S&P Lunch

The Formica Counter as a Dying Art Form

New York has lost a considerable number of its classic luncheonettes over the past two decades. The long Formica counter, the hand-written specials board, the server who remembers your usual order — these fixtures of mid-century Manhattan dining have been displaced by fast-casual formats, delivery-only operations, and the relentless churn of real estate economics. Finding a spot that preserves the form without trading on nostalgia alone is increasingly difficult. S&P Lunch, at 174 5th Avenue in the Flatiron district, is one of the few places in Manhattan that genuinely qualifies.

The luncheonette tradition it belongs to is distinct from the diner in important ways. Where the classic American diner skews large — booths, laminated menus running six pages, all-day breakfast at highway scale , the luncheonette operates as a leaner, counter-forward format built around the midday meal. Tuna melts, club sandwiches, egg salad, coffee egg creams: these are its native vocabulary, and S&P works within that vocabulary with evident commitment. Opinionated About Dining, which tracks quality across price tiers with as much rigour as it applies to fine dining, placed S&P on its 2025 Cheap Eats list for North America, with specific mention of the smash burgers, turkey clubs, egg salad, and the pickle service that frames each plate.

What the Menu Signals

The dishes at S&P are worth reading as a set, not individually. Smash burgers, turkey clubs, and egg salad occupy different corners of the American lunch canon, and pulling them off consistently , each with its own structural requirements , is harder than the format suggests. A smash burger demands precise griddle heat and timing; a turkey club needs layering discipline and bread that can hold the weight; egg salad requires seasoning confidence and a willingness to let the egg be the point rather than something masked with excess mayonnaise. The OAD citation describes the egg salad specifically as "a dandy," which in that publication's editorial register is a considered compliment.

Pickle service is worth noting as a measure of care. Crisp and sour pickles served alongside sandwiches are a standard of the format that many places now skip or substitute with something sweeter and softer. That S&P maintains the correct pickle , genuinely sour, genuinely crisp , suggests the kitchen is calibrated to the tradition rather than approximating it. The coffee egg cream mentioned in the OAD listing is a New York-specific item with a devoted following; the publication notes endorsing it despite it not being a personally familiar variant, which reads as a signal of quality above expectation.

Flatiron as a Lunch Context

Flatiron district sits between Chelsea to the south and Midtown to the north, with Madison Square Park anchoring its northeastern edge. It is a lunch-dense neighbourhood by the nature of its office population and its position between residential Brooklyn commuter flows and Midtown's heavier foot traffic. The dining options in the immediate area run from fast-casual salad and grain bowl formats to sit-down Italian and the occasional tasting menu outlier. Within that field, the luncheonette counter format is a minority position.

Neighbourhood also sits at a meaningful distance from the grand tasting-menu tier that defines New York's most discussed dining, places like Le Bernardin, Atomix, and Eleven Madison Park. S&P occupies a different part of the city's eating map entirely, one where the measure of quality is execution at an everyday price point rather than innovation or ambition. That separation is not a limitation; it is a different category with its own standards, and OAD's Cheap Eats list exists precisely to track performance within it.

For context across the broader American sandwich and counter-service category, comparable operations that have earned similar editorial recognition include Beecher's Handmade Cheese in Seattle and Ben's Chili Bowl in Washington, D.C. , each operating within a specific regional format with documented staying power. Within New York's own sandwich and bakery tier, Amy's Bread and 'wichcraft represent adjacent parts of the daytime eating scene, though with different format logic.

The Case for Craft at This Scale

It is worth considering what the OAD listing signals about how quality is distributed in New York's eating economy. The same organisation that tracks fine dining at the level of Alinea in Chicago, The French Laundry in Napa, Lazy Bear in San Francisco, Single Thread Farm in Healdsburg, Providence in Los Angeles, and Emeril's in New Orleans also maintains a Cheap Eats list , a recognition that rigorous execution is not the exclusive property of expensive formats. S&P's inclusion in the 2025 North America edition places it in a curated set of counter-service and casual operations that met a specific editorial threshold.

Its Google rating of 4.6 across 499 reviews adds a separate layer of evidence. At that volume, the score represents sustained performance rather than a cluster of enthusiastic early reviews. Combined with the OAD citation, it suggests a kitchen that produces consistently rather than occasionally.

The editorial angle at S&P is, in a sense, the angle of preservation. The techniques here , smash patty on a hot griddle, club sandwich architecture, egg salad calibration , are not evolving toward new territory. They are holding a position that the broader market has abandoned. That is a valid and increasingly rare contribution to a city's eating life.

Frequently Asked Questions

What's the leading thing to order at S&P Lunch?

Opinionated About Dining's 2025 Cheap Eats citation calls out the smash burgers, turkey clubs, and egg salad as the core of what S&P does well, with crisp sour pickles as the standard accompaniment. The coffee egg cream is also specifically endorsed. Each of those items sits within the classic American luncheonette format, and the OAD write-up frames all of them as properly executed rather than merely adequate. If you are visiting for the first time, the egg salad and a smash burger together give a reasonable read on the kitchen's calibration across two different technical demands.

For more eating and drinking options in this part of Manhattan, see our full New York City restaurants guide, our full New York City bars guide, our full New York City hotels guide, our full New York City wineries guide, and our full New York City experiences guide.