Food Carts and Trucks

[JPW]

I drove a food truck at Northwestern during my years there.

The guy who owned it had a little pizza shop and did some catering around campus. Lots of deep-dish and hot beef sandwiches.

I believe that both his and the other truck (George's) are no longer operating. In '91, they banned us from using referee whistles to advertise our presence outside the dorms when someone complained that it sounded like a rape whistle. We could never find another noise maker that could penetrate like that whistle

[Soup]

I live around DC and actually you don't have a lot of food trucks in the City. There is one cart of note. On the corner of 7th and I st, nw a woman sells the best half smokes in town.

Other than that most carts and trucks are pretty standard. I realized just how much we were lacking because of a recent visit to Drexel U. in Phili. On one street near 31st and market, there were 7 food trucks. Really reasonable prices. But the best one was actually across from the train station on Market St (about 2 blocks from drexel). A truck devoted to Carribean food. Really good Jerk Chicken and great bean and rice.

[phaelon56]

Earlier in this thread I mentioned having no recollection of food trucks around Syracuse University - how wrong I was. Someone reminded me about the Wimpy Wagon. he was a neighborhood fixture for years but his food career came to an unceremonious end. Apparently he decided to boost sales by selling the very substance that induces munchies. It didn't take long for word of that to get around....

[slbunge]

There are a bunch of food carts on Library Mall at the University of Wisconsin-Madison. I remember Thai and Jamaican food, although I think there were others as well. Evidently there is a very heated debate about late-night carts in more residential areas near campus.

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Actually there is an interesting story behind the Loose Juice cart on Library Mall (close to celebrating it's 30th year there I think). The owner of the cart, Karl Anderson, was convicted and imprisoned for being part of the 1970 bombing of Sterling Hall during the height of the anti-war movement in Madison. The bomb was meant to disrupt activities in mathematics research funded by the army but in a terribly unfortunate incident a young researcher working very late was killed in the blast. If you want to read more, you can go here.

I will say that the Loose Juice's smoothies and fruit juices are really quite good and they are priced much better than the chains (Jamba Juice, etc).

[BryanZ]

Duke has one hot dog cart that's permanent fixture on campus. The quality is very good but it's not cheap. Regardless, it's popular with students. We also have Indian Food catered into our main dining hall once a week, but I'm not sure if that counts.

[phaelon56]

On the corner of 7th and I st, nw a woman sells the best half smokes in town. 

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What are "half smokes"?

[Chris Amirault]

All summer long, there are Del's lemonade and Saugy hot dog stands on or near the Brown University campus -- if yer lucky, one next to the other!

[JPW]

On the corner of 7th and I st, nw a woman sells the best half smokes in town. 

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What are "half smokes"?

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Perhaps the only DC home town food.

Quick summary here

Basically the bastard child of a hotdog and an Italian sausage.

[daniellewiley]

All summer long, there are Del's lemonade and Saugy hot dog stands on or near the Brown University campus -- if yer lucky, one next to the other!

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Chris - is there still the egg truck guy? I went to Vassar, and one weekend my friend Abby and I drove to Providence to visit a friend of hers at RISD. One of the guys we met took us over to the Brown campus at about 2am, and we had the most amazing egg sandwich from a truck. I can still remember sitting on a curb and eating it. Delicious. And, as Phaelon and JJ have pointed out, Vassar had really nothing comparable!

[mimblewim]

Here are some pictures of various food trucks around MIT, including one of the falafel truck that was somewhat famous around those parts in the late 70s/early 80s.

https://alum.mit.edu/postcards/ViewCollection.dyn?id=2

Here's some news about the falafel truck from 1998:

http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/1998/moishe-1104.html

More interesting stuff about food trucks around MIT:

http://www-tech.mit.edu/V121/N17/17food.17n.html

http://www-tech.mit.edu/V120/N7/Food_Trucks.7f.html

http://www-tech.mit.edu/V119/N14/Food_Trucks_rev.14a.html

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Since MIT doesn't really have dining halls, a lot of people frequent the food trucks, of which the most popular is Goosebeary's (Chinese) over behind the bio building, despite the fact that it closes for food poisoning about once a year. People generally pick food trucks based on location (proximity) rather than the food.

[markovitch]

The contractual obligations between some universities and their hospitality contractors often pushes carts off campus property-- at my alma mater (granted, a very small school) the food contractors had first dibs on any catering on the grounds, as well as monopoly rights. The student-run coffee shop was actively deterred from offering anything worth eating.

At larger universities food service often looks a lot like a mall food-court.

[MomOfLittleFoodies]

My university (University of La Verne) in Southern California only had the dining hall and a snack bar. No food carts or trucks. However, there were a few places within walking distance that had better food, and there as Circle K. Since I left, there are a few more food places, but I'm told the dining hall is just as dismal.

I go through the UC Berkeley campus fairly often, and I've only noticed a couple of food trucks over the last 8 years. There are lots of restaurants within reasonable walking distance of the campus though.

