It’s Like Shooting Fish in a Barrel. (Except without the fish. Or a barrel. Or a gun, for that matter.)

Overview: So today was Tacoma’s inaugural food truck festival, The Moveable Feast, at Cheney Stadium. Sophie and I managed to find 12 of the food trucks in our Seattle Met article at the festival that we hadn’t eaten at yet. This was too good of an opportunity to pass up, so we headed down to Cheney Stadium to see how far our stomachs would take us. Not as far as we thought, it turns out. In order to maximize our food truck sampling opportunities, we split up, hitting separate trucks for our main course, which are outlined below. The one thing I have to say about the festival experience is that its sort of like taking wildlife photos at the zoo. You get good pictures, but you miss out on the adventure. So while the food was good, the experience of tracking down our food trucks in their native habitat, and finding new areas of Seattle that we haven’t been is definitely more fun than having them all in one place. But the food was still delicious.

Athena’s, Sophie’s take: Athena’s, your Greek food is something absolutely true to its roots. Fresh ingredients, TWO vegetarian options (felafel OR Field Roast), and you still manage to trick my taste buds into thinking that I’m sitting in a rustic restaurant in Greece, all coming from a food truck! How do you do that!? Yes, your line was long, and yes, the wait was so very long. But it was all worth it! Gigantic props to you for using your local resources with Field Roast. Hopefully we’ll meet again Athena’s!

The Box, Chris’ take: The long line and the pork belly hom bao are what caught my attention and made the The Box my first choice, but it was the unlikely sounding mini bagel burger that stole my heart. Well, the super cute baby in the front seat of the food truck who smiled at me stole my heart too. (Extra points for the cute baby.) The pork belly hom bao was a little different than I expected. Rather than a whole steamed bun filled with goodness, it was a steamed piece of  hom bao dough, served open faced with a braised pork belly filling and napa cabbage slaw, more like a soft taco. My only problem with the hom bao is that the delightfully textured and slightly sweet bun stuck to the wrapper, making the whole thing fall apart almost immediately upon trying to eat it. The end result was that I kind of had to shove the whole thing in my mouth at once. It was good, but I feel like it would have been better if I had been able to enjoy it at a more leisurely pace.

The mini bagel burger, on the other hand, was absolutely delicious. The beef and pork patty was perfectly cooked, tender and juicy. The kind of juiciness that has you licking your fingers to get every bit of flavor. The Asian slaw combined with a hoisin and sriracha ketchup complimented it perfectly, and unlike the hom bao, the firmness of the mini bagel held everything together nicely. The mini bagel burger is worth a return trip, for sure.

Now I know why they say to eat desert first: The food truck we were most excited for, Sweet Treats was there with their homemade ice cream sandwiches: A homemade ice cream flavor of your choice, sandwiched between homemade cookies, again, your choice.  Sadly, with only 5 people in front of us, they ran out of ice cream sandwiches, much to our dismay. We’ll have to track them down another day.

Off the Rez, Chris’s take: Since we missed out on homemade ice cream sandwiches, we headed over to Off the Rez, to try out their fry bread. We were too full to sample their full menu, but we did have one each of their naked fry bread, and their sweet fry bread, (we chose Nutella for our topping). Both were perfect. I was glad we tried both, because the Nutella overwhelms the simple deliciousness of the fry bread underneath. If I had to pick only one, believe it or not, I’d probably go with the naked fry bread.

While waiting for our order, we had the chance to look over everyone else’s fry bread soft tacos, which looked incredible. So we’ll definitely head up to Seattle and hit them up for a full sampling of their menu, and a more comprehensive review.

Sophie’s take: Off the Rez, you are our next mission. Your fry bread, both naked and Nutella-d, was more than enough to have me begging for more. Standing in line and watching your Indian tacos passing us by, made me wish I was hungry. Scratch that, starving. Those tacos are HUGE! Nothing I can’t take though. Overall, your naked fry bread was my favorite. The Nutella seemed to cover up the simplicity of the naked version, although the Nutella was for sure a sweet touch. So, we’ll see you again. Not only for some fry bread, but for those awesome looking tacos… Maybe even more, (I’ll make sure to be hungry when I come)!

