Poke Bowl in Hell's Kitchen: Red Poke on Ninth Avenue

Red Poke sits at 598 9th Avenue on the corner of 43rd Street, and its kitchen runs seven days a week from 11am to 9pm. If you typed poke bowl near me somewhere between Port Authority and the Theater District, this is the Hell's Kitchen counter that answers with Korean seasoning rather than a strictly Hawaiian shoyu profile. A medium Red Poke Bowl is $15.25 on the shop's own ordering page, and the whole menu is listed as dairy free.

The shop says it has been serving the neighborhood since 2016, which makes it one of the longer-running poke counters on the West Side. Owner Ray Park also co-founded Seoul Fried Chicken Co., according to a January 2023 WhatNow report about his plans for a new Korean concept in Midtown. That background explains the menu: gochujang-style heat, yuja citrus, perilla and kimchi aioli show up next to the expected ahi and salmon.

Red Poke runs a second shop at 885 8th Avenue at 53rd Street, for anyone working closer to Columbus Circle. Both keep the same 11am to 9pm schedule, and the website frames those hours around pickup and delivery, so think of it as a fast counter built for a quick meal rather than a long sit-down evening.

Salmon Dreamin' is the gentler option: raw salmon, avocado, edamame, wakame, red onion and crispy shallot dressed in citrus ponzu, at $15.25 for a medium. For something that tastes more like Seoul, the Young Sook Lee bowl mixes ahi and salmon with cucumber, red cabbage slaw, masago, scallion and crispy shallot under a yuja chojang sauce, and it starts at $13.75.

The Creamy Wasabi bowl pairs ahi and salmon with red tobiko, turmeric ginger and a perilla wasabi sauce, also from $13.75. The herbal perilla note in that sauce rounds off some of the wasabi's sharpness. Order it with extra cucumber if you are eating it on a bench later, since the sauce keeps soaking into the rice.

Not everyone in a group wants raw fish, and Red Poke handles that better than most poke counters. The Seoul Bowl brings bulgogi beef with red cabbage slaw, crispy onion and sesame aioli for $13.75 medium. The Gangnam bowl combines grilled garlic shrimp with herb chicken and kimchi aioli at $15.25 medium, and Hell's Veggie uses grilled organic tofu for vegetarians at $13.75.

This fall the counter added a seasonal bowl built on maple-wood smoked pork belly, priced at $15.75 for a medium. It is the richest thing on the menu and the one we would pick on a cold October evening. Skip it at lunch if you are heading back to a desk, though; the pork belly plus sesame-heavy toppings make for a heavy afternoon.

Two small sides round things out. Bao buns are $5 each and dumplings are $6.50 for four. A bao alongside a medium bowl is a sensible order for one hungry person, and two orders of dumplings split across a table work as a starter while the bowls are assembled.

If none of the signature combinations fit, the build-your-own route costs $13.75 for a medium and $16.50 for a large. You choose a base, protein, sauces and toppings in sequence on the create-your-bowl page or at the counter. The mistake first-timers make is stacking three sauces; the wasabi Red Poke sauce and the yuja chojang already carry plenty of flavor on their own.

A balanced custom bowl here usually means one fish, one crunchy topping such as crispy shallot, one fresh element like cucumber or red cabbage slaw, and one sauce. Diners with allergies can download the Dietary Info sheet linked from the homepage, which the shop updated in August 2026, and the dairy-free kitchen makes the counter easy for lactose-intolerant friends.

The location puts it in the path of weekday office lunches around 42nd Street and of theatergoers grabbing dinner before 7pm and 8pm curtains. Arriving right at 11am or after 1:30pm on weekdays avoids most of the noon rush. Before matinees on Wednesdays and weekends, the 5pm to 6:30pm window gets busy with ticket holders eating fast.

Spinach.guide describes the room as cozy and fast-casual, notes the space is wheelchair accessible, and that the restroom needs a key from staff, so ask at the counter rather than trying the door. Reviewers on the same listing describe the staff as quick, and the shop holds a 4.6 Google rating across roughly 1,560 reviews.

Plan B if the line is out the door: the 8th Avenue location at 53rd Street is a ten-block walk north and the natural backup when the 43rd Street counter is swamped. Ordering ahead through the shop's Square page for pickup is the simplest fix on rainy days, when delivery riders crowd the counter.

Carry your bowl west toward the Hudson and the Intrepid Museum at Pier 86, West 46th Street and 12th Avenue, which is open daily from 10am to 5pm. The walk along 43rd or 44th Street passes Hell's Kitchen walk-ups and small theaters, and it takes about twelve minutes to reach the river.

If you would rather eat in a park, head east instead. Bryant Park, between 40th and 42nd Streets and Fifth and Sixth Avenues, has movable chairs and tables, and it is a fifteen-minute walk across Times Square. It is the better choice when the river wind picks up in late October.

Address: 598 9th Avenue at West 43rd Street, New York, NY 10036. Hours: daily 11am to 9pm. Nearest subway: the A, C and E trains at 42 Street–Port Authority Bus Terminal, about a block east. Signature bowls start at $13.75 for a medium; the Red Poke Bowl is $15.25 medium and $18.00 large. Bao buns cost $5 and four dumplings cost $6.50. Order online through redpoke.square.site for pickup or delivery.