I just went to METRO Marché at 30 West 57th Street for the first time and was dazzled by the menu choices and the freshness of everything served! This is a place that really caters to the daytime crowd as it closes at 6 PM on Monday through Friday and at 4 PM on weekends. Many local shoppers, workers and visitors have been taking a slight detour off Fifth Avenue to dine at METRO Marché—which is fast becoming their “go to” spot for super fast, ultra high quality eats. You can get a big bowl, salad and drink for about $20!
MM has a basic glass serving station right in the center of the front room that is divided into salad bar, and sandwich areas. There are separate lines of customers for each one which makes things easier that having one long line. Drinks and desserts are in refrigerator cases about ten feet from the serving station and there is a great diversity of both. For instance, there are health oriented drinks and not just your standard soft drinks like Coke and Sprite. The desserts range from American baked classics, to French-influenced pastries to homemade chocolate energy bites for those who like to live the low carb lifestyle.
As you can see, everything looks like it was freshly picked at MM’s salad bar section. There are more veggies. You can get a giant salad with several toppings and a choice of about 8 homemade dressings for $8.95 or $9.95. As you can see, veggies include carrots, beets, corn, red onions, green and red peppers, broccoli, chickpeas, kidney beans and more. But you can knock your personal salad bar out of the ballpark taste-wise by adding some bite items from the hot food section where the best bowls in midtown are created!
METRO Marché has so many kinds of chicken and roasted veggies behind the hot food counter that your eyes will open up wide and you will want about six bowls with at least four items in each of them. You start out with a base of couscous, white rice or brown rice and pick three or four items to go on top. I noticed that a lot of people on line with me were asking for the fried chicken, but I made a bee line for the Thai chicken and the shish kabob and sided them with the amazing roasted Brussels sprouts. Even though this is a hot food station, you might notice a large dish of unadvertised cucumber and avocado salad nearby that is the best kept secret by everyone but the regulars. Many folks have this incredibly tasty and healthy salad as a side to their hot bowl, or even added to their bowl. The MM bowls generally run about $11-13, so they give great bang for the buck—plus you get free bread!
Here is my fabulous bowl of shish kebab (juicy chicken cubes barbecued with onions and zucchini), cubes of Thai chicken and roasted Brussels sprouts. I rate this as one of the best bowls that I have ever had. As a low carb dieter, it’s hard to find tasty bowls because you can’t really have any grains as a base. This bowl is very well seasoned but ask for some of MM’s homemade hot sauce to put the flavor over the top. You can also ask for one of the salad dressings to put on any of the hot bowls. A lot of people get a bowl with the fried chicken and get the honey mustard dressing to pour on it.
In case you are curious about what the aforementioned cucumber and avocado salad looks like since it is not pictured on the menu, here ya go! It included red onions, tomatoes and a mix of fresh herbs including basil. This is a side and it honestly is so large that it would count as a full size portion anywhere else. There is absolutely no guilt in eating anything with this many nutrients!
If you are curious what my friend Gail Worley of worleygig.com (a super fun food and art blog) had, you can see that she went with a bowl composed of the much-raved-about fried chicken, homemade Mac ‘n Cheese and roasted carrots. There are so many great recipes pasted veggies in the hot bowl section, you probably can come up with 100 different combos when you throw in some protein!
Pictured above is the sandwich counter which also had an incredible selection and when I saw four different people order the Caprese sandwich, I knew that I had to get one the next time I came to MM! They are big enough for two people to share and the staff will eat them up for you by request. You can spot some of the great bakery items on top of the case including some of the Big Apple’s most buttery and sizable croissants, several flavors of muffins and amazing looking bear claws!
There is plenty of seating both in front and in back of MM, which the glass counters where you order smack dab in the middle of the restaurant. I love the community table in front the best. Some great food commentary has been made here…as well as some fast friends. Check out the menu and great prices for yourself at metromarche.com . They offer delivery and pickup and the mornings are quite bustling since they open at seven. During the week you have every executive in midtown picking up their breakfast before heading into their offices!
