kogi truck

los angeles, ca

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one of the kogi trucks parks outside of my office building EVERY WEDNESDAY. so dangerous. the food is extremely heavy, but so delicious. i've tried the kogi dog - hot dog topped with kimchi and mayo; the blackjack quesadilla - grilled tortillas with spicy pork, onions, and cheese; the short rib tacos; and the short rib burrito. all of them are amazing. all of them are super greasy. it looks like there are a lot of vegetables in the picture, but that's only a crunchy topping to what is greasy meat, mayonnaise, and cheese underneath. southern california's healthy vibe might be rubbing off on me because i haven't been back to the kogi truck in a while - it's just too much for lunch. try it, but don't make it a habit.

gourdough's

austin, tx

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believe it or not, we went to get doughnuts after eating at the hula hut. and not just any doughnuts. we went to gourdough's - a famous austin gourmet doughnut truck. it's located in one of the food truck parking lots which dot the austin landscape. (can we start doing that here in palo alto, please?) i ordered the flying pig - a freshly fried doughnut topped with several strips of bacon and maple syrup icing. the doughnut itself is the highlight for me, it's fried perfectly - crispy shell on the outside and soft and chewy on the inside. the toppings were a bit too intense for me, but still delicious.

chairman bao

sf bay area, ca

link to twitter

i've seen this food truck featured on numerous tv shows and in numerous magazine articles, but it's usually parked up north, in san francisco. i was thrilled to find out last week that it would actually be parked right outside my office building in palo alto. it's so much easier when good food comes to me rather than vice versa. their menu has steamed buns, which are small white mantao pockets (pictured on the right). the menu also offers baked buns, which are much larger (as you can see on the left).

not that you can tell from my blog, but i'm trying to eat a little healthier. when faced with chairman bao's amazing menu, i decided to order the steamed bun with pork belly (smaller portion of pork belly) and the baked bun with tofu (larger portion of healthy tofu). what i actually received was a steamed bun with spicy chicken and a massive baked bun with ridiculous amounts of pork belly. i did not discover this discrepancy until i had already walked the 20 yards back to my office. clearly too far to turn back, right? the pork belly was crispy and fatty, the baked bun was slightly sweet, and the pickled radish balanced the flavors - very very good. i hope they come back.

korilla bbq

twitter

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los angeles has the famous kogi truck, which started the whole korean taco movement. what is it with so many food movements these days? anyway, i've never been able to try the kogi truck, but nyc finally got its own version with the korilla bbq truck. every day, people vote on its website to determine the next day's lunch location. midtown east won a few weeks ago. once again, jenny and i found ourselves waiting in a very long line with a lot of other asians.

the korilla truck was relatively new when we went, so it was still working out some of the kinks. there was an overwhelming amount of options - type of meat, type of veggies, type of sauce, type of kimchi, cheese or no cheese, even salsa? i enjoyed the cucumber kimchi - it reminded me of the spicy cucumbers my mom used to make. but frankly, the korean tacos were just alright. kimchi + bulgogi is always going to taste good, but i didn't find anything interesting about adding it to a taco. the corn tortillas were dry and overpowered the rest of the taco. it's a novel idea, but the execution needs some work.

heartschallenger

mulberry & spring

website

jenny and i were shopping in nolita when we came cross this little pink truck parked near desalvio playground. we were intrigued by the cute truck and its unique menu, which includes mochi ice cream and neapolitan ice cream sandwiches.

jenny tried the orange popsicle, which had frozen chunks of orange inside - she said it was very refreshing. my green tea popsicle (which was $2) was a tiny little popsicle, but delicious. it was essentially rich green tea ice cream on a stick. yum. it's a perfect little treat on a hot summer day.

big gay ice cream truck

check twitter

website

i have been trying to find this truck for several weeks now. the problem is that it looks like a normal mister softee truck. so whenever derek and i walked by a mister softee, i would check to see if it had a picture of a large rainbow-colored ice cream cone on the side. there are a LOT of mister softee trucks in the city, so its been a laborious process. but turns out the truck is on twitter, which is very helpful. i finally managed to catch the truck on 17th and broadway on friday afternoon.

the menu had several excellent options, including an ice cream sandwich made with nutella. but, of course, i had to order the "salty pimp" - a cone with traditional soft-serve vanilla ice cream, covered with dulce de leche, sea salt, and then dipped with chocolate. as you can see from the photo, i attempted to start eating it while walking back to my apartment. it was extremely unwieldy - the chocolate coating and ice cream were too soft and melting quickly in the 90+ degree weather. i walked very quickly back to my apartment and stuck the cone in my freezer. a couple of hours later, derek and i enjoyed an excellent frosty treat. the ice cream had turned to a frozened mousse-like texture and the chocolate turned into a crunchy shell. the sea salt provided a lovely contrast to the caramel and chocolate. if you're a salty caramel fan, this is the cone for you.

cupcake stop

new york, ny

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christine and val's tour of manhattan continued after the west village through chelsea and the limelight marketplace. the building was originally a church dating back to the 19th century. it became a nightclub in the 1980s and has now been turned into a collection of boutiques where shoppers can worship at the altar of lesportsac. past all of the shops is a gourmet food marketplace with various types of baked goods, meats, cheeses, and coffee.

i led christine and val straight to the cupcake stop and we each picked out a cupcake + 1 for derek, which were placed in a cute little cupcake container (in order to maintain the integrity of the frosting). the cupcakes are fantastic - i ordered a chocolate peanut butter swirl. perfectly rich and moist chocolate cake (not too sweet, just the way i like it). the "frosting" itself is less frosting than it is mousse - frothy, creamy, and rich. this is not a normal cupcake. this is a fancy cupcake. rich, decadent, and delicious.

