Some notables last month:
Hummus from Gazala’s. Still haven’t had better in NYC
Chili Pan Mee at Pig & Khao
Mochiko Chicken at Cotra. Cotra is top 3-5 in Brooklyn for me these days
Wagyu Flat Iron, Shrimp in Butter sauce at Shmone
Tum Strawberry salad at Rynn. Nice Thai in East Village, but super loud at dinner.
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I miss the OG on 9th. Yes, their hummus is terrific, but back when they were open at Chelsea Market, Dizengoff was my favorite. Now, I’d have to go to Philly to get it.
While searching for the spelling of “Dizengoff” in my files I ran across this list I’d made in 2013. As a Hell-Kitchener from that time, you might appreciate it.
Midtown eating
Marseille, 44th and 9th
Gazala Place, 709 9th (47th-ish)
Good smoky humous, very nice, thin flatbread, felafel to rival Azuri on a good day. Kebabs a bit underseasoned.
Zigolini’s Pizza, 9th betw. 46th and 47th
Among the better pizza places in the area, although slightly more expensive than it should be.
Amy’s Bread, 9th and 46th-ish.
I much prefer Sullivan, but I’ve had the odd good sandwich here.
Across the street from Amy’s is 9th Ave Vintner with a cheese and sandwich shop next to it. They generally have a good hunk of cheese or two, and I believe use bread from Sullivan.
Lunch at Ma Peche is not expensive.
The Bar Room at the Modern is expensive, because the price of the plates adds up. If you can get into the museum, the cafeteria on the 2nd floor offers good value.
Aaheli, 826 9th betw. 54th and 55th is no worse than several of the Indian restaurants in town that are considered acceptable, and it has a decent crisp okra dish. Its South Indian dishes are also decent in a modest way.
Lan Sheng, 60W 39th (roughly across from Szechuan Gourmet) is quite good.
Shimizu, 318W 51st. The sushi is fine, but the shochu selection is the attraction.
Carnegie Deli, a controversial choice, but I’d say their fatty corned beef and matzo ball soup are superior to Katz’s.
Trattoria Trecolori, 254 W 47th, for acceptable if predictable Italian.
Toloache, 251 W 50th, Mexican, esp. for warm nachos and assorted dips.
All sorts of blasts from the past here. When Dizengoff first opened, around day 3 or so I sat at the counter and had a long chat with Michael Solomonov. One thing I much preferred over Gazala is the pita.
Ma Peche was great as was Nishi and Kawi. Still amazed some of these Fukus didnt last long especially Kawi.
The interesting thing about Trattoria Trecolori is that the owners are actually from Galicia and later opened Tomiño Taberna Gallega, our favorite Spanish in the city atm.
BTW, I just googled to make sure I dont confuse things (I’m getting there), and according to Google AI, everything above is correct. Source: Eating With Ziggy 
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While we’re blasting the past, I figure that I should give Ziggy credit for taking me & a couple of others (I can’t recall whom) around Hell’s Kitchen when he was still working in the area many years ago. My wife had worked in a hell hole of an office when New Line Cinema was a new independent (doing Freddy movies & distributing Ninja Turtles, Texas Chainsaw Massacre and Reefer Madness) and Ziggy promised that he knew of interesting hole in the wall places that were good. Gazala was a lunch stop for our tour and I brought home the menu, promising myself to return. I never did. Probably because, back then, my section of Atlantic Ave had enough mid-Eastern places to keep me well fed.
As for Fooddabbler’s list, well Lan Sheng was a get together place for a bunch of us CH posters from the time it opened. The owner got a kick out of byob arguments, not to mention the “appropriate stemware” that one of our group insisted on bringing. And Toloache was the site of a book celebration we gave Steve Sando when he published the first (? I think) Rancho Gordo book.
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I think it’s more what they are serving than what we are choosing. Take a look at the menu and see if you agree. We will go back and try to find dishes more like their chicken curry.
Ma Peche for me was the weakest of Chang’s heyday offerings, but Paul was one of the nicest and funniest guy to helm a chef’s counter (possibly the shyest too). I still remember that meal, only for him and the chicken skin “chips” with white bbq sauce, for which they handed out the recipe on a card at the end.
More of the apps appeal to me than the mains, but the pricing is weird (hard to imagine portions align). Chatti also has a portion vs price alignment issue, though it’s delicious.
It was certainly no Ssäm Bar, but I preferred the range of offerings there to Noodle. It was also (as my notes above indicate) surprisingly inexpensive at lunch for the quality of the food, and they offered an all-afternoon menu. That made it our place of choice for many years after long visits to MoMA.
Ko was something else of course.
I almost always wanted something at the cafe on 2. These days, across at Fogo once in a while.
Ma Peche was good, just not a draw on its own when I didn’t need to be around there.
(Ko to me was a far more special meal than Kappo, even comparing apples and oranges.)
Or you could make it. It’s pretty cinchy.
With a group of eight at Hojokban on Madison near 30th, for a marinated crab pop-up from the Seoul restaurant Gebang Sikdang. This is similar to what you would expect at Rice Thief, only somewhat pricier (the crab sets were $55) and in a more elegant - and a lot more convenient for me - space. We each got our own crab set, and then ordered two crab roe bibambaps (one spicy, one not) and two bowls of crab roe noodles for the table.
The banchan: salad with a sauce that tasted mostly like orange juice, kimchi pancakes (slightly crispy, excellent flavor), tofu steak (too many onions and a weird, rubbery texture), kimchi (mmm, kimchi), a kind of seaweed I’d never seen before that was like a very lacy, elegant nori, radish kimchi in chilled broth (refreshing!). There was also miso soup that I spilled on my own lap, because that’s how I roll.
Soy marinated crab. I was instructed to scrape the roe onto my rice and then pick it up with the fancy seaweed. This was a good method, and the crab was lovely.
The spicy bibimbap before it was mixed with a bowl of rice. Not all that exciting. I’m not a huge bibimbap fan, and I was not moved to become one after eating this.
Crab roe makguksu. Now we’re talking. The flavors here really came together - a little bitterness from the greens; rich, slightly funky roe; toasty buckwheat noodles; and a light, salty broth. More like this!
I think Rice Thief is better, overall (and cheaper), but I’m not gonna be in Seoul any time soon, so it was great to have a chance to sample some dishes from there.
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And afterwards, we passed Salt Bread Ko, so I finally got to have one after being denied at Justin’s. My brilliant companion suggested that these would be great for lobster rolls, and indeed they would.
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For all my love of crab, I have not crossed over to the raw crab camp yet.
Worth the hype / lines?
This was on 32nd St., so no lines, just an annoying touch screen system. It’s a very good roll, light and fluffy and VERY buttery. Like, stealth butter. You don’t really notice it until you see how much ended up on the napkin.
I was mocked for tipping on the touch screen. Deservedly.
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The first time I had it was a sake-marinated version at the long-gone restaurant Canton. The server tried very hard to dissuade me (you will not like! only for Chinese people!), but I insisted and as it happened, I did not like! It tasted like a low-tide flavored jello shot, and it made me physically ill.
Korean marinated crab is very different, in that it is good. But you have to be cool with a gelatinous texture.
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I’ll never say never… all raw fish was a leap of faith for me at some point.
Go with me. If you don’t like it, it will not go to waste.
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