Midtown Lunch

When news broke last night that Yankees star Hideki Matsui was headed to the Dodgers Angels, Midtown Lunch’ers took to twitter with the most obvious question… “What will this mean for Go Go Curry!”  The fast food Japanese curry house has always been a shrine to #55, most recently reveling in his World Series MVP honor.  So… what *does* this mean for Go Go Curry?  Can we expect an Echo Park Anaheim branch of GGC to open in the next few months?  The owner, Mr. Miyamori, released a statement this morning:

“Since GO GO CURRY was hoping that Matsui stays with New York Yankees, we are very disappointed. However, no matter where Matsui goes, I know our hero Matsui does a great job and no matter which baseball team he goes, we keep supporting Matsui for 100%.”

But what about the free stuff!

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• Now that Diamond Dairy is gone, where do you latke? [Midtown Eating]
• Looking for some Downtown soup action [Downtown Eating]
• Bistro 51 makes chicken pot pie soup.  Anybody else? [Midtown Eating]
• Is there a such thing as vegetarian pho? [Eating Outside Midtown]

I was pretty freakin’ bummed when Arang (on 32nd btw. B’way+5th) closed down their Korean/Japanese all you can eat lunch buffet. They reopened for lunch a few months ago (sans buffet), and Ultrayclay is reporting that their lunch specials are not only good, but most are under $10.

Bummer! The newly rennovated Chicken House (on 36th btw. 7+8th) didn’t reopen today as expected. They’re ready to go, but are still waiting for the final permits to be approved. They hope to be open next week…

Our Happy Hour Correspondent “Mamacita” isn’t all alcohol all the time.  She also enjoys her street meat… so when she told me that she had a great chicken and lamb over rice plate from La Baguette Truck (a strangely named halal truck that I’ve walked by many times, but never pulled the trigger on), I told her to her write it up for everyone to enjoy!  Here’s her report…

Every once in a while you find yourself in midtown after dark and seek the comfort of a reliable street cart for dinner. I was in Bryant Park recently on the first cold night of December and my initial thought was that of the cart on 40th St. & Broadway, the 3rd place winner of Street Meat Palooza 1. Unfortunately I found it’s only a daytime cart, so after I got there I reluctantly looked towards the truck that I’ve seen for years on the opposite side of the street. It’s called “La Baguette Cafe,” and has a Parisian motif but with a typical Halal menu. I was hungry so I figured after all these years I’d finally bite the bullet and check it out. Of course I went with the ML staple: chicken and lamb over rice… but I was surprised by what I got for $5.50.

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This week’s issue of New York Magazine tackles the timely issue of “Best Soups in New York” naming what they think are the city’s 50 tastiest. A few soups were mentioned that would be worthy of Midtown Lunch’ing, including the sul long tang from Gahm Mi Oak, the tan tan ramen from Men Kui Tei (I guess I chose wrong last week), and the kharcho from Taam Tov. And a bunch more were mentioned if you don’t mind splurging or going a few blocks out of bounds… like the chicken soup from Ma Peche, the Alsatian beer soup in the Bar Room at the Modern, the oyster pan roast at the Grand Central Oyster Bar, and the hot yogurt soup from Sip Sak. Check out the complete list here>>

Chipotle… Qdoba… Baja Fresh… and now this.  Signage has gone up next to Yushi, on 47th btw. Park+Lex, for a new place called Oaxaca (Wa Ha Ka) Mexican Grill.  I can’t seem to find much about this place online, although it may or may not have a location in San Francisco.  There is a website, and they already have Facebook and Twitter accounts (natch), but none of them have any useful info.  Oaxaca is known for their various moles, and grasshopper tacos- although I’m not holding out hope that some new Midtown fast food chain is bringing the real deal for less than $10.  Anybody heard of this place before?  Info is welcome in the comments…  in the meantime, the rest of us will just sit here mildly interested. (Thanks to Lunch’er “Yelena” for the photo.)