Midtown Lunch

Anybody who has ever lived on the West coast will tell you that there is no good Mexican food in New York City, but I have to say… while I did find a decent taco or two during my 5 years in Midtown, I *never* found any good Peruvian food. I had an ok plate of lomo saltado in Brooklyn once, and a Peruvian owned Cuban chain in Midtown served aji (the Peruvian “green sauce”) with everything. But it was nothing like what you can get here, and I have to say I really missed it.

So a few days after I moved in I started getting the itch for some saltado de mariscos.

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Oh man, do I love Korean fried chicken.  I mean, how could I not?  (How could anybody not for that matter?)  I love fried chicken.  I love Korean food.  Dip one into the other, and voila.  Food magic!  And while there are plenty of versions to sample these days, there are still two major chains that can’t be ignored:  Bon Chon & Kyochon.  Midtown NYC got a Bon Chon a few weeks before I moved to L.A., but I never got to try Kyochon (their Midtown location is still under construction.)  Contrary to what some back East might think, I didn’t move to L.A. specifically so I could eat at Kyochon, but it sure is a nice bonus!

Hello Koreatown lunch…

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As is customary on Midtown Lunch, every Tuesday we’ll profile a random reader to get their recommendations for the best spots to lunch near their work. I’m a huge fan of street food, so I’m pretty excited to have Shawna & Sonja as our Inaugural Profiled Lunchers. They’re the co-founders behind this Saturday’s L.A. Street Food Festival happening Downtown, and I thought it would be fun to find get their recommendations for Downtown L.A. Lunch’ing.

Name: Shawna (left) & Sonja (right)

Age: Shawna: 35; Sonja: 33 (You know Shawna and I share the same birthday… March 9th!)

Occupation: Shawna: Social Media & Marketing Maven/LA Street Food Fest Co-Founder; Sonja: Cultural Curator/LA Street Food Fest Co-Founder/UNIQUE LA Founder

Where in L.A. do you Work?: Shawna: LA is my office but spending a lot of time lately in our loft downtown near 9th & Main; Sonja: My UNIQUE LA office and studio is in historic downtown LA.

Favorite Kind of Food: Shawna: Slow.. fresh, local, seasonal and prepared with love; Sonja: Anything with carbs… Or butter.

Least Favorite Kind of Food: Shawna: Mass manufactured crap. Oh, and calf’s liver. Goose is so much better; Sonja: Olives. I try them a few times a year to see if my taste buds have come around, but nope, still don’t like ’em.

Favorite Place(s) to Eat Lunch: Shawna: Downtown… Clifton’s (648 South Broadway) for its awesome décor, strong coffee and classic cafeteria fare; Market for my “Milk” away from home fix, the Thai steak salad and green tea latté; Nickel Diner (524 S Main St) for a naughty maple-bacon donut; Mariscos Jalisco, a truck on E Olympic for fried shrimp tacos; Lazy Ox (241 S San Pedro) for a plate full of crispy pig ears and a Japanese IPA; the Grand Central Market for whatever looks fresh; Cole’s (118 E. 6th) for a dip sammich and spicy pickles; any 213 Group joint for a liquid lunch.; Sonja: Tiara Cafe (127 E. 9th) Chicken Salad Sandwich w/ microgreens, and their chili is the best. Wurstküche’s Bratwurst (800 E. 3rd) with caramelized onions, french fries with their pesto mayo dipping sauce, and a cold beer. Farmer Boys (726 S Alameda St) makes a deadly bacon/avocado/cheeseburger, called “the farmer’s burger”. I think 3 people could share it!

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Ever since I told people I was moving to L.A. the recommendations have been pouring in from everywhere, and when a good friend/chef told me I had to hit up Daikokuya in Little Tokyo I wasn’t about to argue with her.  Unlike great thai food (which is scarce in Midtown Manhattan), there is no shortage of great ramen joints where I came from- from the places in Midtown that cater to Japanese businessmen (like Sapporo, Men Kui Tei, and Menchanko Tei) to the more expensive downtown spots like Ippudo and Momofuku.  I love them all.  But there was one part of the menu at Daikokuya that I couldn’t help but instantly fall in love with:

Uh… extra back fat in my pork soup?!  How could I not?

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Birria. Photo courtesy of Food GPS

• The Taco Taskforce rounds up the best goat in L.A. [Gastronomy;Food GPS]
• I know where I’m eating lunch on Thursday! [Daily Dish]
• Slaw Dogs sound pretty awesome (a West coast Hot Doug’s perhaps?) [Grub Street]
• Must… have… Ludo Fried Chicken [Ludo via LAist]
• Jerk chicken + sweet potato fries from a truck?  Yes please. [Squid Ink]

I thought long and hard what my first lunch in L.A. would be. In Midtown it was this place called Hing Won, and it epitomized everything about what a perfect Midtown Lunch should be.  So I wanted my first lunch here to be just as special.  Street food?  An all you can eat buffet?  French dip?  So many options.  And then I saw this on Squid Ink. When asked by a reader where she could find the best khao soi in L.A., “The Guru” (aka Jonathan Gold) pointed her towards Spicy BBQ- a Northern Thai restaurant on Santa Monica and Normandie, on the outskirts of Thai Town.

I’ve been a big khao soi fan ever since trying it for the first time a few years ago in a Chiang Mai night market. You don’t see it too often in American Thai restaurants because it is exclusively a Northern Thai dish, and most restaurants here don’t serve dishes from the north. I had actually never tried (or even heard of) khao soi before seeing it being eaten by others in that night market, and my wife had to use the patented finger pointing ordering system to get us a bowl.

I found a decent version in Midtown, but it was a far cry from the original (isn’t it always?) and I was pretty excited to see if L.A. could do any better.  (Spoiler Alert: It can, and it does.)

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