— CiaoCatherine

In which I eat everything in sight

Last week I had the pleasure of interviewing some of the nice folks who turned out for the first annual DC Curbside Cookoff.  Food trucks lined the perimeter of the City Center Parking Lot in Metro Center and nearly twenty thousand people turned out in droves over two days.  On Thursday I interviewed people for a few hours and Friday i just marveled at the epic lines.  The DCRA and DCCAH and BYT put the event on in part to bring attention to the plight of food trucks in DC, which is, that the city council may be making it a lot harder for these trucks to operate in the district.  Tim Carman’s “Inside D.C.’s Food-Truck Wars” details this ongoing kerfuffle.  If you like food trucks, more information on how you can help can be found here and here.

As for what I sampled:

From Takorean: the roast pork and bulgogi steak tacos, each with kimchee slaw, and the chicken taco with romaine slaw.

Verdict:  The pork and steak tacos were the best things I ate at the cookoff.  So filling, but I wanted to go back for more (but came to my senses).  No wonder people were waiting almost two hours in that line!  The chicken with romaine slaw was sort of bland, but a good palette cleanser between bites of the first two kinds.

From Love Bites: sweet potato cupcake with chocolate buttercream frosting (above).

Verdict: Took me by surprise.  While I do enjoy a good root vegetable dish, I never would have selected this cupcake flavor if it weren’t the last one available.  I’m glad it was, because the pairing of the sweet, earthy cake with the chocolate frosting was excellent.

From Curbside Cupcakes: the key lime cupcake.

Verdict: As a Florida native, I approved.  Dare I say, this cupcake demonstrated the highest moisture-to-fluffiness ratio I have experienced in the district.  The only other cupcakes I have enjoyed in DC (and trust me, I’ve tried a lot) have come from Love Bites (above) and Hello Cupcake (particularly the Velvet Elvis, the banana-peanut butter variety), but Hello’s are a bit denser than Curbside’s.

From DC Slices: a chicken-with-wing-sauce variety that isn’t detailed on their menu.  But it existed!

Verdict: I applaud their inclusion of dark meat on the pizza.  Only had a bite, but it was an excellent one.  I see this truck parked outside of Velvet Lounge on the weekends–perhaps I should try them instead of keeping the carry-out place around the corner in business.

I regret not getting to try Sauca’s butter chicken flatbread or Red Hook Lobster Pound’s lobster roll, but that gives me something to hunt down on the lunch hour in the coming weeks, doesn’t it?