Day 13 - Yellow Bulgogi Cart - Korean Truck!

WHAT:

http://www.yelp.com/biz/bulgogi-cart-washingtonKorean cart.

The menu:

WHERE:

14th and L St.

HOW:

Again, this is not a food truck per se, but like last review, this is a regular of the lunch crew and warrants a review. Do not confuse this with the Korean cart in front of the Corner Bakery on K St. It's mind boggling why two korean carts would be in such close proximity as they will be splitting customers, but I digress. You really can't miss this on the corner with the bright yellow cart:

The line isn't as bad as the food truck lines get, so it's minimal waiting time.

The review

I usually get the spicy beef (bulgogi) - which by the way is not THAT spicy, I don't deal that well with spicy things and this dish is fine for me. The other guys love the bibimbap.

As you can see the portion is great for $7, and it comes with greens and kimchi. I really wasn't a kimchi person, until I got it from this cart. Do not miss out on it! Do get the spicy version (either beef or chicken), without it, it is quite bland. Id also recommend the beef over chicken, as bulgogi is the star of the cart. The rice is usually cooked to perfection.

WHY:

8.5 wheeler review. Again, my recommendations are from several adventures of different dishes. I can not be blamed for the non spicy chicken. The short wait, good serving side, and kim chi keep me coming back and have earned this cart third place (for now).

Day 12 - Burrito cart! - @pedroandvinnys

WHAT:

http://pedroandvinnys.com/. Burrito Truck.

The menu:

WHERE:

15th and K St.

HOW:

This is the ORIGINAL. If you go to the About page, you can see that this was the original street food. This is not officially a Food truck, it is stationary at one spot, 15th and K St. - right in front of the CVS. I believe they had a second truck, but no longer do. The line is a toss up, usually in the summer it is lenghty, while later in the season the line dies down.

I was not expecting much when my coworkers told me about this place. Especially when I found out in line that they did not have any MEAT in the burritos. Then came the somewhat complicated ordering process. Let me break it down for you

1. Pick a tortilla flavor. Indicate whether you want cheese with it or not. For example, my usual order is "Spinach cheese". If you don't want cheese say "Spinach no cheese".
2. Decide whether you want black and/or tan beans
3. Decide if you want salsa
4. Decide if you want sour cream or guac (If you want both beans, salsa, sour cream and guac - just say THE WORKS)
5. Choose a number to determine what spicyness level you want 1(Not spicy) to 10(Very Spicy) - As you get better acquainted you can pick out your own spices. The real star here is the MANGO SAUCE

   

   They also have home made sauces of cilantro and another home made smoky sauce, if you want all 3 you say "Triple Delight". While you are in line you can pick out from the plethora of sauces and put it on tortilla chips he has on his stand.

6. Paying is by the honor system. You put your money in a box and you take your change from the box.

The review

My usual is Spinach cheese, black beans, salsa, sour cream, triple delight - didn't I tell you the complicated ordering?

There is a time or two where the beans may be overcooked, or the rice hard. The burrito at that time is still decent, but not great. But this only happens few and far between. The usual burrito has a freshly steamed tortilla, delicious melted cheese, and the GOOSE sauce right now makes my mouth water! It is that good! Very suprisingly, without meat, I am very FULL after.

WHY:

9.5 wheeler review. While I still love my lobster rolls, I had to give the nod to this cart. I do have to say, it is all or nothing with this cart. Majority of people I introduced to this cart LOVED it. There is a small few who did not like it. It is an acquired taste. The first time I had it, I wasn't as fond as I am now. I am sure glad I kept coming back!

Day 11 - Popsicle Truck! - @pleasantpops

WHAT:

http://www.pleasantpops.com/. Popsicle truck.

The menu:

WHERE:

City Center DC

HOW:

So this is a long overdue review. If you check out my past reviews, I attended both days of the Curbside cookoff. The first day I had DC Empanadas, but I didn't get to post a review of my Popsicle review. The line was not that long, and it moved really quick (there is really nothing to make - it's prepackaged)

The review

If you take a look at the menu, this isn't really your run of the mill strawberry, grape flavors. While it really intrigued me with the rare flavors, part of me was dissapointed with the selection as none of them really appealed to me. For my readers, I sucked it up and tried one to post a review on here! I asked the lady what was the most popular one and she directed me to the watermelon mint popsicle.

