Midtown Lunch

As mentioned in the forums last week, Tri Tip Grill (in the Rockefeller Center Concourse) has recently opened for breakfast, including an egg sandwich featuring their trademark beef. This is great news for people who believe it’s never inappropriate to enjoy some medium-rare red meat. People like me.
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Did you happen to catch last week’s 30 Rock episode, which featured Tracy Jordan trying to convince Jack Donaghy to invest in a new Times Square theme restaurant featuring “unlicensed versions of Japanese monsters battling it out in the dining room”.  Eater posted a clip, and asked if anybody knows where it was filmed. From the looks of it, we’d guess somewhere in the non-restaurant depths of Rock Center.  (It actually looks more like the lobby of 30 Rock than a restaurant.)  This isn’t the first time 30 Rock has delved into ML territory… in Season 1, Kenneth’s church was hidden behind a secret door in the back of Margon (but that wasn’t tough to recognize.) Anybody know the place in last week’s episode?

Burgers made from Pat LaFrieda beef are becoming more and more common in Midtown. It’s long been the calling card of Shake Shack, and recently other burger places like Bill’s Bar & Burger and Schnipper’s have used LaFrieda beef to try to separate themselves from the pack. With so many “burger places” using LaFrieda beef, it wasn’t a total shock when Zagat reported that Bread Factory Cafe (on 8th btw. 55+56th) was now advertising LaFrieda beef, even though Bread Factory is an all purpose, generic Midtown deli (minus the by-the-lb buffet), not a place that specializes in burgers. Clearly this situation warranted further investigation.
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It looks like the Vendy Award winning Biryani Cart (on 46th and 6th) is on a roll. A few weeks ago they got a new logo, and added a few new sensible menu items. After all, if you sell biryani and kati rolls, adding a new curry or dal doesn’t seem too strange. But hot wings!? Yes, you read that right. The Biryani Cart has a brand new cart hitting the streets soon serving their special brand of hot wings and steak and cheese subs. As you can see from the brand new sign they’ll carry four kinds of wings (all deep fried and then sauced) plus I’m guessing some kind of sauce-less option for those who like their wings plain. We’re also hearing that the Philly cheese-steaks will be small (like a hot dog bun) and come two to an order- like their famous Kati Rolls. The cart will be parked on the opposite side of the street (the NW corner of 46th and 6th) and we’re hearing it is less than two weeks away from launching. To say we’re excited for this one would be quite the understatement…

Remember back in January when Street Sweets announced they’d be changing their name? Well, the day has finally arrived.  A winner has been chosen, and the Street Sweets Truck will officially be known known from this day forward as… (drumroll please)…  Sweetery NYC.  Despite being forced to change their name by a similarly named bakery, they assured us that there would be no change whatsoever to their business and they are committed to “more interesting corporate events and give aways, changing & expanding the offerings that appear [on] our menu, and ultimately expanding our business to include other outlets to distribute our products.”  Exciting!  They have also changed their Twitter account to @sweeterynyc (although if you were following @streetsweets you don’t have to do anything… you’re still following their account.)

Related:
Street Sweets Truck Forced to Change Name, Want You To Help (For a $500 Prize!)

Tacos from Korilla BBQ. Photo uploaded to the ML Flickr Pool by CarbZombie.

• It sounds like Taim Mobile had a great first day in Midtown… [Twitter]
• … the wait was short at first, but by the middle of lunch it was over 30 minutes long [The Feast]
• Cool Hunting has created a brooklyn pickle pop up in a Midtown Gap [Grub Street]
• LaFrieda beef spotted at a generic Midtown deli?! [ZagatBuzz]
• A new Bon Chon is coming soon to 2nd Ave. [Grub Street]

If you like to eat, chances are you like to drink (read: a lot of you are freakin’ lushes), so 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.

Yeah, there you are… sitting in your cubical, waiting for the open bar at the holiday party, wishing the canapés are not Costco brand mini quiches and the weird guy from accounting doesn’t corner you into a conversation about how no one properly fills out their reimbursement forms, leaving you thinking, “Good lord, my life is an episode of The Office.” Luckily for you I’m here to help keep your holidays on ice with these local bars to hold your holiday party at or to unwind after hours with your coworkers.

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