Midtown Lunch

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.

Rudy’s bar has been keeping busy this summer. They’ve given the booths a fresh layer of duct tape, started serving chicken and chili, and began renovations to their backyard. Some might recall last year that the Department of Buildings threatened to shut them down due to fire and safety issues regarding their space. However, The Pig abides and construction is in full gear out back.

Check out the progress and their new drink deal after the jump!

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Earlier this week Gothamist reported that the Department of Health has relaxed restrictions on allowing roasted meats to rest in a window of your shop exposed in the open (heaven forbid!)    Does this mean the proper roast pork and roast duck will finally return to the window of Ying Du (on 38th btw. 7+8th)?  It hasn’t yet, but we are holding out hope!

Related:
Ying Du’s Roaster Ruined by the DOH?
Ying Du Reopens Minus Their Roast Pork/Duck Station

Just a friendly reminder for those who aren’t using Midtown Lunch to its full potential… you can follow a ton of Midtown Lunch spots on Twitter yourself, or you can make it easy and use the Midtown Lunch Twitter Tracker.  You might have noticed on most days, just before Noon, we remind you about it. But the ML Twitter Tracker is available all the time via a link on the right hand side bar.  It conveniently shows you an up to date stream of what all the Midtown Lunch spots on Twitter (not just trucks and carts) are saying- and the best part is, it’s not effected by your work’s ban on Twitter.  On the Midtown Lunch Twitter Tracker today… Treats Truck is on 45th, Joyride is on 52nd, Rickshaw is on 45th, Frites N Meats is on 48th, Schnitzel is on 52nd, Street Sweets will be on Park after 11am, Wafels & Dinges is on 52nd, Crisp is offering a coupon, Papa Perrone is on 55th, Jamaican Dutchy is closed, and Maoz will not open until 1pm for maintenance.  But, as always, you’ll want to check the Twitter Tracker yourself before heading out to see if anything has been added since we posted this… enjoy!

We have to admit, last Friday when Cer Te (on 55th btw. 5+6th) twittered this photo and called it “Surf & Turf” we thought they were just joking… nope. It’s a real special, and they’re offering it again today. $11 gets you half a sirloin wrap and half of a lobster roll wrap, take out only.  Sure it’s $1 over the ML price range… but how can we complain when lobster and steak is involved?

Now that Downtown has its very own section of the site, what are we going to post on Fridays at 10am? Answer… how about a new column devoted to those lunches just south of the ML boundaries. Every week we’ll post about a lunch in Murray Hill south, Gramercy, Flatiron, and everything in between… or to make it easy: Flatiron Lunch.

We’ve seen Sagaponack‘s kalbi tacos here on Flatiron Lunch, Chris wrote about the new options at Bann Next Door this week and the new Koreatown Bon Chon has bulgogi tacos on their entree list (although they aren’t serving them yet). So, maybe it shouldn’t be that surprising to walk into New York Bakery and find Koreans selling Mexican food.

Just blocks away from Koreatown, surrounded by flower shops and wholesale stores, New York Bakery is a tiny shop run by a Korean couple that caters to the local latino workers, taking orders and greeting customers in fluent Spanish. I later found out that Danny checked it out last year and found myself even more intrigued.

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Passing by the bustling 49th & 6th street corner today, I was somewhat shocked to see that the Bulgogi & Kimchi cart (on 49th btw. 6+7th), an old favorite of mine, had undergone a trio of changes. It’s no secret that Koreans are enamored by the idea of cosmetic surgery and fittingly this week, the Bulgogi & Kimchi cart, perhaps channeling their inner K-pop star, seriously upgraded its façade. At the same time, they’ve decided to change their name to “Bapcha”, which literally translates to “Food Cart” in Korean, and is now boldly displayed in an unmistakable medium weight Helvetica.

But the most relevant change for lunch’ers, is a $1 bump in some of the prices, as well as a small menu shuffle. Check out the new menu prices after the jump.

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• Today, the Cafe Duke on 51st had bulgogi burritos!? [Midtown Eating]
• Not taking their own coupons is another reason PAX sucks… [Midtown Eating]
• The Rock Center Bill’s Bar & Burger is opening in two weeks? [Midtown Eating]
• Can we talk about under $6 lunches again? [Midtown Eating]

This is a bummer… The Bon Appetit Cafe, the awesome pop up event that brings famous chefs to our area for one week in September to make $10 lunches for the workers of Midtown,  is becoming part of Fashion Week (booo!) and moving out of the ML boundaries.  This year the cafe will pop up September 12-16th in Lincoln Center (on 64th and Columbus.)  The line up of chefs looks as good as previous years (Michael White, Bill Telepan, Emeril, Cat Cora, etc.) but 64th Street!?  That hurts…

Related:
2009: Your First Look at the Bon Appetit Supper Club and Pop Up Cafe
2008: Lunch at the Bon Appetit Pop Up Cafe
2007: Emeril, Giada, Govind, Cat Cora, Pichet and more serve up lunch for under $10 in Midtown!

Terrible new for fans of the Little Morocco Cart, the popular street meat cart discovered a year ago this month on 39th and 7th. Lunch’er “Joan” tipped us off that the cart was missing today, replaced by a regular, run-of-the-mill street meat cart. Earlier this summer, Jeremiah discovered they took off fish and kofta from their menu due to lack of demand. Could the overall demand for their food be down as well? Let’s hope not!  Anybody have any more info?  Let us know in the comments…