Unfortunately, upon first taste, my face cringed. I wasn't sure really what I was tasting. It was a bit sour, little flavor and very icy. Dissapointed, I tried to find the positive in this frozen treat, but I could not find one. I didn't even end up finishing it.

WHY:

2 wheeler review. I definitely think it was $2.50 down the drain, as I literally threw it away more than half still left. I think I'll stick to the Dole Popsicles I get at the local grocery. These pops were not pleasant to me!

Day 10 - EL Floridano - @flmeetsdc

WHAT:

http://elfloridanodc.com/. Florida inspired sandwich truck.

The menu:

WHERE:

Farragut Square

HOW:

To my delight, there was some variety added to the usual food trucks in my immediate area. I waited in line for this truck during curbside cookoff, but they ended up running out of food. Honestly, walking towards the truck this day, I had no idea what kind of food they had. The line wasn't that bad

We were about the tenth people in line and it took about 15 minutes to get our food. I was sort of dissapointed by the lack of choices on the menu. There weren't even any side items (chips, drinks, desserts - none).

The review

After 10 trucks, I finally wised up and made a deal with my coworker to split a sandwich so I can review more than one meal. We ended up with the classic fidel and the ho chi bann mi. The fidel was you cuban (duh!) sandwich

while the ho chi ban mi, as the name suggests, is Vietnamese inspired sandwich.

Unlike the past 'inspired' food, this sandwich actually DID have some Vietnamese flavor to it that I could recognize. The Vietnamese flavor really complimented the turkey meatloaf. I am unsure how this relates to Florida, maybe there is many Vietnamese people in Florida? Nevertheless, the ho chi ban mi was very good! The same goes for the Fidel. You can't really go wrong with a cuban, it aleady has yummy ingredients. It is a thinner sandwich, naturally so it did not fill me up as much as the ho chi bann mi.

WHY:

8 wheeler review. Both of the sandwiches I tasted were very tasty, the wait wasn't that long, and the service was good. The only knock against it being that the cuban itself would leave me still a bit hungry after I was done. In addition to that, there is no complimentary side orders that can overcome that hunger.

Curbside cookoff

Not a review this time, but just wanted to have a seperate entry for the curbside cookoff

If you saw the post before, you saw my day 1 experience. Day 2, we left early and we were greeted by this:

EVERY SINGLE LINE was an hour plus wait. That was simply unacceptable.

That is entirely way too long to wait in line for food. It was apparent that those waiting in line were either tourists or just plain didn't have much work to do back at the office. I mean look at this:

The longest I've waited in line is for 45 minutes for the lobster roll, but typically our wait less than 5 minutes. Why would I wait that long, when I can wait till the truck parks nearby and save a lot of time.

After this epic fail, we went to nearby chinatown and got some Texas BBQ as we all had our minds on the BBQ Banditos truck.

Day 9 - DC Empanadas @dcempanadas

WHAT:

http://dcempanadas.com/. Empanadas food truck

The menu: here

WHERE:

CityCenterDC

HOW:

So, I was planning on going to the curbside cookoff and try the majority of the food trucks that I have not yet tried. On my way to work, I get an email from the upper management saying they are going to buy lunch for us for a job well done. Perfect timing right? Anyway, I was able to stop by the cookoff in the afternoon for a quick snack

Since it was mid afternoon, there was several trucks that were not in operation, I guess they were gearing up for the dinner crowd and were drained from the lunch crowd. I wanted to try DC Tacos, but they were shutdown for a while. I didn't want anything too big, since I already had lunch, so an empanada sounded good.

The review

I got the original and the thai (yeah, a snack - riiiight). Anyway, the thai was terrific! I've had julia's empanadas and this really blew it out of the water. After the thai, I was expecting the original (please refer to my 1st item on the menu theory) to be awesomeness in empanada form. Unfortuantely, it did not fit the billing. I'd definitely reccommend the thai (pork) empanada!

WHY:

8 wheeler review. Just based on the thai empanada, this deserves the 8 wheels. It is a bit pricey at $3.50/per, and a little small to eat just one for lunch. I'd recommend 3 empandas for a filling lunch.