Midtown Lunch

Paying for Indian food by the pound always seemed like a losing proposition to me, so I wasn’t exactly surprised to see the gates down on Kashmir Express Friday (on 8th Ave. btw. 39+40th.) They were closed temporarily by the DOH last year, and last week’s closing could be temporary as well- but to me this looks a little more permanent. Thankfully the all you can eat Kashmir Buffet (in the basement of “The Cave” next door) is still open. I’m a fan of the food… just not paying what it weighs.

Related:
Adventure Lunchers Should Flock to Kashmir Buffet
Kashmir Offers Up More Creative DOH Cover Ups

I like the sweet stuff just as much as the next guy, but desserts are not exactly my area of expertise. I tried the chocolate chip cookie from the Street Sweets Truck, and thought it was fine, but for a comprehensive look at their offerings I decided to turn to Kathy YL Chan, our resident coffee, sweets, and Hawaiian food expert here on Midtown Lunch (she’s also the blogger behind A Passion for Food.) She “sacrificed” herself by trying a good number of the Street Sweets Truck offerings, and filed this Top 5.

First the Treats Truck, then Dessert Truck, Wafels & Dinges, and now the Street Sweets Truck (followed by the Big Gay Ice Cream Truck). It would be easily to shake one’s head at the severe overflow of baked good and dessert oriented trucks in the city, but as far as I’m concerned (from a consumer perspective) the more, the merrier.

Unlike the other aforementioned trucks, Street Sweets Truck sets itself apart by being tied to a stone and mortar bakery in Brooklyn, One Girl Cookies. One Girl Cookies bakes a good number (but not all) of the products sold at the SS truck, including a selection of One Girl Cookies and some goods exclusively made for for SST.

I sampled my way around a good portion of their products, and while nothing is “the best of its kind”, as a whole SST is a notch above Treats Truck, the most comparable of moving dessert vehicles in town. Below, the top five to note for your next SST visit.

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I don’t usually eat lunch in Midtown on the weekends (why would you!?!), but occasionally it will happen.  Like on Saturday when I found myself in Koreatown buying ingredients to make homemade kimchi.  I stopped in to pick up a little lunch at Woorijip (on 32nd btw. B’way+5th) and noticed something I had never seen before: korean blood sausage (or soondae.)  Nice.  It was in the refrigerated section in the back, so it wasn’t as good as it would have been had it been warm (I don’t like microwaving things) but the flavor was still good.  Made with cellophane noodles, the blood flavor was actually pretty mild (overwhelmed a bit by the intense garlic flavor.)  I’m guessing there are much better versions of this to be had on 32nd street, but all in all it was a fun treat, and not nearly as offal tasting as you would expect.

Related:
Woorijip Gets a Makeover, Still the Best Cheap Korean on 32nd

Following in the footsteps of HB Burger, who extended their $10 Midtown Lunch special through this week, the Burger Joint in the Parker Meridien is offering their own early bird lunch special via twitter: “7/20/09 thru 7/23/09 11:00AM -11:45AM.For $10 bucks you get a burger or cheeseburger, fries & a soda. Ask for ‘Twitter PKG’ when you order.” You know, because it isn’t bad enough that there’s a long line every day in there starting at noon… they want the lines to start at 11am! Follow the Burger Joint for yourself on twitter, or on the Midtown Lunch Twitter Tracker>>

Photos Courtesy of OC Mexican Food Blog

It looks like the battle between Baja Fresh and LA’s Kogi BBQ truck is just starting to heat up.  A quick recap for those who haven’t been following it closely… at the end of last month the OC Mexican food blog first reported that Baja Fresh had added “Kogi Tacos” to one of their locations in Irvine, CA, a seemingly blatant rip off of the LA Korean taco truck with the same name.  Readers were outraged, although some commenters on various blogs pointed out that “kogi” is just the Korean term for “meat”, so it’s probably legal.  On Thursday, NRN confirmed that Baja Fresh was in fact going ahead with their Kogi named line of Korean tacos, although the owners of the NYC Baja Fresh said it wasn’t going to be coming to New York.  (And in a double whammy, neither is the Kogi BBQ Truck we were promised a few months ago!)  Well, the Wall Street Journal blog is the latest to chime in, shining some added light on the legality of the name, and whether or not Baja Fresh can use it:

[Baja Fresh] chose to call the dish “kogi” because that is a transliteration of the Korean word for meat. Although it says now a Korean-language expert is investigating whether “gogi” might be a more accurate spelling and if Baja should use that instead.