[KitchenMom]

jogoode - I don't know if it's too late, but I can tell you about the trucks around Temple U. in Philly. I think the trucks there represent the diversity of the school, so in that way they are all fitting.

Within a four block radius, right in the center of campus, here are the trucks I can think of - numerous generic "greasy" trucks serving cheese steaks, buffalo chicken steaks and cold sandwiches; a halal truck featuring home-roasted turkey in various forms (sandwich, salad, etc.); a couple of hot-dog trucks; a Chinese/Vietnamese; at least two other straight-up Chinese; an extremely popular Korean truck; a crepe truck; pizza; middle-eastern; a truck featuring various grilled chicken sandwiches called "Chicken Heaven" (they also do the best salads on campus); a truck that makes grilled wrap sandwiches; a couple of fruit salad trucks; there used to be an indian truck, but I haven't seen it in a while...hmm...there are probably more, but I can't think of them at the moment. This doesn't even count the semi-fixed storefront places that are almost trucks and include a bagel place, more vietnamese, middle-eastern, a salad place and a few others.

Many of the trucks are run by Greeks, especially the generic ones, though in the last couple of years, more and more of the trucks have been bought by Vietnamese families.

So, with all this, why is it that I always have such a hard time finding something for lunch?

[chemprof]

Cart de Frisco at the University of Oregon. Thai-style fresh grilled chicken sandwiches w/ multicolor slaw. Unique to Eugene! (I'm pretty sure)

A very difficult jones for me now that I'm in NC!

Anne

[Soup]

I've mentioned this on another tread but the carribean food truck next to Phili PA train station Rocks. Last trip to NY, I got off my train and got a togo plate of oxtails with fixens. Filled the car with a heavenly smell. Way better than the selection at the food car.

I've eaten there 4 times this summer and every meal has been consistantly good and cheap.

[KatieLoeb]

JJ if you want to come to down to Philly for some "research", I'm sure we can find enough PhilleGulleteers to show you around the various trucks.

[godito]

I don't know if he's still there, but there was this guy, Gyro Bob at Kent State University. Yes, he had good gyros, but he made the best cheeseteak sandwiches. He was parked at Frankil Avenue, just outside the bars (incuding Ray's Place and Loft Pizza)

[elfin]

We called it a "Roach Coach"

[markabauman]

At Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, NY, there is a cart from "Thunder Mountain Curry", run by Mike Gordon, a CIA graduate. RPI has a significant Indian/Pakistani student/faculty population. Mike shows up about three days a week and they line up, both Easterners and Westerners. Some first-timers are a bit skeptical about a non-Indian making their cuisine, but they are quickly converted. Comments such as "This is better than my mother makes!" are not uncommon. He's usually at the Troy Farmer's Market on Saturdays (not this one, however). It's often my Saturday morning late breakfast/early lunch.

[MarketStEl]

Since MIT doesn't really have dining halls, a lot of people frequent the food trucks, of which the most popular is Goosebeary's (Chinese) over behind the bio building, despite the fact that it closes for food poisoning about once a year.  People generally pick food trucks based on location (proximity) rather than the food.

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Yet another example of how the geek paradise at the south end of Massachusetts Avenue in Cambridge and the geek paradise halfway along the street's route through the city are almost polar opposites.

I now see that Harvard is distinctive not only for its lack of fraternities (actually, there is one, which keeps a very low profile) and sororities, but also for its lack of food trucks.

I think this has something to do with the school's residential model, which is derived from the elite British universities. (Yale, Princeton and Duke, to name three, also follow this model, in which dining with your classmates and faculty is an important part of the undergraduate experience. Penn recently adopted it, but the food truck culture is too ingrained there for this new model to easily dislodge it.)

--Sandy Smith, Harvard '80

[MarketStEl]

I know you saw the Philadelphia thread already, but I figured I'd throw in my two cents as a current Penn student. We really do have a lot of food trucks -- including Chinese, so Toronto wouldn't be unique in that respect. I think Berkeley also has numerous Chinese food trucks.

What's on Penn's campus? My favorite* are:

You were going to add a footnote?

- Greek Lady: The owners are Greek, but most of their food isn't.

The Greek Lady is to the Penn food truck universe what Pam's Deli appears to be to UVM--a local legend and a campus institution. Then again, so was Sophie's.

- Yue Kee: Probably has the most disreputable appearance of all the trucks on campus, and service is extremely slow (you can call ahead to place an order, but it'll still take half an hour to get your food ready) but it's the best Chinese truck...

and probably the only food truck in metropolitan Philadelphia to get a full-blown Craig LaBan review in the Sunday Inquirer. (LaBan gave Yue Kee Mobile Kitchen two bells out of four--"very good"--and advised readers to order off-menu.)

