Old Yet New in New York: Papaya King Crowns the East Village

By Mitch Broder

They snap downtown just the way they snap uptown.

That’s all that matters. Papaya King East Village is a success.

Yes, the hot dogs that gave a second career to tropical fruit drinks have ventured from East 86^th Street to St. Mark’s Place. Thus, Papaya King has a second location for the first time in decades. And the dogs traveled well. Here, too, they’re one of the best bites of New York.

The new store is three times as big as the old, and it has a concrete porch. It takes some time to acclimate to all that luxury.  But the hot dogs are the same, which is to say perfectly tasty and snappy, as are the buns, which is to say perfectly fluffy and crunchy.

As is the papaya drink, which is to say perfectly creamy and frothy. It’s unlike any other fruit drink you know. It’s mysterious. And best left that way.

Papaya King, born on that uptown corner in 1932, has had other branches, but they disappeared despite the perfection. The original location was bought by a group of investors three years ago. The new store is their first attempt to build on history.

“It’s a good match for the brand,” says Blake Gower, the group’s head of development. “It’s a quintessential New York experience on a quintessential New York street.” He’s especially proud of the porch: “It’s one of the key design elements. It kind of makes this place feel like it’s always been here.”

Blake wanted to have a place that looked new to people who like new things and old to people who like old things, and he got as close as you could expect. The classic neon sign, for instance, is new and yet manages to say Old New York in the middle of the city’s body-piercing corridor.

Inside, the walls preserve a Papaya King tradition: little signs designed to enlighten you about frankfurters and fruit. But here they’re tailored to the neighborhood, as in: “Right across the street from where you’re standing was the legendary Five Spot Jazz Club. All the greats played there. Bet they wished for franks after shows.”

Blake dug even further back to come up with the bamboo counter and the thatched grill awning laden with artificial fruit. They recall Papaya King’s origin as a stand called Hawaiian Tropical Drinks, where just fruit juice was sold, sometimes by a man crowned by a pith helmet.

The porch has wooden chairs that make you feel like you’re at the old homestead, until you notice the view of the St. Mark’s Hotel, the St. Marks Ale House, and Karaoke St. Marks (and you get a snootful of smoldering sandalwood from the nearby incense stand).

It’s a unique blend. But it could be what the neighborhood needs, since Papaya King could be what every neighborhood needs. Among nearby competitors is Japadog. But Japadog has hot dogs with bonito flakes. Papaya King has two hot dogs and a fruit drink for five bucks.

It has toppings, too, though not bonito flakes. But try a couple of these dogs straight.

As the longtime slogan promises: “Our Franks are Tastier than Filet Mignon.”

Eat royally at Papaya King, at 3 St. Mark’s Place, between Cooper Square and Astor Place, in New York City.

READ THE WHOLE STORY OF THE ORIGINAL PAPAYA KING — AND OF DOZENS OF OTHER CLASSIC CITY SPOTS — IN “DISCOVERING VINTAGE NEW YORK,” COMING ON JUNE 18 AND ON SALE NOW!

New in New York: Warm Up to the Cup at Meatball Obsession

By Mitch Broder

When it’s hot, you want a cup of ice cream. When it’s cold, you want a cup of meatball.

When you look at it that way, you may begin to grasp the logic behind the Home of the Original Meatball in a Cup.

The Home is Meatball Obsession, which looks like an ice-cream stand except that instead of ice cream containers it has meatball pots. It serves you a cup with a giant meatball in the flavor of your choice, with the toppings of your choice and Parmesan bread instead of a wafer.

It opened in time for summer, since it is clearly up for a challenge, but it is now embarking upon its maiden meatball season. It has unveiled new items, new toppings, and a new meatball, and it is waiting to see you having yourself a little Italian meal walking.

In keeping with popular practice, it provides you with three steps toward acquiring your optimal movable feast. Step 1 is “Indulge Your Obsession,” which means “Choose Your Meatball,” which means you can have Beef, Turkey, Pork Sausage, or the new Chicken, in Sunday Sauce.

Step 2 is “Choose Your Style,” which means that if you don’t like cups you can have your meatball stuffed in the Original Pocket Sandwich. Step 3 is “The Toppings,” which means that you can complicate your meatball with flavorings from Locatelli Pecorino Romano to the new Sautéed Peas and Onions.