The 411:

Tacoma Food Truck Festival:

tacomafoodtruck.com

Twitter: @tacomafoodtruck

Facebook: The Moveable Feast

Athenas:

feastwiththegods.com

Twitter: @eatwiththegods

Facebook: Athena’s
The Box:
theboxonwheels.com

Twitter: @theboxonwheels

Facebook: The Box

Off the Rez:

offthereztruck.com

Twitter: @offthereztruck

SPAM is magical. Like unicorns…

Chris’ take: Sophie and I took today off to head up to Seattle and hit up Marination Mobile, another one of Seattle Met’s top 13 food trucks in the Seattle area. On Fridays, they are located right outside Uwajimaya, our favorite Asian grocery store in the Puget Sound, a definite bonus. Sophie is the vegetarian Korea-phile, so I’m sure she’ll have plenty to say about her experience today. Hopefully, it won’t include mentioning that we had to endure the amazing smells coming from this food truck as we drove past it several times, since I had some technical difficulties figuring out how to get into Uwajimaya’s parking lot. At one point, Sophie almost got out of the car to order before the line got too long.

And the line was long, but it moved along remarkably quickly, giving us just the right amount of time to peruse the menu and decide what to have. I couldn’t decide, so I decided to sample a variety of items: a kalbi beef soft taco, a spicy pork soft taco, an aloha (kalua pork) slider, and a spam slider. All of them were done perfectly, the meat juicy and tender, but not soggy or over-seasoned. It’s the toppings that really shine here, adding the perfect crunch of homemade slaw, with spicy, flavorful sauces. Out of the four, the spam slider was definitely my favorite. Spam is one of my favorite meats (I think it’s a meat), and the spam slider is put together masterfully, with the abundance of flavorful toppings and sauces, perfectly balanced, so the salty deliciousness of the spam could still shine through. All nestled comfortably inside a soft, fluffy bun, lightly toasted. I knew from the line and the aroma as we pulled up that we were in for a treat, and I wasn’t disappointed!

Sophie’s take: Lucky for me, I had plenty of time to get excited for this food truck-ing experience… Not only days before we went, but the time we spent continuously driving PAST the food truck itself. Countless times, I “mentioned” that we take “this road over here” or “that road over there”, but to no avail! There we were, spending our wonderful father-daughter time driving past our final destination.

But, this food was for sure worth the wait! Not only did it smell almost too-good-to-be-true, but it tasted like it too! I ordered the kimchi fried rice bowl, with a fried egg and tofu. Now, give me a second. I must love them for being vegetarian-friendly AND Korean. I have made kimchi fried rice quite a few times, and not once was it even close to as amazing as this. Their kimchi was at the perfect amount of fermentation, adding the perfect amount of sour and sweetness. Just imagine, a perfect mixture of sour, sweet, and spicy… All mixed together with warm, steamy tofu and a perfectly fried egg. Yes, it was that amazing.

The 411:

Marination Mobile moves around, plus they have a brick and mortar joint as well. Check them out here:

marinationmobile.com

Twitter: @curb_cuisine

Facebook: Marination

Sometimes, if you’re lucky, the donuts come to you

Chris’ take: As we mentioned earlier, the 45 best food trucks listed in Seattle Met magazine spend most of their time in Seattle, and show up mostly at mid day. So you can understand our excitement when one of their top 13 rated food trucks showed up at Meeker Days this weekend in our own little town of Puyallup! Now anyone who knows me knows that there is a food item that I am particularly passionate about. Donuts. Whether its posting about Happy Donut Friday at the hospital cafeteria on Facebook, or arguing over the merits of traditional donuts like Dunkin Donuts or Winchell’s, vs. Krispy Kreme (yuck), I take my donuts seriously.

But enough about me, what about Street Donuts? If you’re in a hurry, and don’t have time to read the rest of this, here’s the summary: You need to go to Street Donuts. Their mini donuts come fresh out of the oil with the perfect blend of firmness and softness, the type of donut that “gives” when you bite into it at exactly the right point. (If you don’t know what I’m talking about, then you’re not truly passionate about your donuts).

But it’s not the perfectly fried miniature rings of awesomeness that sets these folks apart, its their toppings. We went with the obviously safe choice for our first batch, cinnamon and caramel. From the very first bite, the cinnamon and caramel donut was pure perfection. The kind of perfection that makes you close your eyes and wish the moment could last forever (I told you I’m passionate about donuts). But that was the easy choice. For our second batch, we went with their signature ginger and cardamom dusted donuts. Now I’ll be honest, I didn’t even know what cardamom was (its a floral spice!), but that didn’t stop us. With a little trepidation, I bit into the first ginger and cardamom donut, and… It. Is. The. Best. Donut. I’ve. Ever. Had. Period. I’m serious. When you go to street Donuts, try the ginger and cardamom donuts. If you don’t like them, I’ll buy the leftovers from you.