- The Original Le An: I think I'm misspelling this since I haven't eaten there in over a year. While they claim to make Chinese food, you're better off going with Vietnamese stuff (a decent pho, chive dumplings, sweet rice in a bamboo shoot for dessert, bubble tea)... The "Real" Le An is across the street, so it can be confusing. I think one of our local papers did a story last year about the difference between the two carts.

Le Anh--and I haven't eaten at either of them in well over three years. I believe the story about the dueling Le Anhs ran in The Daily Pennsylvanian--or was it the CityPaper?

- Bui's: I feel like they're a campus institution. You can technically get cheesesteaks, hoagies etc. here, as at many other trucks (as mrbigjas mentioned), but people come in droves for the egg sandwiches, especially on weekend mornings (well, really more like noon or 1PM, but that's "morning" for a lot of people). It's basically two eggs on an Amoroso roll, with cheese (always white American) if you want it, any kind of breakfast meat you might want, and "salpeppakechup?", the trademark line of the people at Bui's, who are extraordinarily nice as well. You can try to make a sandwich  that's vaguely healthy here by ordering egg whites with fresh tomatoes on a roll. And I think it's impossible to spend more than $4.00 on a sandwich here, no matter how much junk you load it up with. A standard egg and cheese runs you $2.00.

This one I've never patronized, unless it has no name on its exterior and I just don't know I've eaten there. Where is it located?

There's also Magic Carpet (for vegetarian items, like falafel and spinach pie), Hemo's (for grilled chicken sandwiches that are good when you add spinach, mushrooms, tomatoes, cheese, and "Hemo sauce" -- really just like a runny Dijon), MexiCali, Indian trucks, crepe trucks, various hoagie trucks where you can always get a hot dog, meatball sub, cheesesteak, etc., other Chinese trucks...the list goes on and on. Most undergraduates seem to live off of food trucks (which makes sense, given that a meal in the dining halls costs something like $10 or more). There are also several interesting food trucks near Drexel that I haven't had a chance to try yet -- soul food, barbeque, and Jamaican stuff. 

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I believe the best Jamaican food truck in University City is parked outside the 30th Street post office on Market Street. It's bright pink--you can't miss it.

I can recommend MexiMovil at Drexel to you as well, and that Philly food cart thread referenced in the opening post has some others.

BTW, Diann, I worked at the University of Pennsylvania for 18 years, through April 2004, and was the managing editor of its faculty/staff newspaper, the Penn Current. We did our share of writing about international cuisine in University City, including a person-in-the-street feature about readers' favorite food trucks. I was in the Office of University Communications (the PR office, which publishes the Current during the Great Food Truck Controversy in the early 1990s, when the University moved all the trucks off of the 3600 block of Walnut, the 100 block of South 36th, and a few other nearby blocks in order to improve the view from the Inn at Penn. Looking back, there were some unfortunate casualties--including Sophie's, which I mentioned above--but many of the best trucks survived and are still in business. One of them that isn't, sadly, is Jow's Lunch, mentioned in the Philly thread--marital difficulties led to its demise.

You haven't lived until you've eaten "crying tiger."

Edited August 23, 2005 by MarketStEl (log)

[loiosh]

Since MIT doesn't really have dining halls, a lot of people frequent the food trucks, of which the most popular is Goosebeary's (Chinese) over behind the bio building, despite the fact that it closes for food poisoning about once a year.  People generally pick food trucks based on location (proximity) rather than the food.

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Is Baker dining not open anymore? That was the most old-school dorm-style operation.

MIT does offer a variety of foodservice options including traditional hot-lunch kind of stuff, a food court (mmm, Burger King), and some other stuff. The key detail, though, is that dining is done via account -- you pre-pay for x dollars worth of food and each transaction is debited against that, or you can just pay cash for your meal. It's good because you're not paying for food you don't eat. So people often eat off-campus, order pizzas, or cook...some of the dorms have large kitchen facilities for the residents.

The falafel on Mass Ave used to be really good. I'm always bummed when I get a falafel here and it doesn't come with a free soda. One of the Chinese trucks by Tech Square was good as well...everything came with steamed veggies, there was a brown rice option, and chili garlic sauce was available for generous slathering. Good times.

[zeffer81]

When I was in college at George Washington in D.C., there was a food truck called Manoosh's (sp?) right on campus open super latenight. There was nothing remarkable about the food, yet Manoosh, the proprietor was a piece of work. He had a horn that he would toot for his special customers. Imagine the thrill that his horn brought thousands of drunken college students! The zoning board tried to get rid of him, but the GW community put up such a fight that they let him be. I haven't been there in a few years, so I'm not sure if he's still around. I'm now back in Philly, and there is no better city for foodcarts.

[Behemoth]

I have to give a shout-out to another overlooked Penn institution: Rami's Lebanese truck on 40th street. Best shawarma in the city, and extremely nice guy to boot.

[Margaret Pilgrim]

Okay, come up! The closest ethnic truck to the Phyly airport? (United has stopped food service on cross country flights, and I refuse to buy the catered boxes!)