Isn’t Momo the name of a mime or a chimp or something? Maybe I’m thinking of Coco, but either way the name doesn’t exactly inspire me to want to eat here. The odd cafeteria feel of the place doesn’t do anything to pique my interest either. The space is just, I don’t know, too open or something. The tables and chairs have wire legs, and they’re too spread out, and you can just see too much of the floor. Whatever, I got my food to go anyway. And by the looks of things, so did everyone else who was definitely not eating here. Maybe there are just too many food choices in the neighborhood to warrant a lunchtime rush? I had originally planned to get some sushi, but wasn’t inspired by what I saw. So I decided to play it safe and get the chicken teriyaki. Nobody needs one of those soul-sucking, Giambi worms crawling around their lower intestine. Things started off well when I opened the bag once I got it back to my office and found that they didn’t mess up my order, and did indeed give me something that most definitely resembled poultry. In fact, it seemed to be all-white medallions of chicken, minus the dark meat and cartilage that seems to make up a lot of the stuff out there. There was a dearth of sauce, though, and the stuff honestly looked like the chicken teriyaki I might make if I was to put my limited culinary skills to the test in my sweatbox of a kitchen. While the food was relatively tasteless, the grub seemed to be of a higher quality, and I didn’t at any time feel I was going to break my tooth or have to pull chunks of congealed fat from my incisors. Perhaps I’ll go back and give the raw fish a chance, but odds are I’ll run into one of the other 42 Japanese joints in the ‘hood on the way there. [MF]
947 8th Ave.
212/757-3502