Nom Nom, Bacon Bacon Trucks Stammer Their Way to OTG Debuts

Two much-anticipated food trucks with doppelganger names made their Off the Grid debuts at the Upper Haight event tonight.  The Nom Nom Truck (which should perhaps be called Nom Nom North)  was making its San Francisco debut as well, and the Bacon Bacon Truck, whose San Francisco Debut occurred a week ago, was finally ready for prime time.

The Nom Nom Truck is a spin-off of a Los Angeles truck of the same name and features banh mi. It comes to us with a certain amount of TV celebrity, some polished marketing, an apparent fan club and T-shirts. The Bacon Bacon Truck, which I encountered previously, features bacon and, well, more bacon. It taps an amorphous but huge bacon fan club and, yes, has T-shirts.

Foot long banh mi

Nom Nom's menu features banh mi in four flavors: Grilled Pork, Lemon Grass Chicken, Vegetarian Tofu and a "Deli Special" (which I forgot to inquire into).  If you don't know what a banh mi is, I'm surprised you are reading this blog, but the Nom Nom folks have thoughtfully posted a tutorial on their truck. The sandwiches are a foot long and $7.00.  If you are looking for smaller bites, they serve taco versions of all the fillings except the Deli Special, for $2.50.

Line at Bacon Bacon Truck at 5:15

I decided to go for a banh mi, and they had me at pork. My sandwich had a generous quantity of the pork, nicely grilled, and the vegetable matter was fresh and thinly sliced.  If I could find fault with anything, it would be that the saucing and spicing could have been more sprightly.  The star of the banh mi was, if anything, the long, thin baguette, so nicely crispy on the outside and soft on the inside.  Nom Nom's banh mi probably won't make you forget the sharper flavors (or the lower pricing) of Saigon Sandwich, but hey, you are at Off the Grid.

Nom Nom.  Bacon Bacon. Bottom line: which to choose from?  It's really apples and oranges, but if I absolutely had to choose, it would be Nom Nom for the sandwich, but Bacon Bacon for the T-shirt.

Mentioned: @NomNomTruckSF, @baconbaconsf

Food Trucks Land on New Public and Private Spaces: St. Mary's Square and 450 Mission

Today marked the launch of not one, but two new San Francisco landing areas for the Bay Area's restless and growing fleet of food triucks: Off the Grid's newest venue at St. Mary's Square, and the privately sponsored Truck Stop at 450 Mission St.

St. Mary's Square has been referred to by Off the Grid as its Financial District outpost; it could equally be called its Chinatown event, situated as it is in between the two.  However you look at it, I found it easily OTG's most pleasant setting, and it's a pity that it can only accommodate four or five trucks. It's relatively wind free, and the truck staging area has a profusion of foliage, park benches and meandering walkways which make it exceptionally cozy. Beniamino Bufano's monumental statue of Sun Yat-Sen provides a benign presence as well. Today's fare was provided by Señor Sisig, Fins on the Hoof, Toasty Melts and Curbside Eats.  The "soft" launch testified to the energy of Off the Grid's buzz machine; with promotion mostly by Twitter and OTG's Facebook page, the turnout supported healthy lines for each vendor.  Next week's event will feature a new platoon of four vendors, and possibly a fifth; there appears to be both the space and the market to support five trucks.  Due to Off the Grid: St. Mary's proximity to Chinatown, its terms of agreement preclude vendors of Asian food; interestingly, given the presence of Señor Sisig today and of HapaSF next week, Filipino fare has apparently been give a working definition as "not Asian."

The private-side food truck venue that launched today is known as the Truck Stop and was described in detail in SF Weekly's SFoodie blog.  It is located in the loading area for 450 Mission Street, its sponsor.  The lane is capable of holding three trucks in a single line. Today it resembled a smaller, somewhat grimmer version of Off the Grid's linear Minna St. layout. The "grimmer" is, fortunately, a temporary condition: the truck lane is surrounded by scaffolding, even overhead, due to some construction work.  The good news is that the lane leads to the pleasant, sun-swept plaza area for 50 Fremont St. (which today, incidently, hosted a Farmers' Market).  The event is to take place every weekday lunchtime, with a rotation of trucks, many already familiar to Off the Grid veterans.  Today's lineup consisted of Curry Up Now, Brass*Knuckle and Kara's Cupcakes. At 1:15 when I arrived lines were very light; though there may well have been a substantial Noon peak. It's also likely that word of this event is just beginning to get out.

