A rule never to violate in choosing a cart

Searching for some new cart options today, I spied an old fav in a new spot. Hot Soup, a veritable fixture of 54th and Madison, has apparently relocated to 52nd and Lex. No doubt the news was lost in all the political coverage of recent days.

The twice-a-month lunch choice was apparently uprooted because of construction at its longtime site. Which explains why the burrito wagon next to it had pulled up stakes as well.

But there it was, beckoning to me with such worthy choices as Chicken Chili, Italian Wedding Soup, Vegetarian Split Pea, and Gumbo. Each priced at under $5, slab of bread included.

Yet the proprietor was not to be found. As I was surveying the situation, he dashed back to the cart—violating my Prime Directive in choosing a wheeled source for lunch: Never, ever, ever buy from a vendor who’s just returned from a “break.” A break equals bathroom time, which means conning access from some unsuspecting or sympathetic business with indoor plumbing, like a Barnes & Noble or a Ranch*1. Which means the vendor was dashing in and out, possibly to avoid detection, almost certainly to get back to his cart. And that means hand washing might’ve been a skipped step. The guy wasn’t exactly kneading his hands in a terrycloth towel.

So I doubled back to Indian Food, an old dependable that had also disappeared on Friday. I couldn’t get the story from the two women inside because they were chatting in their native tongue to a non-customer on the sidewalk. Instead, I walked away with a great Non-Vegetarian Platter (curried boneless chicken, sag paneer, rice, a piece of nan) for $5. And fewer worries about safety.

Who moved our cart?

My neck’s sore from scanning the skies all day, wondering if it’d be cigar-shaped or the classic saucer format. Clearly something must be up there, sucking up cart after cart. How else do you explain today’s disappearance of the burrito stand, the Indian food trailer and even the smoothies and fresh fruit wagon? Clearly someone is stealing the great carts of midtown.

My trusty brethren in plastic-utensil dining, the able Frumkin, set out in an admitted funk because of today’s big music news. The man has been despondent for years because the Rock n Roll Hall of Fame has refused to induct the Dave Clark Five time after time after time. Finally, the judges came to their senses this year and gave the one-time Beatles rival the nod. The band would’ve been formally installed in 10 days. But its lead singer, Mike Smith, died yesterday from pneumonia. He would never get to bask in the adulation he was due.

Obviously in need of solace, we headed out to the ever-trusty burrito cart on 54th and Madison. It was not to be found. We looked on alternate corners, and even a block north. All in vain.

Ah, said I, let’s hit that Indian cart, one of the under-sung sidewalk choices in our heavily suited stretch of Park Avenue. Gone. Ditto for the fruit-salad cart that parks next to it each day.

In our search for something out of the ordinary, we passed probably a half-dozen halal meat stand, all beckoning us with a whiff of curry and the sizzle of chicken on the flattop grill. But that was our cart stop yesterday. A repeat was out of the question for culinary adventurers of our distinction.

Yet our options were limited by the unexplained disappearance of some old favs. We could only speculate that the proprietors were driven away by some chilly temperatures. Either that, or the city has been cracking down again at the behest of merchants who feel they’re losing business to rivals who pay no real estate taxes.

So we settled for Subway. Write it off to grief over Smith.

The CartFood Manifesto

Once upon a time, in a New York City not that long ago, one of the most reckless things you could do was hit a Sabrett cart for lunch. The vendor would bang open a metal box filled with strangely colored meat tubes soaking in what looked like chicken soup, if you were lucky, or dishwasher, if your risk quotient was running a little higher that day. He'd spear this rubbery eel that was unlike any hot dog you've ever eaten, slap it on a Wonderbread roll, and then ask for your choice of either onions--actually some sort of watery clay pot-colored sauce with a few scraps of onions thrown in--or sauerkraut. The purpose of both was apparently to mask the taste of the dog itself.

Today, if you work in the city, you'll occasionally spot the tattered blue and yellow umbrellas of those dirty-water-dog emporiums. But they've mostly given way to a new generation of wheeled food outlets, peddling an array that befits a city of New York's diversity. As the cost of opening restaurants has soared, carts have become the point of entry for immigrants looking to pursue their livelihood via the food business. The result is a traffic jam of carts along the sidewalks of any highly trafficked midday location, offering the sort of flavorful and sometimes exotic options that earlier generations could only find in ethnic neighborhoods. The only thing today's NYC carts have in common with the Sabrette carts of yesteryear are relatively low prices.

This blog is devoted to an exploration of that often overlooked component of the New York food scene. Accompanied by my friend and colleague Paul Frumkin, a cookbook author and Culinary Institute of America grad, I plan to hit the options that abound around our offices at 55th and Park. From there, we'll branch out to other areas, with field trips to renowned cart venues like Greenwich Village (awesome dosai near Washington Square; I've yet to try the area's new dessert trucks), Carnegie Hall (Ground Zero for soup carts) and Rockefeller Center (one-time outpost of Daisy May's BBQ, though we suspect the carts have been garaged for good). And someday, if we can get the necessary visas and shots, we may even venture to Ground Zero of the city's cart culture, Jackson Heights, with fare ranging from roast chicken to goat meat to tacos.

But for the near future, we'll likely have our mouths full from just trying the places in our immediate area. Within a few blocks, the hungry pedestrian could try pizza, Indian platters, burritos, soup, smoothies, several varieties of fruit salad, grilled Halal meat from any number of purveyors, sausage from an apparent Dale Carnegie drop-out who nonetheless should have his own CIA class, and enough empanadas to feed us for a month.

We hope you'll alert us to other carts worth trying throughout the city (we've already been tipped off from the staff of Food & Wine of a chicken specialist near there offices), and to comment on carts you favor, or what to try at any given wheeled outlet of note.

In the meantime, a recommendation: Fans of Rafiqi's would be well served to try the Halal court on the northwest corner of 54th and Park. There's usually a line, but it's worth the three or four minutes. Let us know which you like better, the lamb or the chicken.