“It speaks to our non-desire to rip off the Kogi name,” Mr. Rink says. Research and development staff from the chain did sample the tacos at the Kogi truck, but didn’t copy the recipe, Mr. Rink says. It created its own Korean taco using steak and chicken.”

So it seems like the word “kogi” is not really the commonly used phonetic spelling of “meat” that we thought it was.  Which begs the question… doesn’t the Kogi BBQ Truck have a trademark!?!

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Asking your kid to hold your Tim Hortons Iced Cappuccino = Bad Idea

• SMP 2 Winner Kwik Meal included in this look at the country’s best street food [Forbes Traveler]
• Tuesday there’s 2 for 1 beers at House of Brews [Eater]
• Joe The Art of Coffee has a mighty fine chocolate chip cookie [Blondie and Brownie]
• The Southwest Porch will now be serving food and drinks during lunchtime everyday [Grub Street]
• You will be seeing a lot more 7-11 locations very soon [Gothamist]
• James Boo decides he likes Kati Roll better than the Biriyani Cart [Eaten Path]
• Katsuhama’s lunch special is “not bad for $11, eh?” [A Passion For Food]
• A Restaurant Twitter Tracker! What a great idea… [Wined and Dined]
• Where do street vendors get their eclectic collection of cups? [City Room]

If you like to eat, chances are you like to drink (read: a lot of you are freakin’ lushes), so I thought maybe it was time to introduce a happy hour column to the site. Every week, our Happy Hour Correspondent “Mamacita” will post about a different bar in Midtown that fits the Midtown Lunch mentality: unhealthy food, not lame (unless it’s lame in a cool way), and most importantly… cheap. This week she hits up Wakamba, a dive bar that should be right up her alley.  Only it wasn’t…

The Distinguished Wakamba Cocktail Lounge cemented its roots in the seamy stretch of 8th Avenue when in 2000 an unarmed Brooklyn man was shot and killed in a fracas with three undercover narcotics detectives on the bar’s doorsteps. This is now the unsavory reputation that has publicly followed Wakamba, but this is not the reason tourists or professional don’t want to be caught dead there (no pun intended).

You see at first look Wakamba has all the makings of a great dive. It has a memorable and quirky name (it’s distinguished after all), plus a Hawaiian meets nautical theme. It’s fully equipped with fish netting, Hawaiian leis, bamboo, paper lanterns, life savers, plastic fish and flowers. It even has a small Catholic altar perched on the side of the front windows, Mets and Yankees jerseys, and a ceiling that looks like the dingy whipped peaks of a frosted cake.

Sounds awesome right?

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You know the gross (and somewhat embarrassing) photo I post of all my lunches at the end of the year?  Inexplicably, Photo Magazine’s new food issue (August 2009, in stores now) thinks it’s “hypnotic” and “sublime”.  “All those beige carbs and and lunch meats form a compelling quilt of everyday eating.” [via Eat Me Daily]

The Serious Eats New York crew hit up the newly opened Mantao Chinese Sandwiches (on 53rd btw. 2+3rd) the other day and posted a pretty comprehensive (and attractive, thanks to the photos of Robyn Lee) look at their offerings:

The sandwiches range from $2.50 to $4.50. They’re dainty things—you’d probably want two for a meal, although one makes a nice snack. The soft and fluffy sesame seed-topped bread is the best part about the sandwiches. The fillings, while not bad, are less memorable (right now, at least; hopefully they’ll improve with time).

From the sound of things I think these guys need a little more time before being subjected to the Midtown Lunch +/-

Related:
Mantao Sandwiches “Official” Opening is Today