Midtown Lunch

This is the final week for free lunch from MasterCard’s Priceless NY promotion at various food trucks, so freeload while you can! You can find vegan truck Cinnamon Snail and something called Pizza Truck of NY on Varick btw. Houston & King. In slightly out-of-bounds territory, Vendy Awards Cup-winner Solber Pupusas and the Mudtruck will be on Broadway btw. 8th St. & Astor Pl. You probably know the fine print by now, but if not you can find it here. The gist: You have to have a MasterCard, retweet with #PricelessNY and/or “like” the credit card on Facebook.

I’ve eaten a lot of things that are hard to take tasty-looking pictures of – i.e. every Indian steam table lunch ever – but when I took the lid off my latest Korean meal from Cafe Hanover on Hanover Sq. (at Pearl) my heart sank a little because it looked pretty unappealing. By that I mean it looked like there was an oil spill all over some udon noodles, and that became my introduction to the dish called jja jang myun on their menu, also known as jajangmyeon.

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As is customary here on Midtown Lunch, every Tuesday we’ll profile a different lunch’er and get their recommendations for places to eat in Downtown NYC. This week, we have Shira who is afraid of a condiment and is making the best of working in the FiDi rather than Midtown West.

Name: Shira K.

Occupation: Music publicist

Where you work: Wall & William

Age: 23

Favorite kinds of food: Malaysian, Vietnamese, South Indian, Korean, Greek, Italian, ramen, anything with butternut squash & sage, parmesan cheese, any sort of carmelized roast veggie, lobster rolls, boeuf bourguignon

Least favorite foods: I am known for not just hating, but FEARING ketchup.

Favorite lunches downtown: I used to work in Midtown West and sorely miss Carnegie John’s cart, Meze Grill, Mooncake Foods, Bapcha cart, Katsuhama, Sapporo, Biryani Cart, Tri Tip Grill, etc.  Though the Greek Street Meat cart on Wall St. (at Broad) has almost made up for my Carnegie John’s cravings, and Pita Press on Cedar (btw. William & Pearl) is similar to Meze Grill.  Downtown, I like the curry chicken at the Banh Mi cart on Hanover Sq. (at Pearl), the braised beef at Dig Inn (formerly The Pump Energy Foods) on Pearl (at Pine) when I feel like being healthy, Bennie’s Thai Cafe on Fulton (at Gold), Adrienne’s Pizza Bar on Stone (nr. Hanover Sq.) and Financier Patisserie’s (Multiple Locations) chicken pistou soup.  This one cart (the Turkish coffee cart) on the corner of Wall & Pearl has hands down the best coffee I’ve ever had from a cart (super flavorful, heady, almost cinnamon-y) and I head there whenever I start fading in the afternoon.

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There was a little bit of alarming news in the ML: Downtown inbox last week, with a Lunch’er saying that soup mecca Cafe Doppio at Broad & Beaver was closed for renovation. That can sometimes mean that the place is just closed permanently, but no before confusing everyone by taping some note to the metal shutters saying they’re “renovating.” When I walked by, the windows were all papered up, so it looks like they are actually sprucing the place up, and I bet that the Hale & Hearty next door is hoping they take their sweet time.