PROFILE: Downtown Lunch’er “Grace”
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 Grace who is into comfort foods from a variety of countries and thinks there should be a nickname for a certain stretch of Maiden Lane.
Name: Grace C.
Occupation: Digital marketing for government agency
Where you work: William St., between Fulton & John
Age: 29
Favorite kinds of food: If I ranked the world’s cuisines: Italian – pasta carbonara, New York pizza, chicken marsala with mashed potatoes and broccoli; Japanese – RAMEN, sushi, scallop sashimi, curry, gyoza; Chinese – dim sum, Cantonese-style lobster, emperor’s tofu, walnut shrimp, whole steamed fish, white rice alone, snow pea leaves, crunchy pig ears, xiao long bao; Thai – Isaan-style barbecue chicken, tom kha gai, som tum; French – escargot; American – grilled cheese, waffles… basically, all my comfort foods.
Least favorite foods: Bottom-feeders such as sea slugs and sea urchins. I also can’t bring myself to bite into an intact octopus head.
Favorite lunches downtown: Fried zucchini vegetarian pita at Pita Press on Cedar (btw. William & Pearl) with Greek herbal tea; pork dumplings with Chinese spaghetti $6 lunch special at A-Pou’s Taste Cart on Liberty St. (nr. Broadway), with corn soup if I’m in the mood; the classic at Baoguette on Maiden Lane (btw. Broadway & Nassau); pizza sandwich at Potbelly on Maiden Lane (at Gold) with a real strawberry shake; bento box at Ise on Pine (btw. Pearl & William) for special occasions; pad see eew with chicken at Bennie’s Thai on Fulton St. (at Gold); kosher falafel at Pita Express on Ann St. (btw. Park Row & Nassau); and Blue Spoon on Chambers St. (btw. Broadway & Church) for pressed sandwiches. In the summertime, I’ll stop for $3 fruit juices from the guy in front of Zeytuna. And salads and small turkey chili with cheddar cheese from Patuca, which are sadly now gone.
The “go-to” lunch place you and your co-workers eat at too often: Soma by Nature — the fast food Korean place on William (btw. Fulton & John), Subway, Chipotle for burrito bowls, Chop’t’s $$$ salads, and of course, Yip’s Chinese buffet.
