Midtown Lunch

Back in May after the Bob & Jo Truck started parking in the Financial District one day a week, I had a bulgogi sandwich that had a lot going for it, but was marred by too-chewy baguette. I haven’t been back because there are about a million other trucks hitting the area these days that consistently serve delicious food. On Tuesday (when the truck parks on Hanover Sq.), although the siren song of the many taco trucks crowding the lower FiDi was strong, I instead headed to Bob & Jo where a line of people was ordering rice plate after rice plate. Perhaps trying a baguette sandwich at a Korean food truck had been too risky a venture and the meat over rice was where it was at.

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Judging by the massive line greeting me at the Cinnamon Snail truck’s weekly stop in the Financial District on Tuesday, a lot of you are fans. Thus, it’s no surprise that they’ve been nominated for this year’s Vendy Cup to be given out at the Vendy Awards on September 15 on Governor’s Island. I’ve only eaten at the truck once but really enjoyed my five spice seitan sandwich. As you may or may not know, the truck serves nothing but vegan lunches and baked goods, but unless you have some irrational fear of fake meats, you shouldn’t let that scare you away. My second trip to the truck netted an open-faced sandwich of sorts and a doughnut. Would my second vegan lunch be as good as the first one?

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There are a lot of trucks selling Korean food fused with other cuisines like tacos, sliders and even falafel, so it was kind of refreshing when I looked at the menu at the Bob & Jo truck and saw that it was pretty straightforward. Yes, there are baguette sandwiches but otherwise you’ll find rice platters, bibimbap and japchae with traditional meats or vegetables. They’ve only recently been parking in the Financial District one day a week, usually on Tuesday at Coenties Slip & Water, with occasional forays into Soho but Midtown contributors have already extensively sampled the menu and since it looked pretty good I decided to give the truck an ML: Downtown review.

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A while back, while investigating the mysterious My Belly’s Playlist delivery service, I discovered that not only did Yorganic exist, but it sells something called Bliss Bowls which are essentially rice bowls with Korean ingredients. The kicker is that everything in this place is organic, hormone-free, natural etc. With Cafe Hanover just around the corner also selling Korean food, I was curious how these yuppie rice bowls stacked up.

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This site has previously had reviews of fried chicken noodle soup and other items from the Korean portion of Cafe Hanover at Hanover Sq. & Pearl, but for some inexplicable reason we’ve shunned the Kyedong chicken. This brand of Korean fried chicken is advertised in a poster in the window and in panels on the wall behind the front counter where you pay. Sandwiched between offerings of pork belly for $40 and whole chickens, there are portions of chicken at Midtown Lunch-friendly prices. Click through to check out the behemoth lunch box it comes in, housing equally oversized pieces of chicken.

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If you’ve been paying attention to the ML Downtown Twitter Tracker, you may have noticed Big D’s Grub truck mentioning they have rice platters every once in a while. The truck mostly sticks with tacos and grinders with Korean meats, and they were quiet about introducing this new menu item that isn’t available every day. Yesterday they were in the Financial District and I decided that some Korean meat over rice was just what I needed to perk up a dreary day.

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It’s not often that eating lunch actually makes me angry because often that little break where I get to put food in my mouth is the highlight of my day, whether it’s sub par or awesome. After striking out on my lunch idea one day, I happened to walk by Kortako on Nassau (btw. John & Fulton) and realized I hadn’t returned since their much-delayed opening at the beginning of December. I had a burrito on my first visit which I enjoyed for what it was (Kor-Mex fusion), but another person didn’t seem too positive about the place in the comments of that post. So I stepped inside to try something different and it was all downhill from there.

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