They use the term “restaurant” loosely here. I mean generally restaurants don’t have benches bolted to the floor, lighted menu boards behind the counter and sun-toasted old photos of their food in the front window. On top of that, restaurants don’t generally make you wait at the aforementioned counter while they reheat your food from under glass. Generally. So let’s call this what it is: a pizza joint. And as a pizza joint, it’s just average. And who, with all the options in NYC, wants to put up with just average? Granted, I ate not a slice but my go-to at greasy pizza joints like this one: a chicken roll. And while 99% of all fake Italians and 37% of all other people know that chicken rolls are made with fucking chicken cutlets and not chopped up white meat, this joint just missed the gondola. I mean when you dip your chicken roll into the little cup of sauce, tipping the just chewed end toward gravitational South, the last thing you want is your fowl filling tumbling out into the cup and all over your orange, plastic tray. And that’s why you use a cutlet. No mess, no fuss — the perfect self-contained food. Suck it, Belmora. You defile the good name of the chicken roll and all it stands for. Stupid one-percenters. [MF]
139 E 57th St.
212/935-2080