You get a single meatball — in either format — for $4; you get one topping free and others for 50 cents or $1 apiece. To expand your options, there are now ravioli, and to complete your meal there are now cannoli, which come from Arthur Avenue but get assembled in the store.

It may all sound a little detached, but be assured that, in fact, it all came straight from Grandma’s kitchen. The Grandma was Anna Mancini, and her grandson is Daniel Mancini, who has spent his life obsessesed with her meatballs, which is why he brought them back.

“One of my favorite memories was waking up every Sunday morning to the wonderful smell of her meatballs and Sunday Sauce cooking on the stove,” Daniel says in his meatball credo. “Sunday afternoon our home was full of family and friends enjoying the feast my grandmother prepared.”

He had a career running clothing companies but ditched it to make meatballs, which he has since sold in stores under the name of MamaMancini’s. But he also wanted to sell them hot, so this year he opened his meatball stand. He didn’t come up with the cup. Grandma did that, too.

The city, of course, has been in a meatball phase for a while. The phase has given us, among other things, The Meatball Shop and The Meatball Factory. No meatball source, however, has been quite as accessible as Meatball Obsession’s color-coded pots and open window.

I had meatballs. I had Beef and Turkey. (I had them before there was Chicken.) Both of them were excellent, and the sauce was delicious. Two or three make a good meal. You get two for $7.50 and three for $10. You get a 10 percent discount on 50, but my limit is 45.

“I would be lying if I said I wasn’t a little nervous before we opened Meatball Obsession,” Daniel says in the credo. “Would people not want a meatball in a cup?”

So far people have wanted it. And more are bound to want it, because meatballs always look better in December than in July.

Roll with it at Meatball Obsession, 510 Sixth Avenue, between 13^th and 14^th streets, in New York City.

New in New York: Watch Your Lip at Pie Face

By Mitch Broder

I only eat things that aren’t smiling at me, which leaves most of my friends at risk, but I made an exception for a pie. Still, it was tough to stick a fork in its face.

I actually ate most of six pies, all of which had faces, because they were the pies of New York’s first Pie Face Bakery Café. Pie Face is the Australian fast-food chain founded on the reasonable premise that meat pies that can upstage fashion models must have a global future.

New York’s first Pie Face is on Broadway at 53^rd Street, and it has people lining up daily for its expressive pastries. This is partly because it faces the people lining up to see David Letterman, but also because it has pie that you can justify as food.

The idea is not new in Australia, where meat pies sell like hot cakes, and where Pie Face already sells them in seventy jolly stores. It’s also not new in New York, which has for a while had Tuck Shop, which I wrote about when I thought it would be my one meat-pie post for the season.

But Tuck Shop is proud to have grown from one store to three in seven years, while Pie Face has the unmistakable look of an aspiring hand-food empire. It plans to turn New York into Pie City before turning America into pie country, its emotional crusts vanquishing our impassive burger buns.

I almost believed it could happen after a representative named Colbern Uhl presented me with a tray of six fresh hot Mini Pies. Not all of them were smiling, and one was missing an eye, but they were all delicious, including the ones I would never have ordered if I’d had to pay.

The pies’ various fillings are identified by their various mouths, which is why only one has the trademark smile, since the smile is also a C. The C identifies the Chicken & Mushroom Pie, which tastes like the one meat pie Americans embrace, which is chicken pot pie. If you’re intransigent, get that.

Kevin Nieves, the store manager, egg-washes your pie.

If not, try the S mouth, the Chunky Steak Pie, which tastes like chicken pot pie would taste if it were steak pot pie. It’s the most popular. Or try the M mouth, the Mince Beef & Tomato Pie, which is said to taste like shepherd’s pie but which I thought tasted like pizza pie.

The X mouth is the Mexican Pie, since the M was already taken. I expected it to be spicy, perhaps because it has jalapeño. But it wasn’t. The spiciest pie was the Tandoori Vegetable Pie, and even that wasn’t very spicy. It has a V mouth because a T doesn’t make a good mouth.

The O mouth is the special, which is currently the Thai Chicken Curry Pie, which like the others that sounded spicy is instead mild yet flavorful. I asked Colbern why its mouth is an O. “It’s saying, ‘Wow! I’m the special!’” she explained. “They talk?” I asked. “They talk,” she said. “If you want them to.”

Apparently, some customers would want them to, so that the pies could explain themselves. Colbern said that patrons are often baffled by savory pies. “They like them ’cause they’re smiling at them. But they want to know what a meat pie is. Once they have one, though, they come back for more.”

