Japanese tourists and businesspeople create the same, albeit more positive, effect:  Midtown is full of authentic Japanese food-  and I’m not talking about sushi.  I’m talking authentic kaiseki meals at places like Hakubai (in the Kitano Hotel), ramen at places like Menchanko Tei, amazing izakayas (after work drinking and eating spots) like Sake Bar Hagi, and the grill-centric Yakitori Totto, and its two sister spots Yakitori Torys and Aburiya Kinnosuke.

Traditionally yakitori (and the izakaya that often serve it) has always been an after work or late night snack type of thing, to accompany drinking, so it made sense that these places wouldn’t be open for lunch.  Of course this is America, and my desire for meat on a stick knows no cultural boundaries!  Many of us who work in Midtown have always lamented that these places weren’t open for lunch… and as a business owner, what’s more important?  Authenticity, or paying the rent?

So, you can imagine my excitement when Yakitori Totto announced last month that they were now open for lunch. But Totto is not cheap-a single skewer costs $3+ at dinner time- and even though I had begged for this moment I secretly knew that it probably wouldn’t be cheap enough to quality as a true Midtown Lunch.

Yesterday, I walked over to 55th btw. B’way+8th for the moment of truth.

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If there was any doubt the building had nothing to do with the shoddily installed planters that blocked the El Rey Del Sabor cart from parking on 43rd and 6th the other day, they were erased yesterday. Lunch’er Jeff sends in this update:

Walked real fast near where the El Sabor/Greek Hotdog Lady battle went down… bad news, didn’t see the El Sabor cart but good news some maintenance men were out there working hard to move the planters. Can’t be 100% what the situation was but they definitely were chopping off and cracking the cement that glued them down… and they were definitely lifting the planter boxes to move them around a bit.

Another comment confirmed that they were completely gone by 3pm. So… one would think that would clear the way for the return of the El Rey Del Sabor cart today! If you’re on the scene, let us know if they’re there serving up tacos and enchiladas.

UPDATE: From the comments… “They’re back again today!” The cart, not the planters…

Related:
The Latest Weapon in the Vendor Wars is… Sidewalk Planters!?

A new cart popped up this morning on 52nd & 6th, and Lunch’er Yasmin sent in this report: “I was getting my daily fruit smoothie this morning when I noticed a new cart had been set up directly next to the smoothie truck on NW corner of 52nd and 6th. This DEFINITELY wont appeal to you, but might appeal to your vegetarian readers, or those on diets. Here are some crappy phone pictures…”

I was in the area when Yasmin emailed the photos, so I decided to swing by this new cart and found a “scene” that at this point should surprise nobody.

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