New York food: 'Rice' is nice

Last weekend, my friend and I packed our bags and boarded a bus destined for New York City. There, we met up with a good friend of ours who attends art school in Manhattan. After catching up over cappuccinos in Union Square, we decided to get some food at a place on 53rd and Sixth that all of us had heard much about and were dying to try.

By the time we arrived there, it was already 12:45 a.m. and pouring rain. Well, we had come all the way from Maryland, so we figured that we might as well just tough it out. Besides, we believed that the line probably wouldn't be very long in these conditions anyway.

Oh, how wrong I was. Even though New York is the "city that never sleeps," this was a little ridiculous.

We waited for about 45 minutes in a line that stretched down the entire block. We jumped around and huddled together for warmth. I looked around enviously at the boots people around me were wearing. Like a true Marylander, I was accustomed to wearing flip-flops everywhere and today was no exception.

For all this pain and misery, you may be wondering exactly what this New York food Mecca was. Bobby Flay? Masaharu Morimoto? The McDonald's in Times Square?

No, no and definitely not.

It was nothing more than a humble cart on the side of the road that served halal gyros. I call it Chicken and Rice, but according to Wikipedia it is also known as "The Spot, the Godfather or the G-spot." When our wait was finally over, we each paid $6 flat for the "combo," which consisted of chicken, gyro meat, yellow rice, iceberg lettuce and pita bread in a round tin.

Mimicking the actions of the true New Yorkers there, we each took a bottle of "secret sauce" — there always seems to be a "secret sauce" — and gave our platters a good coating. Unable to find a place to sit indoors, we settled for an outdoor courtyard adjacent to the Museum of Modern Art and proceeded to dig in.

I thought that Chick-fil-A made the best chicken, that Chipotle had the whole chicken mixed with rice thing down and that there was no way this platter in front of me would make the wait worth it. But I was wrong again — so wrong.

That platter of Chicken and Rice was like manna from Heaven. I think the word "orgasmic" is just too cliché to describe good food, so I'm going to settle with saying that it was just plain and simply scrumdiddlyumptious.

I know that a trip to New York City is out of the question for many right now. But after finals, consider taking a day trip there just to experience Chicken and Rice. Hide your tourist-y self by having $6 on the ready and by casually saying you want a "combo." Don't forget the secret sauce. And finally, I must impart unto you a word of caution: After trying this, you will be wholly disappointed with all the food joints that you thought were good in College Park.

Angelina She is a freshman neurobiology and physiology major. She can be reached at she at umdbk dot com.