Lenny’s Cafe

I’ve always been a fan of Lenny’s sandwiches and salad. Food is definitely 4 stars but this review warrants a 2.5 stars.
Lenny’s has fresh ingredients for their salads and sandwiches but they recently «upgraded» to a new menu which increased the price (e.g., an average of $ 1 – 2 on sandwiches and salads). After my recent visits, I thought what a major ripoff to get a salad here. The portions are small; they give you a tiny scope and add-​on are like ridiculously expensive.
Yes, sandwiches have unique favors (e.g., Russia dressing on the ‘Emma,’ — my all time fave. However, for $ 9 – 10 a sandwich, I might as well head over to a different deli/​sandwich place. Sorry Lenny’s, instead of wasting money on store renovation, I’d imagine reasonable pricing is surely the strategy to ensure customer loyalty. Lenny’s may be well-​known for having fresh ingredients but perhaps not customer retention.

I actually really like this place. I went to the new location located in the Financial District.
The menu here is huge I literally did not know what to get. Initially I was going to get a sandwich but once I saw the hot buffet I took a detour over there.
The food was really good. For the hot buffet for $ 9.95 you get to choose 1 meat and 3 sides, and they LOAD the food up. It was so much food I could only eat half of it I had to save the other half. I ordered rigatoni with eggplant, chicken marsala and mac and cheese. It was pretty enjoyable for fast food. I will definitely be going back to try the sandwiches.

The staff was very nice, but the service was very slow. They seemed to have a lot of call-​in orders. The sandwich, while made correctly, was terrible, because the ingredients were just pretty gross, and the sandwich was overpriced even for a financial district lunch.

This whole chain is such a damn ripoff. Which is really disappointing because it’s so close to where I live, and I want to love it, because the actual food quality is not bad, but I just can’t. They charge for every little thing you put in your sandwich, do to your sandwich. $ 0.50 for a different kind of bread. $ 1 for three craisins. My coworkers and I order from the upper east side location, and once they tacked on an extra $ 2 solely because it was an open faced sandwich rather than a regular sandwich (this was the manager’s explanation). Wouldn’t «closing» the sandwich require more «labor»? lol.
After this event my coworker swore off the place but I still was going, out of convenience.
Sadly I have noticed that this location is even stingier than the uptown one I am used to. Every time I order a salad, large or small, the container is HALF filled. These salads run about $ 8 for a small, and you’re going to skimp on lettuce that costs you nothing?! Ugh. (Please see my photo, it’s really quite amusing… except that it’s my money.)
A small bagel with skimpily applied veggie cream cheese will run you $ 3.50.
Ah yes, and that $ 1 delivery charge «due to ever increasing costs», that every other business in nyc manages to get past, and still offer free delivery. Love it.
I don’t know where one gets «inexpensive» from this place, for what you get. I am accustomed to high NYC prices but I know when I’m getting played.
The whole company is grimey if you ask me.

My friend and I came here for a late lunch. The place is a fast food sandwich shop, kind of like Subways; except this place has a wider variety of breads, and ingredients.
I ordered the Teriyaki Chicken sandwich on a hero and I was able to split it with my friend. The amount of chicken on that sandwich was too much for me to handle. I recently started eating meat again and so I don’t know if regular meat eaters would fee the same. The price was on the expensive side, around $ 9.00 because it was on a hero but if you get it on whole wheat it’s around $ 7.00.
Overall the experience was quite pleasant, hoping to head over there again for lunch!

In the barren wastelands of the Financial District, one sandwich shop stands alone. That sandwich shop is not Lenny’s, it makes the discussion but ultimately falls short of total victory.
Lets go through the good and bad aspects of Lennys, a slowly growing chain in NYC that puts Subway (its main competition) to shame.
The good:
–Accuracy is strong. I have ordered from here several times and have not had the wrong ingredients in my sandwich.
–Economies of scale and efficiency. This fast casual chain is run lean and purrs along almost as efficiently as a Chipotle yet it has about 10X the amount of ingredients and combinations. The staff is well-​trained and takes their job seriously, a step up from the Just Salad location a block away.
–Ingredients are better than what you would find at a Potbelly Sandwich Shop or Subway. Customization options aplenty with choices for toppings and additional items to add to your salads or sandwiches so you can stray as far or as close to the menu as you please.
The bad:
–Value proposition. We aren’t even in the same ballpark as a $ 5 footlong, a Lenny’s sandwich will set you back an Alexander Hamilton without taking into account drinks or chips. The size of the sandwiches are small in comparison to other places in the area.
–As an add-​on to value proposition, just try ordering extra veggies or extra meat on your sandwich. You will get charged a $ 1 extra but the increase in price doesn’t come through in the finished product. It is exactly the same as the regular sandwich except they squeeze extra money out of you.
You could do worse and overall Lenny’s is a safe choice to grab lunch with some co-​workers.

The salads here are kind meh, there’s so many other places in the area that have better salads. Um they’re also expensive!
I just bought a salad with spinach, chickpeas, tomatoes, cucumbers and zucchini and it cost me $ 10.07. WTF! I could have went to Yorganics a few blocks away and gotten an all organic produce salad with numerous toppings for the same price!
On another occasion I got a wrap during lunch and they charged me $ 10 because I asked to have hummus added to the veggie wrap. When I got to my office I realized they didn’t add the hummus. I won’t be going back here again.
Go to Yorganics, they’re fresh, organic and extremely reasonably priced.

