34th in TRANSITION

by Kevin Walsh

It’s one era of fast food giving way to another. The rubber steaks of Tad’s, shot through with teeth-jarring gristle, have surrendered to the prefab pizzas of Pizza Hut and the maple donuts of Tim Horton’s on 34th Street.

Update: I’m told something completely new is moving in, and Pizza Hut  and Horton’s are moving out too.

8/23/13

8 comments

John Sterbenz August 24, 2013 - 8:31 am

I have never set food in a Tad’s, but if their exterior signage is to be believed, there apparently used to be one in my hometown of Detroit, my much-closer-than-New York surrogate-in-a-pinch of Chicago, and my visit-every-year-city of Cincinnati.

For all my trips to New York, I’d never seen the 34th St. location. If it were near 34th and 7th, I would have had to walked by it. I’ve been intrigued by the one on Powell St. in San Francisco (still open as of 4/2013) and perhaps the NYC location that must have existed in Times Square. As of my last bit of searching in April, getting any information on the (former) Detroit or Chicago locations was fruitless.

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Mike August 24, 2013 - 8:57 am

Pizza Hut and Tim Hortons actually were in the same building as Tad’s. They all closed.

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Jon August 24, 2013 - 9:52 pm

I think they all closed, actually. I remember the Pizza Hut being open next to Tad’s there for several years. The same corner featured the Riese Restaurants Millennium Countdown clock in the late 90s.

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Tal Barzilai August 25, 2013 - 6:11 pm

At least I was able to go to one of their locations when it was still around, which was the one over at 47th Street and 7th Avenue over in Times Square.

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RM August 28, 2013 - 10:33 am

I’ve never been to Tad’s, but remember the signage since youth. sayonara!

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Linda August 30, 2013 - 7:45 pm

Used to eat at Tad’s back in the late ’60s-early ’70s. It wasn’t the best, but it was fun! Used to work in Macy’s so this was the nearest restaurant.

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Pat O'Rourke October 8, 2013 - 11:10 pm

I remember Tad’s and would dine their on payday. That and another site of questionable cuisine was The Blarney Stone Bar and Steak House. Although you could both eat and lace up and run down the street in the meat they served it was a unique experience for a 14 year old working his first job in Manhattan (Arnold and Constable across from The 42nd. St. Library)

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april July 7, 2015 - 5:01 am

Ah, Tad’s, particularly the one on 42nd off the corner of Fifth. I loved that place when I was a kid. Where else could you find a good-size and certainly decent NY strip with a large baked potato plus full salad (iceberg lettuce with chickpeas and Russian dressing, on the side 🙂 for that price? I think I once went to the one on or near 34th, but definitely remember a few lunches at The Blarney Stone (33rd near Eighth), unless that was a competitor. My coworker (who only shopped at Bloomie’s, a straight guy at that) devoured many a hot Virginia ham sandwich there and enticed me to do the same. I remember visiting one near the last incarnation of the Academy of Music on 14th by Union Square. Those surely were the days! As for Arnold Constable’s, it became B. Altman’s and Stern’s later on, I do believe, before becoming an arm of NYU. Please correct me if I’m wrong.

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