I was walking up 6th Ave in the twenties and saw a truck on the SE corner of 26th St and 6th Ave that I had not seen before. After doing a little research, I saw that UltraClay had recently written about this truck on Midtown Lunch.
He called it the NYC Mobile Eatery (the old name on the front and side of the truck), but when I was ordering, I noticed a sign next to the window that said Empanadas Paradise. When I asked for a menu to take away, it also said Empanadas Paradise, and it said they had homemade Argentinian food.
I was originally thinking of getting the Argentinian lomito, a monster sandwich with steak, ham, egg, cheese, lettuce and tomato, but once I saw the name, the deal was sealed. If a dish is in a restaurant’s name, try that dish first.
Today’s Lunch is a beef, a chicken and a cheese empanada ($2 each of 3 for $5) from Empanadas Paradise.
The first empanada I tried was beef (below). It was pretty thick with seasoned ground beef and onions. The beef wasn’t heavily spiced, but it had a nice flavor, like it was cooked in beef broth or something like that, with a little lemon juice in there too.
I was a little surprised there were no raisins in the mix, which I’ve previously had in beef empanadas, and thought was traditional in Argentinian empanadas. Nevertheless, this was a good empanada for $2.
The next one I tried was the chicken empanada (below). It was a chicken version of the beef empanada with a nice pocket of seasoned ground chicken and onions that seemed like it was cooked in chicken broth for extra flavor. It looked like there was some paprika in there, but there was a tanginess in the chicken that wasn’t in the beef. My guess is he put in a touch too much lemon juice. It was still pretty tasty, though.
I’m glad that I left the cheese empanada for the end, because it was more like dessert. You can see below that it really flattened out on the way back to my office, and was a fraction of the thickness of the beef and chicken empanadas. It was sprinkled lightly with sugar, and the cheese was a sweet cheese as well, like you get in cheese blintzes. This was a nice way to end the meal.
Today’s Lunch from Empanadas Paradise was pretty good. The empanada crust was a tad chewy on the bites without filling, and there was more oil on the lunch bag than there should have been. But the empanada fillings were tasty, and 3 for $5 is an excellent deal.
Next time I want to try the lomito sandwich, but I need to be a little hungrier than I was today.