NOTE: the limelight marketplace location is CLOSED

van leeuwen truck

twitter

website

on the way into mesa grill, jinny shrewdly noticed the van leeuwen truck parked outside. instead of ordering mesa grill desserts, we decided to get ice cream from the truck. van leeuwen is another one of the fancy food trucks - this one serves gourmet ice cream and coffee. it's a little pricey, but still cheaper than a plated dessert at a restaurant.

and it was perfect for a sunny afternoon. seriously, everyone eyed our ice cream enviously as we walked down the street. someone even shouted, "hey, that ice cream looks good!" and it was good. gourmet ice cream from a truck! awesome.

wafels and dinges

location

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the dangers of watching foodtv. last weekend, derek and i were in our comfortable and warm apartment, hiding from the cold. we ended up watching an episode of throwdown with bobby flay that featured the big yellow wafels and dinges truck. the belgian waffles looked so amazing that i immediately checked twitter to see where the truck was located. it happened to be parked in the west village, which is a short cab ride away from our apartment.

after stopping at BLT burger for some dinner (derek can't eat sweets for a meal), we walked over to the yellow truck. despite the freezing cold temps, there was a short line of eager wafel fans. derek and i each ordered the wafel that we saw on foodtv - the famous "liege" wafel with one "dinges" (topping). we chose "speculoos" - a spread that they make out of belgian cookies. it's peanut butter-like in consistency, but the taste lies somewhere between graham crackers and gingersnap cookies. the liege wafel itself was incredibly dense - it could easily be a meal in itself for me, at least - and there are bits of caramelized sugar hidden in and around the wafel. yum.

rickshaw dumpling truck

locations

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in the world of food trucks, i guess the rickshaw dumpling truck is kind of a cheater. they have "brick and mortar" stores - the rickshaw dumpling bars - which means that they can prepare the dumplings in the restaurant in order to stock the truck. other truck vendors have to rent cheap space in one of the outer boroughs and then drive the food into manhattan. whatever. i'm not a huge fan of the dumpling truck, but sometimes i'm in the mood for dumplings and today they happened to be parked a block away from my office building. i didn't get a break from work until 2 pm today, so i knew that there wouldn't be a line.

i picked up an order of pork+chive dumplings and an order of duck dumplings. quality-wise, these don't come anywhere near to being the best dumplings in the world (that honor belongs to my mom's homemade dumplings.) in fact, they taste pretty much like the dumplings i make myself - kind of overcooked and a little bland, but when dunked in sufficient amounts of soy sauce, they're quite satisfying. the duck dumplings are unique and i like the hoisin dipping sauce, but they're not spectacular. anyway, when i'm in the mood for dumplings and the timing is right, the rickshaw dumpling truck is a pretty good option.

sweetery

locations

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since sapporo had such speedy service, jinny and i had time to stop by the street sweets truck before heading back to training. whenever i'm on the west side, i want to try one of the food trucks that i read about on nyc food blogs. so during the morning session of our training, i checked the ML twitter tracker on my blackberry to see which trucks were in our area. that day, the street sweets truck was conveniently parked just a block away from the training site.

thankfully there was no line because jinny and i spent a few minutes asking about every single item in the display case. finally, jinny decided on four petit fours and a cupcake. i got a cup of joe, the pumpkin whoopie pie, and a flourless chocolate walnut cookie. the coffee wasn't very good, which was okay because the desserts were amazing. the whoopie pie was made up of two soft cake-like pumpkin cookies with sweet cream cheese frosting in between. so good, but so sweet that i had to wait a few hours before eating my chocolate walnut cookie, which was deliciously dense and fudgy. both cookies had such rich flavor that i could see them being served as a final dessert plate at any fanchy white-tablecloth restaurant. i love the fact that you can get such high quality treats from a truck!

NOTE: street sweets is now known as sweetery, changed title of post.

jamaican dutchy cart

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i had a meeting in midtown near times square that thankfully ended just before lunchtime. i didn't need to be on the east side for another hour, so i thought it was the perfect time to meet up with a west side friend and try out one of the delicious carts that i always read about on midtown lunch, but that are too far away from my office. so i walked around, hoping to run into one of the recommended carts.

fortunately, i managed to find the jamaican dutchy pretty easily. and managed to get eric out of his times square office to join me. the cart is hard to miss - there's a huge flatscreen tv mounted on the cart playing reggae music videos. place your order at the front window and pay/pickup at the side window. we took our lunches to an outdoor seating area just east of the cart. stew chicken with rice and plaintains was amazing. jerk chicken was just okay - a little too spicy and dry for my tastes. next time i'll stick with the stew chicken. good price for great food - i'm really starting to catch on to this whole food cart thing.

bian dang (fka nyc cravings truck)

locations

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although this whole fancy food truck craze started taking over the streets of manhattan a while ago, i'd been relatively uninterested until i heard about a taiwanese food truck serving excellent fried chicken with "secret" pork sauce over rice. since then, i've been trying to find a day where their schedule coincides with mine - i.e., when i have 45 mins to spare and when they will be conveniently parked close to my office. i even resorted to using this whole newfangled twitter thing.

as you can see, today was the day and jenny was the lucky victim to get dragged along and forced to wait in the sweltering heat for nearly an hour. a note about the line - neither jenny nor i have ever seen that many asians gathered together in midtown. where did they all come from? anyway - back in the cool comfort of my office, i mixed the rice, secret pork sauce, and a few drops of sriracha together and dug into the juicy flavorful chicken. pre-mixing is crucial because otherwise the pork sauce (w/ pickled cabbage) is too salty. so good and so filling for only $7. thankfully i also ordered a diet dr. pepper ($1) to help stave off the food coma.

NOTE: NYC Cravings Truck is now known as Bian Dang