Mikes newest location at 35 West 36th Street has been a ghost town since the summer time. While the sign in the window states they are closed for the summer, it’s obvious to all the store is not re-opening. This the first location in the Mikes chain to close its doors.
The popular Midtown West lunch location has permanently closed its doors. Koshertopia has confirmed that Pick a Pita located at 607 Eighth Avenue has closed.
It’s all over for the Lunchbox. Koshertopia has confirmed that the original NY Lunchbox at 255 West 36th Street has permanently closed its doors. May be best for those Midtown West consumers to bring their own lunchbox.
Kosher Dining options in midtown are once again expanding. Koshertopia confirmed that the proprieties of Eden Wok are opening Pitopia at 1369 Broadway (corner 37th St.). The address, a previous Subway restaurant is prime location for the many midtown kosher consumers. With renovations under way, the location is set to open in early June. Pitopia will offer vegetarian salads, hummus bar and falafel & more.
Stay tuned for more details.
Fresh and environment conscious is the motto of Crisp – the popular falafel chain that is now kosher. Offering a combo of centuries-old Mediterannean food favorites with today’s nutrition-packed add-ins. Koshertopia has confirmed that the following locations of Crisp, 110 West 40th St. (between 6th & Broadway), 684 3rd Avenue (caorner of 43rd), as well as Crip on Wheels are supervised under the Cup K (Rabbi Israel Mayer Steinberg).
Location Links:
Note: The 111 Fulton Street location is NOT under kosher supervision
And yet another one closes. Manhattan’s well known midtown lunch and Saturday night hot spot, J2 is temporarily closed.
Stay Tuned for further details
Koshertopia has confirmed that after a brief closing, Shalom Bombay in Manhattan has re-opened for business as normal. As an added bonus to the many lunch goers they are now offering an expanded lunch buffet.
As one opens, one closes. Kosheropia has confirmed that the popular lunch spot Rosa’s Pizza has temporarily closed. Management informed our staff they are aiming to re-open this coming Friday.
Stay tuned for more details.
Cheese, tomato sauce, dough. Pizza, with its three basic ingredients, is really a very simple food*. Why then is good pizza so hard to find? While that may be a good question – possibly even a great or profound one – it is not a question I am going to answer here. Instead let’s focus on something a bit more practical. Given that there is so much bad pizza out there, where can you go to score a good slice?
It is in search of the answer to this question that I sought a guru in India went to Rosa’s Pizzeria, located on the ground floor of the Empire State Building. I’d been hearing great things about Rosa’s for a while, but I just never made my way over there. I can’t say exactly why I didn’t go until now, but I can tell you that I feel like an idiot.
There is no outside entrance to Rosa’s, so you are forced to find your way through the labyrinthine hallways of the massive building’s lobby. Navigation is not my strong suit (I’m a food critic not a cartographer) but I managed to find the restaurant with little difficulty. Now that we’ve gotten directional issues out of the way, let’s talk about pizza!
I tried the plain pizza, a “Grandma” slice (cut in a square with thin crust, loads of sauce, topped with mozzarella and parmesan), a fried eggplant slice, a roasted pepper slice, a broccoli and mushroom slice, a “Margherita” slice (like the “Grandma” but more traditionally shaped), and a tomato and mozzarella slice. Upon hearing my excitement about trying his restaurant for the first time, the owner brought me a batch of fresh-out-of-the-oven dough knots (think garlic knots, sans garlic), which were delicious.
All of the slices were excellent, but there were really two highlights for me, the “Grandma” slice and the roasted pepper slice. The mozzarella and parmesan featured on the “Grandma” complemented each other perfectly and the pepper slice was not only topped with delightfully crisp slices of pepper, it looked beautiful to boot. The sauce on both (which is the sauce they use on all slices) had a unique and satisfying sweetness that managed not to be overpowering despite its robust flavor.
I’ve heard people say that Rosa’s is expensive at $2.75 for a regular slice and $4.00 for a topping slice (though the slices are big and everything is steeply discounted if you buy a pie). Relative to other pizza places this may be expensive, but based solely on the quality of the food, it’s the best kind of bargain. If you’re looking for a good slice of pizza, you really can’t do much better than Rosa’s Pizzeria.
*note: Pizza seems like a simple food, but it really isn’t. There are so many questions: What kind and how much cheese should you use? What flavor should the sauce have? Should that flavor dominate the pizza or should the cheese take center stage? Should the dough be thin or thick? Should it be crispy or soft? But this isn’t pizza-making 101, it is pizza-eating 9000 and it is a robot from the future.
Rosa’s Pizza
350 Fifth Avenue
New York, NY 10001
(212) 244-7672
When I decided to write a review of Le Marais – the French style steak house, not the aristocratic district that is a center of Parisian Jewry – I thought to myself that I had to do something new. I couldn’t just go there for dinner and order a Tournedos steak (the tenderloin cut for which the restaurant is famous) or a Steak Au Poive (the Tournedos’ pepper crusted cousin) or even the Hanger steak, because I’ve had all of those things so many times before and already know that they are fantastic. It’s difficult to bring a critical eye to something you already love, so to mix things up I went to Le Marais for lunch – something I have heard is great, but have never actually experienced.
I met my brother at the restaurant at 3 o’clock and we were seated quickly. Despite the awkwardness of the hour (no longer lunch and not quite dinner) it was still pleasantly full – maybe it’s just me, but there is something unsettling about eating in an empty restaurant. I’ll take this moment – with me and my brother looking over the menu and dipping a bit of fresh bread in olive oil – to discuss the decor. The restaurant is well decorated and relaxed, with a retro feel that calls to mind New York in the 20’s – a tin ceiling and exposed brick, mirrors and a few posters on the walls. That said, something about the size feels constricting, as if the room is too small or the ceiling is too low. That problem is alleviated if you are lucky enough to eat in the upstairs section by the bar.
Looking over the menu, we noticed that it was identical to the regular menu with only two “lunchy” additions, the French Dip Sandwich (a steak sandwich served with a beef broth dipping sauce), and the hamburger, both priced at fifteen dollars, so that’s what we ordered. Since this was a review lunch and not just a lunch lunch we also ordered the smoked duck breast with roasted peppers as an appetizer, which was amazing. Our waiter brought our food out quickly enough; though I know from experience that when the restaurant gets to be more full the service can slow to a crawl.
The lunch items were simple and delightful, and both were served with a side of delicious French fries. The burger was a bit more than an inch thick (though I’m a food critic, not an engineer so I may be off) without an excess of toppings to distract you from the perfectly cooked meat. The French Dip Sandwich was tender without being overly chewy and served on crispy French bread (not pre-dipped and soggy as it is many places).
We were too full for dessert, but even without something sweet to cap it off, it was still an excellent meal and, price-wise, a fairly reasonable one. I knew that Le Marais was a great steak house and a wonderful place to go for dinner, so I guess it shouldn’t have surprised me when it turned out to be a great place to go for lunch as well.
Le Marais
150 West 46th Street
New York, NY 10036
(212) 869-0900
