An article in the Dallas Morning News this morning by Katherine Unmuth motivated me to get off my ass and write something about the DFW Food Truck Festival I attended last night. Those writers do post their articles quickly..
I will agree (with Ms. Unmuth) that there is a food truck revolution happening in Dallas. It is also quite a recent one. The way it seems to work in Dallas is that people stalk the food trucks on twitter and drive out to their locations, which vary quite a bit, for lunch or dinner. Of course, the part of town will have an effect on the traffic. A visit to Gandolpho's, which I reviewed earlier here http://bananadallas.blogspot.com/2011/08/gandolfos-new-york-delicatessen-mobile.html#more, in the industrial part of town had hardly any customers in attendance. On the other hand, a visit to Nammi at Flora and McKinney had a good amount of people. In places like New York or Austin, they just seem to be floating around. People go to them when they see them rather than following their twitter feeds. Perhaps if our food truck community gets large enough, we will get to that point.
After glancing at an article by Scott Reitz about how crowded this festival would be, and how bad parking would be, I was planning to get there early. I think he posted it on the Dallas Observer, I found the post from twitter, but I don't see it any more. He suggested arriving at 5 PM, that most of the trucks should be setting up by then. However, my state of mind interfered. I had run off to this Chocolate Conference that morning with no coffee. I had the idea the chocolate would give me energy. But that so didn't work. I need more caffeine than that. By the time I got home, I was beyond stuffed and exhausted. I had a cup of espresso and was trying to wait till I had more energy. I also wanted to wait till I was a little less stuffed before we left. We got into the lot with the food trucks around 6:45 PM.
I know it was the first of it's kind, and I was later than I should have been, but the lines were ridiculous, the heat was ridiculous, and I just thought it was a miserable time. My friend Zeena wanted grilled cheese from Ruthie's Rolling Cafe, so that's where we started. We waited on line for a little while and filled out pieces of paper to select the kind of grilled cheese we desired. I chose San Francisco sourdough bread, sharp cheddar, mozzarella, bacon, roasted tomatoes, and pesto. However.. I actually never got to try this sandwich. I thought after we got to the cashier, we would get our food. But no. They informed us there would be a 30 minute wait for our orders. Ok fine. More than an hour later, we were still waiting. At this point, we decided to cancel our orders and get our money back. I, on the other hand, exchanged my order for a t-shirt since I thought it was adorable.
I will agree (with Ms. Unmuth) that there is a food truck revolution happening in Dallas. It is also quite a recent one. The way it seems to work in Dallas is that people stalk the food trucks on twitter and drive out to their locations, which vary quite a bit, for lunch or dinner. Of course, the part of town will have an effect on the traffic. A visit to Gandolpho's, which I reviewed earlier here http://bananadallas.blogspot.com/2011/08/gandolfos-new-york-delicatessen-mobile.html#more, in the industrial part of town had hardly any customers in attendance. On the other hand, a visit to Nammi at Flora and McKinney had a good amount of people. In places like New York or Austin, they just seem to be floating around. People go to them when they see them rather than following their twitter feeds. Perhaps if our food truck community gets large enough, we will get to that point.
After glancing at an article by Scott Reitz about how crowded this festival would be, and how bad parking would be, I was planning to get there early. I think he posted it on the Dallas Observer, I found the post from twitter, but I don't see it any more. He suggested arriving at 5 PM, that most of the trucks should be setting up by then. However, my state of mind interfered. I had run off to this Chocolate Conference that morning with no coffee. I had the idea the chocolate would give me energy. But that so didn't work. I need more caffeine than that. By the time I got home, I was beyond stuffed and exhausted. I had a cup of espresso and was trying to wait till I had more energy. I also wanted to wait till I was a little less stuffed before we left. We got into the lot with the food trucks around 6:45 PM.
I know it was the first of it's kind, and I was later than I should have been, but the lines were ridiculous, the heat was ridiculous, and I just thought it was a miserable time. My friend Zeena wanted grilled cheese from Ruthie's Rolling Cafe, so that's where we started. We waited on line for a little while and filled out pieces of paper to select the kind of grilled cheese we desired. I chose San Francisco sourdough bread, sharp cheddar, mozzarella, bacon, roasted tomatoes, and pesto. However.. I actually never got to try this sandwich. I thought after we got to the cashier, we would get our food. But no. They informed us there would be a 30 minute wait for our orders. Ok fine. More than an hour later, we were still waiting. At this point, we decided to cancel our orders and get our money back. I, on the other hand, exchanged my order for a t-shirt since I thought it was adorable.
 |
| I do think their mascot is adorable! |