That’s what Wayne Homschek and Betty Fong discovered as the creators of the Australian fashion label Paablo Nevada. At a show, they thought it would be ironic to serve lowly meat pies with their high fashion. It was ironic. The crowd got more excited by the pies than by the fashion.

So the clothing designers became meat-pie entrepreneurs, taking branding inspiration from a smile face someone drew on a napkin. As an incidental irony, “pie-faced” is not exactly a compliment. But this is clearly the restaurant chain that could turn that around.

Along with the Mini Pies, Pie Face has regular pies, and along with the savory pies, it has sweet pies. The apple has an A mouth, the blueberry has a B mouth, and the cherry has a C mouth. Still, no one confuses it with chicken & mushroom.

The shop has soups, sandwiches, and sausage rolls, and coffee coded with scary faces. And it has stacks, which are meat pies topped with mashed potatoes, gravy, and peas. What it doesn’t have is a place to sit. You can stand at a counter or eat walking. Pie Face wants you to have an authentic Australian experience.

To that end, it also has an authentic Australian dessert called a lamington. It’s cubic sponge cake filled with raspberry jam and coated with chocolate and coconut.

I didn’t try it, since I ate six pies. And it doesn’t seem to be heavily promoted.

Maybe it won’t be. Still, be prepared for New York’s first Cake Face.

Get your fill at Pie Face, 1691 Broadway, at 53rd Street, in New York City.

Strangely New York: Stepping Out at B-Bap, Chickpea, and Nooi

B-Bap. It means rice. Sort of.

By Mitch Broder

If I took Step 1 at Chickpea, and Step 2 at My Maki, and Step 3 at Nooi, and Step 4 at B-Bap, I could have the Hummus with Tahini and Eel in Tomato Diablo Sauce topped with Organic Bacon Bits, plus Parmesan and Green Olives, since Nooi has a Step 5.

My Maki. Before.

But I can’t, since My Maki has just gone out of business, leaving me eelless, so for Step 2 at My Maki I’ll substitute Step 3 at B-Bap, because what could be better in Tomato Diablo Sauce than Julienned Eggs, unless it’s Bean Sprouts, which are 23 cents less?

The point here is not only that I can design a disgusting lunch. It is also that My Maki has just gone out of business. While this doesn’t delight me, it does suggest to me that people may have had their fill of places that require you to write the recipe for your food before you eat it.

The late My Maki (“Sushi How You Like it”) was one of the latest. It opened just last March, on 43^rd Street between Third and Lexington. It was proud of your work. In its window it posted a quote from UrbanDaddy exclaiming that “you’ll brainstorm, micromanage, and give birth.” And where better to do those things than a sushi bar?

My Maki. After.

In its Step 1, you chose from two Wraps. In Step 2, you chose from 10 Main Ingredients. In Step 3, you chose from 18 Other Ingredients, which included Craisins and Doritos. In Step 4, you chose from eight External Toppings, which included seven Dipping Sauces, which, perhaps for variety, were listed on the store’s menu board as Step 5.

After brainstorming and micromanaging, you could give birth to a soy-wrap eel roll with jalapeño, mango, sundried tomato, cream cheese, and Doritos, topped with crab mix and crunchy tempura, and dipped in citrus ponzu sauce. A few months after the opening I saw a guy at the corner holding up a My Maki sign. I was not surprised.

But for now, other four-step (or five-step) restaurants seem to be flourishing, no matter how much of their job they get you to do. The steps vary, sometimes at the same place, but all the spots give you the same chance to create something so vile that you’ll want to come back and try again.

Nooi. It means noodles. Sort of.

Nooi (“Pasta-to-Go”) is on Lex between 40^th and 41^st.  The experience here begins with the appetizing slogan “Simply pick your.” Step 1 is Size. You pick 26 or 32 ounces. Step 2 is Pasta. You pick regular or multigrain. Step 3 is Sauce; you pick from 11. Step 4 is Extras; you pick from six. Step 5 is 2 Free Toppings; you pick from another six. But at Nooi you can also pick different steps.

On its Web site, Step 1 is Step 2, and Step 2 is Step 1, and Step 4 is Customize Your Pasta, though Step 3 is still Sauce. And Step 5 is Add Salads, Drinks or Dessert, since Step 4 combines Steps 4 and 5, which doesn’t explain why only the sign in the store window refers to dessert  —though not to salads and drinks — as Step 6.

