On Saturday we went to the OC Foodie Fest. The non-VIPs were let in at 11:30, but we arrived at 10:30, mostly because we wanted to get out of the house. It turned out to be a good move, because there was already a line to get in. We parked in adjacent lot for $5 (instead of the $15 at the Honda Center) and got some exercise in the process. Unfortunately, I am without a camera (I’ve broken two in the past six months…I know, I know) so I was unable to be like all of the other foodies and take pictures of everything we ate.
There were 49 food trucks, but we were only able to sample from six of them. Here is what we had:
1. Nom Nom Truck–D made a beeline for this truck as soon as we were let in, because we knew it would be popular due to its success on the Food Truck Race show on the Food Network. He ordered the lemongrass chicken banh mi. This was definitely k’s favorite. We were fighting over the last few bites! A local cable tv show asked if they could tape k eating because they wanted to show the audience that kids are welcome to these types of events too. Too bad we’ll probably never see it on air.
2. Crepes Bonaparte–Spicy Apple Bottoms Crepe (cooked cinnamon apples, caramel, and whipped cream). Another Food Truck Race contestant, although we were sad to say good-bye to them this week. It was OK, but we couldn’t try their more creative crepes because we were afraid the pesto would have nuts, and we had to avoid the nutella, etc. for the kids. n liked the apples, though.
3. Don Chow Tacos–Taco trio (Kung Pao Chicken, Chinese BBQ Pork and Ultimate LA taco (carne asada sprinkled with cilantro, salsa, bacon and grilled onions)). Saw this one on Triple D. The Chinese BBQ pork was the best…a little sweet. This trio was very filling!
4. The Shrimp Guys–Coconut lime shrimp with rice and luau punch. I thought it was good, but the portion was pretty small. If I ever go back to Oahu, I’m definitely going to go to a shrimp truck on the North Shore, which this truck is based on. I’m glad we got there early because this line was really long later in the day.
5. Fry Smith–Rajas fries (Fire-roasted poblano chiles, carmelized onions and shawarma-marinated steak with jack cheese). The steak on these fries was pretty high quality, but we were too full by this point to fully appreciate them. They also had kim chi fries with pork which I might have tried had we gone sans kids.
6. Coolhaus–Roasted pear with nutmeg ice cream between two snickerdoodle cookies. Granted, this was a tiny truck, but the amount of waiting time between giving your order and picking up the sandwich was pretty ridiculous. I mean, how long does it take to put a scoop of ice cream between two cookies? However, the ice cream tasted very “fresh” and was definitely something I had never tried before. (Wasn’t in the mood for the brown sugar bacon flavor!) It also comes in an edible paper wrapper which n took a bite of. I think this woman was looking at him weird since she probably didn’t know the wrapper was meant to be eaten.
Anyway, we walked around a bit more and then trekked back to the car. The morning had started out pretty cool (a nice relief from the week before), but by the time we left, around 1:30, it was definitely warming up. It was kinda fun hanging out with 8,500 fellow foodies, plus we saw a few people we know. Goodbye Summer!