SF's First Bacon Truck Launches; Blindsided by Pent-up Bacon Lust

 

Considering the bacon-everything madness of the past couple of years, it's hard to believe that until today we were more than a year into Food Trucks 2.0 without a single bacon-interest truck on the street in San Francisco. That all ended with the official Launch of the Bacon Bacon Truck (@baconbaconsf) at 63 Bluxome St., where it'll be found Tuesday through Thursday, at least this week. 

Sign at Union Square Greenmarket

I decided to check out this historic day in the annals of bacon on my way to Costco.  The truck's location in an arty alley (a winery, a silk screen print shop and a couple of galleries are among its neighbors) a short block from Caltrain and the #30/45 bus stop made this easy.  I intended to just be a Looky Lou and take a couple of pictures and be on my way.  I do like bacon, though, common sense and cardiology aside, and fell prey to the phenomenon known as Bacon Hypnosis which is triggered by the fumes of cooking bacon.  I was hooked. Perusing the menu, which consisted of various appropriate uses of bacon, I selected a sandwich with the the very San Francisco name of the LGBT* as likely to cause the least damage to my arteries.  

"It'll be about 20 minutes," said the Bacon Pusher in an apologetic tone.

"No problem," I said "I'm retired.  I've got all day."

The words were almost prophetic. My 20 minutes turned into 30, then 40 and eventually to more than an hour's wait for my sandwich.  I wasn't alone;  there were a couple of dozen other people in the same waiting mode. The Bacon Bacon staff were repeatedly apologetic, and continually supplied samples of fries, bacon jam and root beer. There was only so much room for a griddle on the truck, they explained, and only so many strips of bacon could fit on it at once. The demand had simply outraced the supply.  Maybe it was the pleasant, sunny 70° weather or the hypnotic effect of the bacon fumes, but the waiting crowd was remarkably patient and cheerful, and each new order off the grill was given a celebratory greeting. 

For  the record, my sandwich was beautifully prepared, and the slices of thick bacon perfectly cooked, crisp but not burnt, and very, well, bacony.  It was a good sandwich, and worth $7.00, considering the market.  But was it worth more than an hour's wait?

From the Bacon Bacon Truck operators' point of view, I'm sure the problem of dealing with too much demand, rather than too little, is one they'll gladly take back to the drawing board.

*Described on the menu as "Little gem lettuces, goat cheese, bacon, tomato"

Mentioned: @baconbaconsf

Street Food Saint to Appear at SF Festival?

Maria Piedad Cano, "The Sainted Arepa Lady" (foreground) at her cart

If there’s such a thing as a living legend in street food, it’s Maria Piedad Cano, “The Sainted Arepa Lady.”  Keep your fingers crossed, she may be making an appearance in San Francisco, maybe at La Cocina's 3^rd Annual San Francisco Street Food Festival on August 20.  The possibility was raised by the @Arepalady herself on Twitter when she recently tweeted “Not out tonight, sorry! Oh soon to sell arepas in San Francisco, CA for a day?”  When I speculated aloud (well, a-screen) on Twitter that this might have something to do with the Street Food Festival, I got a sort of confirmation from @streetfoodsf (spokestweeter for the Festival) with the terse response “Might have some truth.”  Hmmm.

It was none other than Jim Leff, the enigmatic founder of  chowhound.com, who beatified a Jackson Heights, NY street vendor and brought her to the attention of  netizens and eventually of the mainstream media.  In a piece called "The Sainted Arepa Lady" in the early 1990’s, Leff said:

I don't know her name; such knowledge would detract from my appreciation of her as an archetype. While I speak pretty decent Spanish, I've never been able to fully follow her conversation, but it doesn't matter. I go when I'm feeling blue, stand under her umbrella, and feel a healing calm wash over me as she brushes the sizzling corn cakes with butter. Zen master-like in her complete absorption in the task, she grills the things with infinite patience and loving care.