Chickpea (“Always baked. Never fried.”) has several stores besides the one I visited, which is on 45^th Street between Madison and Vanderbilt. Here you choose your format (pocket, wrap, platter, plate, or salad), and then you Select Your Hummus (original, basil & toasted pine nuts, roasted red pepper, jalapeño & scallions).

Chickpea. It means chickpea.

If you’re not yet fried, you Add Your Essentials, which include Falafel, Shawarma, Shawafel, Chicken Kebab, Chicken Breast, Chickplant, Lamb Turkey Kebab, and Chicken Cutlet. Then you can choose from Extras, including eggplant, avocado, and fries, except that Extras don’t count as a step, leaving Chickpea with just three.

B-Bap (“Fusion Rice Bar”) is on Ninth Avenue between 54^th and 55^th. Here “customers can design their own b-bap bowl.” Step 1 is Select Your Base. Step 2 is Select Your Protein. Step 3 is Select Your Toppings. Step 4 is Select Your Sauce/Garnish. Mostly, you’re mixing rice with meat, vegetables, and sauce/garnish, making B-Bap the place with the least room for bad judgment, and the only place I know with Julienned Eggs.

16 Handles. I assume they did the math.

If you’ve taken steps at one of these places but still want to step out for dessert, the logical next step is 16 Handles (“Frozen Yogurt Your Way”). The chain, which has several stores in the city, invites you to Select Your Cup Size, Fill with Yogurt, Add Toppings, Weigh and Pay. It claims “trillions of possibilities.”

I don’t want trillions of possibilities. I want a cup of chocolate.

Or a bowl of rice. Or a stack of falafel. Or a plate of noodles. OK, with sauce.

I am not alone, for New York has clearly rejected cream-cheese-Dorito sushi.

Though it may have been only because the Doritos didn’t work with the teriyaki.

Getting a handle.

Have it your way at B-Bap, Chickpea, Nooi, and 16 Handles, but not at My Maki.

Strangely New York: Will Masala Twist Be the Next Kung Fu Bing?

The new Masala Twist.

By Mitch Broder

If you miss having bings in a toilet, go and have kababs in the same toilet.

The Chinese pancakes are gone, but the urinal seats live on.

The late Kung Fu Bing.

A month ago I wrote of the demise of Kung Fu Bing, a Chinese fast-food restaurant on the Lower East Side. It had hoped to do for the bing, or pancake, what hamburgers did for the bun. It didn’t succeed. It failed first in Chinatown, which is like the latke failing in Borough Park.

It was gone so fast that I didn’t have a chance to eat a bing, though based on review words like “gummy” and “greasy,” I would have been a fan. But I was more fascinated by its seats, shiny white bowls on conical pedestals, which bore an uncanny resemblance to a modern male relief station.

More important, they looked uncomfortable, a condition that’s clearly trending in the gimmick-grounded fast-food joints that seem to open here hourly. I suggested that the plastic chairs played at least a subliminal role in the death of Kung Fu Bing. I praised New Yorkers for their refinement.

The Toto Toilets Model UT104E#01. 

But no sooner did I post than Kung Fu Bing was replaced by an Indian fast-food restaurant called Masala Twist. The owners, of course, changed the menu. They changed the signs. They changed the décor. Sort of. But they kept the seats. I reacted rationally. I took it as a personal attack.

Though it may be thrifty, it seems imprudent to furnish a fledgling restaurant with conspicuous reminders of a conspicuous predecessor that flopped. Twice. And it still seems imprudent to me to invite people to eat on things that evoke the opposite of eating. I will never give up.

Masala Twist has a compact menu with economical selections like Chicken Tikka, Shami Kabab, and Eggplant Masala. I think it hopes to do for masala, or spices, what Kung Fu Bing didn’t do for the bing. Its Web site suggests that they’d like you to refer to the store as “Twisty,” which I believe is Indian for “Mickey D’s.”

The Web site also says: “When you eat at Masala Twist, it is just like eating at households throughout India.” I have not eaten at households throughout India. But I’ll just bet that the residents don’t take their meals on leftover Chinese-pancake seats that look like they belong behind a door marked “Men.”

Size up the seating at Masala Twist, 189 East Houston Street, between Orchard and Ludlow streets, in Manhattan.