Prices on menu don’t reflect the cash register, Isn’t that illegal?
Sandwiches are pretty decent. Lots of choices. It definitely has that chain feel, like the people who work there are’t tied into the product in any way, just on shift.

Consistently quick yet great service. Variety of great deli sandwiches.
Recommendations:
Spicy Grilled Chicken
Chicavo
Tonkatsu
C3
#1
Western Omelet Platter
Check it out!

It was just okay. The sandwich itself wasn’t anything that I thought. You could customize the sandwich how you wanted, but you will get nickeled and dimed for every single change you make to your sandwich. I don’t mind paying a bit extra for having the items that I want, but there are other alternative places to visit and eat. I was on a tour and we happened to end in front of this place. I wish I would have walked around to try an alternative.

Worst customer service ever. I’d never been there before and didn’t get any help from anyone while ordering, I felt very rushed. The ordering system is overly complicated.
My salad was doused in dressing, just awful. The Turkey club was not bad, but you can’t really mess that up. The sandwiches don’t come with anything and they don’t have fries or chips there. Thus the small side salad which cost $ 4.
Their beverages prices are out of whack and are not labelled in the case. How is an 8.5oz soda 50 cents more than a 20oz? She scanned the smaller more expensive one and swiped my card before I could say anything. I said I wanted to swap it for the 20 oz one since it was a better deal. She wouldn’t refund my order and redo it, instead said that it was «only a 20 cents difference» and if I «really wanted the 20 cents». First of all, it was a 50 cents difference, but besides that I shouldn’t have to deal with the attitude when all I’m trying to do is get lunch.
Ended up spending $ 16 on a sub par sandwich, a salad with wilty lettuce and drenched in awful caesar dressing, and a drink I paid 50 cents more than I should have. Never again, so many better places to eat in this area!

Love customizing your sandwiches?
Love having it brought to you while it pours outside?
me too.
Lenny’s delivers hearty and reliable sandwiches that are more convenient than they are reasonable but you cant be mad at that when your lazy ass doesnt want to walk in the rain, right?
figured so.
I love me some turkey and cheese. Nothing fancy. But tasty and sufficient!
These guys are my hero for always coming thru when i need them. Delivery doesnt take too long either.
Thumbs up!

This Lenny’s location is right by my apartment. While I have never had one of their signature deli sandwiches which I hear are quite good, I have ordered breakfast here on a number of occassions.
A number of occassions being on the weekends when my boyfriend is too lazy to get breakfast and I venture out while he’s still fast asleep under the covers.
I always get an omelette and he usually gets a ham, egg and cheese on an everything bagel.
I can’t complain. My omelette is always good, nicely sized and I never wait long for my order.
My boyfriend on the other hand is a breakfast sandwich snob and I have to give minus one star because he doesn’t particularly love theirs.
Poor Lenny. I’m sorry you have to put up with my pretentious bagel loving boyfriend.

Lenny’s #1.
Pastrami, cole slaw, corned beef, cheese, dressing.
Amazing.
Oh, and the cookies for dessert. Makes me a happy dude.
Slight drawback was delivery was slow (and let’s face it, minutes feel like hours when you are waiting for hot pastrami!) and the sandwich got a lil soggy from delivery.

Went here on a whim for a quick morning bite and was not overly impressed with the customer service. I felt kinda rushed and not readily helped by the workers there.
The food however was on par with an average deli/​salad place that had a hot grill for morning and lunch.
The bagel was average and I was not impressed but there are not better options for bagel in the immediate area. I have had their bagel at other locations and they seem better.

C4

Great, fast, clean New York City style Deli. Everything you want, nothing more or less.
Personally, I have tried a bunch of their sandwiches (and am a big fan), but after I had the Hot Pastrami and Corned Beef on Marbled Rye (#1), I never tried another. Once you eat the perfect sandwich, why try others?

Lenny’s is right down the block from my office. It’s been over eighty-​five degrees down here as of late, and who wants to walk halfway through the financial district when it’s that hot?
I used to work in midtown and had access to Toasties, the greatest sandwich shop in all of everywhere. They make a Thanksgiving sandwich that is utterly delicious, and I’ve been looking for a replacement here. There’s some fake Toasties on John St, but I’m not going there — I’m loyal to the original. I am happy to say, however, that Lenny’s makes a fine Thanksgiving sandwich (the H1, I believe). Fresh turkey, gravy, cranberry sauce, stuffing. That’s a fine sandwich right there — and it’s good.
Their other sandwiches are good too. If you’re looking for a sandwich that’s larger than your head, go elsewhere — these are well sized. I’m certainly not hungry for at least a few hours afterwards.
It’s a reliable sandwich shop. What more do you need?

I like this place. It has a bright, clean and welcoming atmosphere. Whenever I go, I walk in like a regular and order the Jimmy T. sandwich on whole wheat bread. It’s consistent in taste every time; it’s like I’m eating the classy adult version of a McDonald’s chicken sandwich! Grilled sweet onions? Check! Yellow banana peppers for tang? Check! Oozy mozzarella? Check! Freshly breaded chicken cutlet? Check! Honey Mustard? Check! Toasted bread? Check!
What can I say? Jimmy T. is my kind of man, I mean, comfort food!

Worst, smallest pastrami sandwich in the city.
I thought they only gave me half a sandwich, by mistake.
The ordeing system and line are totally retarded. Speed and efficiency are good, but the ordering etc system is confusing and they mess up orders a lot. Any random deli is better than this crap.