One Dinner, One Breakfast, One Snack for the Train

[porcupine]

Overnight trip to NYC imminent.  Will be staying near Penn Station.  Need an early dinner in that area.  Nothing too pricey/fancy, open to any cuisine.  Also would rather not pay for hotel breakfast the next morning, and weather's supposed to be awful so would rather not go gallivanting about.  And maybe get something to go to eat on the train (departing Penn Station around 12:30).  Thanks!

[DonRocks]

Overnight trip to NYC imminent.  Will be staying near Penn Station.  Need an early dinner in that area.  Nothing too pricey/fancy, open to any cuisine.  Also would rather not pay for hotel breakfast the next morning, and weather's supposed to be awful so would rather not go gallivanting about.  And maybe get something to go to eat on the train (departing Penn Station around 12:30).  Thanks!

This thread deals directly with the Penn Station problem. You should browse this entire Help Needed forum (I try to title things well), and see if any other threads match up to what you're looking for - if so, please link to them here.

[cheezepowder]

You may already know, but fyi, the "Koreatown" area of Manhattan is right near Penn Station.  32nd Street between 5th and 6th Avenues has a bunch of Korean restaurants.  There's also a small grocery store and at least one bakery.  I don't have any particular recommendations for restaurants though.

I've been to the Korean bakery Paris Baguette (mentioned in the other Penn Station thread), which is a chain that I saw in Seoul.  Definitely the Korean style of pastry -- squishy white bread and both sweet and savory pastries (some in odd combinations and some are both sweet and savory).   I don't have specific recommendations, but I liked some pastries and not others.

[ktmoomau]

I like the stop at Eataly for my pre-train meal snack, but it isn't super close.  I don't know about price, but the Breslin isn't too far from that area for dinner perhaps.  Hill Country Chicken isn't also terribly far away. Or maybe HanJan?

[porcupine]

Thanks for the ideas.  We ended up going south for a late lunch/early dinner at Shanghai Cafe on Mott St (soup dumplings, spicy wontons, cold sesame noodles), then over to Rich to Riches (because my friend had never been there).   Found  great pour-over coffee at some random shop between the two (Nolita, maybe? ).  Where else but NYC...?  I was solo for breakfast and not very hungry so a bowl of oatmeal and lots of coffee at the Breslin worked out fine.  Afterwards finally made it to Joe the Art of Coffee, which was very good, but I'm pleased to say you can get just as good or better coffee in DC (but the density of good coffee shops is much lower, of course).  Train snack ended up being a forgettable grilled cheese sandwich from the hotel restaurant.

There's only one day left but if you're in NYC make it a priority to head to the Cloisters and listen to the Janet Cardiff installation of Thomas Tallis' 40-part motet.