ometimes it seems like there's a new falafel shop opening in New York every day. They add up quickly, but rarely offer customers anything beyond ethnic fast food. Fortunately a restaurant like Pita Joe comes along every now and then to remind New Yorkers of the quality that they should demand from this type of restaurant. The pitas here are packed full of fresh falafel, chicken (breadcrumbed cutlet, spiced-up grilled breast), or vegtables (grilled eggplant/hard-boiled egg/hummus). Salads pile the above in ingredients onto a pile of greens (with some variations ike tomato salad w/ scallion & jalapeno, and cucumber salad w/ dill and lemon). The menu also offers curious delicacies like grilled eggplant nestled with a hard-boild egg and humus. And to wash it all down you can skip the North American carbonated poisons and instead enjoy some Turkish coffee with cardamom or one of a variety of homemade juices (lemon, raspberry, mango, etc.). Just because food is cheap and fast doesn't mean it has to be crap. It increases the chances of crap, but it certainly doesn't guarantee crap.—PB