Midtown Lunch

Photo Courtesy of Colin Keefe

• I really wish Cafe Soho’s Korean Fried Chicken was under ML budget [Phila Weekly]
• Rotisseur started serving lunch this Thursday [Zagat]
• Supper has added a small plate serving of “Jewish Fried Chicken” to the menu [Grub Street]
• And for vegetarians who want to get their fry on, Adam Erace loves the tofu fritters at Circles [Meal Ticket]

Sawatdee, the lime green new Thai restaurant, opened on South St last Friday and both Meal Ticket and Yelp Philly hinted that I needed to check out their lunch menu.

Like Erawan, the lunch menu has you pick 3 courses. Here they do them for $9.95.

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For the 3rd week in a row, I am interrupting our regularly scheduled/centrally located programing to explore Northeast Philly. This week, it’s Pio Pio, a Cuban “deli, grocery, restaurant”.

With a name like Pio Pio, I assumed Peruvian chicken, since there are a whole bunch of Pio Pio’s in NYC who do just that. Further confusing me were the cute little hatching chicks on the awning, how could I not think it was a chicken joint?

While they do actually serve chicken along with American food (sandwiches, pizza, cheesesteaks) from a counter in the front, I was more interested in the Cuban food from the counter in the back.

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As is customary at Philly Lunch, every Tuesday we turn over the site to a different lunch’er for his or her recommendations for the best lunch in Philadelphia. This week it’s Chris, who I hear is quite the home chef. 

Name: Christopher

Age: 27

Occupation: Sales

Where in Philly do you Work?: Mt. Laurel, NJ

Favorite Kind of Food: Asian-y stuff.

Least Favorite Kind of Food: I will eat anything you put in front on me, but (non-fried) chicken is usually pretty boring.

Favorite Place(s) to Eat Lunch in Philly: The dude at 20th & Market for his falafel; its by far the best in the city. The lemongrass tofu banh mi at Q.T. Vietnamese (10th & Arch), usually supplemented by dessert from K.C. Pastries (10th & Arch-ish) and a couple lamb skewers from Solo (next to Q.T.). If your job is permissive about liquid lunches, Jose Pistola’s (15th & Spruce) frequently has Friday afternoon beer events and Monk’s (16th & Spruce) is way less crowded than during the evening.
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Opa, the new Greek restaurant in Center City, is starting to serve  lunch  next Monday (7/18) and is offering free lunches of their “toast”,  a traditional Greek pressed sandwich, to customers that day. It comes with Lancaster ham, manouri cheese, and honey mustard dressing, plus oregano fries on the side. Yum! I am always down for a fancy grilled cheese. I am also happy to report that practically all of the lunch menu is $10 or less. Burger fans be alerted, they are serving a feta stuffed hamburger.

Full menu after the jump

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This Saturday at the Piazza at Schmidts was the 1st Vendy Awards in Philadelphia, a “street food showcase and intense cook-off between the best sidewalks chefs in Philly.” Tickets were completely sold out and the vibe was sweaty but happy. I was privileged enough to  be one of the judges who sampled the  offerings of all 8 trucks and voted to pick the winner of the Vendy Cup.  While I admit that coverage of events after the fact can be lame and not helpful at all, the venders here all provided food you could normally expect at their trucks, so reading ahead will not only let you recap the event if you attended or let you live vicariously through the pictures if you missed out, it can also give you a preview of what you could get at any of these trucks on a given day.

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Photo Courtesy of UltrayClay

• The sausage at Frankford Hall, looks almost as good as the ones at New Wave [UltraClay]
• The cafeteria at the United Plaza building at 17th and Ludlow has some secretly good salads that are not dumbly priced [Foobooz]
• A new Thai place, Sawatdee, opens today. Meal Ticket has pictures [Meal Ticket]
• There is a dish that tastes like “eggplant marshmallows” at Sushi Planet [Mac & Cheese]
• Phila Weekly has love for Cafe Soho’s KFC [Phila Weekly]