People, I need your help. And you know I wouldn’t ask if it wasn’t important. Last Friday I received my favorite kind of email… a tip from a Midtown Lunch’er named Johanna:
“Noticed a new-looking Korean food cart on the south side of 49th west of 6th this morning on my way to work — thought you might want to know. They seem to offer traditional food (bulgogi) along with more regular-sounding sandwiches……odd.”
Sounded amazing. And four of my favorite words… “Korean”, “cart”, “bulgogi” and “odd”. Needless to say, I was pretty excited for lunch that day. When 1pm rolled around, I went outside, and the cart was nowhere to be found! I was sure that Johanna had gotten the street wrong, so I walked up to 50th and down to 48th looking for the cart… but it was useless. Same crappy soup carts and halal trucks that always line 49th.
When I got back to work, I emailed Tipster Johanna and confirmed the exact location of the cart (which was definitely not there at lunch time). I was very disheartened, and wondered why a reader would play such a dirty trick on me. It’s not right to lie about Korean food from a cart, and get me all worked up into a frenzy. But, later on that night my wife confirmed Johanna’s story. She too had seen the cart setting up that morning! And the story gets worse. My wife said it had a sign saying “Bulgogi Sandwich $1” and it even had pictures of these little pork bun looking things. Now I was in total shock. Not only did this magical disappearing cart have bulgogi, but it had it in sandwich form. Ridiculous. I have to find this cart.
Monday was a holiday, so Tuesday I went out to 49th St. (knowing the cart wouldn’t be there) and asked one of the halal guys if they had seen the cart. He confirmed the existence of the cart and said that it had set up on Friday only to leave a few hours later when there was no business. If you have seen this cart- or know of it’s whereabouts, please contact me immediately by posting a comment to this piece or emailing me at zach@midtownlunch.com I don’t think I have to stress how important this is to me. Odd Korean Cart shows up selling $1 “Bulgogi Sandwiches” (whatever the hell that is) in front of my office building only to disappear two hours later. It’s like the Kaiser Soze of lunch carts. This cart must be found.
Also, don’t confuse this missing cart with Kim’s Aunt Kitchen cart on 46th, which just started serving Bul Go Gi (but not in sandwich form). Pictures of that cart (and the bulgogi I settled for on Friday, after I couldn’t find the new korean cart) after the jump…
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Posted by Zach at 9:07 am, January 18th, 2007 under 46th btw. 5+6th, Cart, Kim's Aunt Kitchen Cart, Korean.
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