We now know not only her name, but some details of her life.  She was formerly a lawyer and a judge in her native Colombia, but gave that up when it became too risky a profession.  She’s in New York only in the warmer months, wintering in Colombia: she vends her wares only on Friday and Saturday nights, from 10:00 or 11:00 PM to dawn.  Unlike other vendors who favor subway station locations, she sets up at 79^th and Roosevelt, in proximity to a string of night clubs.

Despite her hours and location, what the Arepa Lady deals is anything but “drunk food.”  She’s the queen of arepas in arepa-rich Queens, home to around 80,000 Colombians.  Two types of exquisite arepas come off her griddle: arepas de queso, the more familiar thick circular cheese-stuffed corn cakes, and the sweeter arepas de choclo, which are made from ground fresh corn in a crepe-like batter and are folded in two after topping with farmer’s cheese.

I was lucky to find Maria Piedad Cano at her cart at around 11:00 in the evening on May 29, 2010 (thanks, EXIF data!).  I had earlier stuffed my gut at the Golden Mall in Flushing, a few stops down the 7 line, and only had room for one arepa; I chose the more exotic (to me) arepa de choclo and downed it while it was still hot off the griddle.  I have been craving another one ever since, as well as one of her arepas de queso.  If the Sainted Arepa Lady does indeed show up at the Street Food Festival this year, some other vendors are going to be moved down my dance card.

Two Spin-off Food Truck Debuts: Kasa Indian Truck and Pacific Puffs Truck

Tonight's Off the Grid:Upper Haight featured the debut of a new Indian food truck, the Kasa Indian Truck.  The Kasa Truck is a spin-off from Kasa Indian Restaurant in the Castro, and features kati rolls. Kati (sometimes spelled kathi) rolls are somewhat like burritos, only with a roti wrapper.  Tonight's menu included two kati roll options, chicken tikka masala and gobi aloo, $4.50 each.  The same two fillings were available as rice plates (thalis) for $7.00, as well as a saag paneer rice plate. An additional offering was a veggie samosa with a potato and sweet pea filling.  House-made mango lassi and house-made chai and several bottled drinks were the thirst-quenchers.

I went for the CTM (chicken tikka masala) kati roll.  In a way, it's like a smaller version of Curry Up Now's CTM burrito, but with the flakier roti wrapper. It was served as a to-go item, foil-wrapped and brown bagged, which caused some damage to be done to the fragile, buttery wrapper, as can  be seen from the picture.  Despite some cosmetic damage, my CTM roll was able to be eaten hand held, though I would suggest that they serve them in a paper boat with a fork unless specifically requested as a to-go item. Although I requested mine spicy when asked, it came to me far less spicy than Curry Up Now's CTM burrito. Despite, or perhaps on account of, the lack of heat, the flavors came through clean and sharp. It also came with enough heft to serve as a light meal on its own, and was a good value.

Earlier in the week I caught up with the Pacific Puffs truck in its debut.  The Pacific Puffs truck is another spin-off venture, with a bricks-and-mortar parent in the Marina.  It was originally to have debuted at Monday's Off the Grid:San Mateo soft launch, but hadn't cleared the approval process in time.  Its coming out party, therefore,  was the following day at a meetup event at The Lunch Box (246 Ritch St.) promoting the Foodspotting web app. Pacific Puff's offerings for the event were cream puffs with a choice of four different filling flavors:  vanilla, chocolate, fruit whip and peanut butter at $3.25 each.  They also offered a choice of powdered sugar or chocolate toppings for the puff. I don't have a sweet tooth, and seldom go for anything resembling a dessert, so I'll recuse myself from judging the product.  I did try a peanut butter flavored puff, and found it a little too, well, sweet, and the peanut butter flavor too subtle.  I would have been happier if it had been filled entirely with Maranatha Peanut Butter, but that is just me.  Sweets lovers will finally have an alernative to cupcakes and creme brulee.