Sophie’s Take: Now, don’t get me wrong. I love sweets. But, they just can’t be “too-sweet”. Doughnuts have always been the happy-medium, the perfect mixture of sweet and savory. But then… today, I realized that throughout my doughnut eating carer, I have been cheated. Biting into that cardamon ginger street doughnut, I knew that from now on, I was going to be spoiled. There is no turning back to what I thought was a “good” doughnut. Nothing can quite compare to the perfect harmony those two spices create. It was a symphony of pure deliciousness. Yes, the caramel cinnamon doughnuts were wonderful as well, but nothing like those cardamon ginger dusted rings of heaven. So thank-you Street Donuts, thank-you for raising my ever high expectations of what a good doughnut is like. Thank-you. (By the way, if Dad offers to buy those doughnuts off you, I’ll pay you $2 more! Keep that in mind…)

The 411: Check out Street Donuts at streetdonuts.com, or on twitter, @streetdonuts. And if you’re free this weekend, Meeker Days is still going on Saturday and Sunday, 6/16/12, and 6/17/12 in Downtown Puyallup. Make sure you stop by Street Donuts while you’re there!

Taco Bus Adventure

Chris’ take: So, it turns out, that almost all of the Seattle food trucks only operate between 10:00 and 2:00, which makes it a little tough to have lunch there, seeing that Soph is in school, and I’m at work in Puyallup. So today, we decided to hit one of the local taco buses here in Puyallup, Mis Chiquititas on Meridian. It lacks the ambiance of Taqueria Los Amigos, our usual haunt, which is in an old school bus, and co-located with a bikini barista stand. Mis Chiquititas owner was super friendly, and gave me the opportunity to practice my spanish. Generally speaking, I only know enough spanish to get myself in trouble, but today I was able to use it to learn an interesting piece of trivia. The owner has four children and fifteen grandchildren. I’m wondering if that is where the name Mis Chiquititas comes from?

I had my usual, the carnitas torta, and it did not disappoint. The meat was tasty, with just the right amount of crunch and spice, the bun was toasted to perfection, and the sandwich provided a juicy, chin dripping highlight to our beautiful sunny day.

Sophie’s take: From a vegetarian’s perspective, this place rocks! Most food trucks I’ve heard about, aren’t necessarily the most vegetarian-friendly. That is, unless you like to drink soda pop for a meal… They may not have many specifically “vegetarian” options, (one to be exact), but you can easily order a dish with no meat. For instance, today I ordered a Regular Quesadilla. Normally, this comes with some type of meat, but you can easily ask for “no meat”, in which they’ll ask you if everything else on the quesadilla is OK.

I have to say, quesadillas are a food dear to my heart, and Mis Chiquititas… Well, their quesadillas are quite amazing. Not only did they use multiple types of cheeses, but they had lettuce in the quesadilla. Genius! Now, every time I eat a quesadilla, I’m going to want lettuce. Mis Chiquititas, your food does not fail to impress!

Guest blogger’s take: Today we brought famed taco bus aficionado, Maxwell Oliver Ollivant the First along for his expert opinion. Max chose to sample Mis Chiquititas tacos, three spicy pork tacos, and three carne asada tacos, all six ordered “extra hot” Max states that the tacos had excellent flavor, tangy zest, and were plenty spicy. He definitely liked one of the selections better than the other, but to be honest, we weren’t quite sure whether it was the spicy pork or the carne asada, but my guess is the pork was the one he liked better. Both were excellent though, he says.

The 411: Mis Chiquititas is located at 12413 Meridian Ave E. Puyallup, Wa.

Everyone needs an epic quest…

Our Epic Quest

Chris’ Take: Welcome to our blog. For several years now, Sophie and I have been food truck fans. Although, to be completely honest, I’m not sure either of us have ever been to one, except maybe taco buses, or food trucks that park at The Fair. So, to be clear, we have been fans of the idea of food trucks, and have watched shows like The Great Food Truck Race on TV, wishing we had cool food trucks closer to home. So, imagine our excitement when we ran across the latest edition of Seattle Met magazine, highlighting the 45 best food trucks in Seattle. OUR BACKYARD! It immediately became apparent that this was to be our epic quest: Sample all 45 of the food trucks highlighted in the article. So, over the next several months, (perhaps more, after all, 45 food trucks is a lot), we will search out and sample each of the food trucks highlighted in this magazine, and report back here about our experience. Sophie and I will each post our own impressions, which may be very different. Bon Appetit!