Midtown Lunch

Every Tuesday I turn over the site to a different Midtown Lunch’er for his or her recommendations for the best lunch in Midtown. This week I’m excited to welcome Moira, the brains behind Rum and Blackbird a brand new food walking tour company in Hell’s Kitchen.

Name: Moira

Age: 28

Occupation: Tasting Tour Tycoon

Where in Midtown do you Work?: Rum & Blackbird Tasting Tours in Hell’s Kitchen – I know 9th Avenue is technically out of bounds for midtown lunch, but I do find myself venturing into the thick of midtown for the right food, especially if its something Mediterranean or barbecued.

Favorite Kind of Food: Savory pastries and meat pies

Least Favorite Kind of Food: Salisbury steak and over-cooked salmon.

Favorite Place(s) to Eat Lunch in Midtown: This list is a bit 9th Avenue focused: Xie Xie (on 9th btw. 45+46th) for their sweet glazed pork bun, Poseidon Bakery (on 9th Ave. btw. 44+45th) for their spanakopita and tiropita. Inside midtown, Akdeniz (on 46th btw. 5+6th) for hummus and babba ganoush and Virgil’s BBQ for BBQ trash riblets.

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If this is wrong, than I don’t want to be right…

I’m all for the Department of Health making sure our food is safe to eat, but this is ridiculous!  Apparently at the end of last year, the Department of Health adopted a resolution that rewrote many parts of the health code as it pertains to street vendors.  It takes effect January 1st of this year, and if enforced it’s going to have a huge effect on Midtown Lunch’ing.  Namely, no more fish, shellfish, or seafood from street vendors.  Here it is direct from the newly rewritten Article 89:

§89.19 f(2) Fish. No fish, shellfish, or any food consisting of or made with an aquatic animal, as defined in Article 81, shall be prepared, stored, held for service or sold from a mobile food vending unit.

The full ramifications of this are just sinking into my brain right now, and it’s easy to joke about the “safety” of eating seafood from a truck. But think about all the great seafood options being offered right now from carts and trucks in Midtown alone… the fried cod from the Schnitzel Truck, Tianbula from the NYC Cravings Truck, and the always delicious salmon and tilapia served by Kwik Meal (shown above.) And worst of all, what the hell is Kim’s Aunt Kitchen Cart going to sell?! This must be some kind of a bad dream.

And that’s not all.

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When news broke last night that Yankees star Hideki Matsui was headed to the Dodgers Angels, Midtown Lunch’ers took to twitter with the most obvious question… “What will this mean for Go Go Curry!”  The fast food Japanese curry house has always been a shrine to #55, most recently reveling in his World Series MVP honor.  So… what *does* this mean for Go Go Curry?  Can we expect an Echo Park Anaheim branch of GGC to open in the next few months?  The owner, Mr. Miyamori, released a statement this morning:

“Since GO GO CURRY was hoping that Matsui stays with New York Yankees, we are very disappointed. However, no matter where Matsui goes, I know our hero Matsui does a great job and no matter which baseball team he goes, we keep supporting Matsui for 100%.”

But what about the free stuff!

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• Now that Diamond Dairy is gone, where do you latke? [Midtown Eating]
• Looking for some Downtown soup action [Downtown Eating]
• Bistro 51 makes chicken pot pie soup.  Anybody else? [Midtown Eating]
• Is there a such thing as vegetarian pho? [Eating Outside Midtown]

I was pretty freakin’ bummed when Arang (on 32nd btw. B’way+5th) closed down their Korean/Japanese all you can eat lunch buffet. They reopened for lunch a few months ago (sans buffet), and Ultrayclay is reporting that their lunch specials are not only good, but most are under $10.

Bummer! The newly rennovated Chicken House (on 36th btw. 7+8th) didn’t reopen today as expected. They’re ready to go, but are still waiting for the final permits to be approved. They hope to be open next week…

Our Happy Hour Correspondent “Mamacita” isn’t all alcohol all the time.  She also enjoys her street meat… so when she told me that she had a great chicken and lamb over rice plate from La Baguette Truck (a strangely named halal truck that I’ve walked by many times, but never pulled the trigger on), I told her to her write it up for everyone to enjoy!  Here’s her report…

Every once in a while you find yourself in midtown after dark and seek the comfort of a reliable street cart for dinner. I was in Bryant Park recently on the first cold night of December and my initial thought was that of the cart on 40th St. & Broadway, the 3rd place winner of Street Meat Palooza 1. Unfortunately I found it’s only a daytime cart, so after I got there I reluctantly looked towards the truck that I’ve seen for years on the opposite side of the street. It’s called “La Baguette Cafe,” and has a Parisian motif but with a typical Halal menu. I was hungry so I figured after all these years I’d finally bite the bullet and check it out. Of course I went with the ML staple: chicken and lamb over rice… but I was surprised by what I got for $5.50.

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