The FUTURE is here!

Comic books, cartoons and pop culture promised me flying cars, robot servants and meals in a pill. Mostly, I have been disappointed. There is, however, hope. I recently went to a Noodles & Co. Restaurant and saw a healthy chunk of the awesome future I was promised-- in a soda machine.


Behold, it is beautiful. One machine, one spout, approximately 3,000,000,000 flavor combinations. There is vanilla Sprite, orange diet coke, raspberry Coke. It is Nirvana in a soda fountain. I may not have a flying car, but I do have this awesome soda machine, that is almost as good.


Note: it is so awesome and shiny, that you can see Liam's face in the button. - Posted using BlogPress from my iPhone

Food Slinger's - Cheesesteaks are so hot right now!

Ok, we are nearing the end of my food truck hunt.  Recently, I was able to hit Food Slingers.  This was made possibly by the fact that Curbside Cafe (producer of exemplary calamari tacos), decided to go elsewhere on Thursdays, leaving a spot at the Court house open.

This is a nice truck, with nice folks.  They are passionate about their food, and were eager for me to experience their cheesesteaks.

I ordered one, and ate it.  In retrospect, there was one problem.  I ate it too soon.  It was so fresh and hot, that I burned my mouth in my haste, and didn't taste it as well as I should have.

This was a very good cheesesteak.  I will eat there again, and try their variations.  That is certainly going to be Food Slinger's biggest challenge, making the most of a limited menu.  If they can't make the most of a small menu, they run the risk of being an also ran in a crowded cheesesteak and food truck market.

I for one, hope they make it.

Island Breeze - not my favorite breakfast

Ok, I didn't love island breeze.  In fact, this is going to be a very short post.  Instead of an in-depth review, I'll just give the two reasons why I am doing a post on the Island Breeze truck.

First, with the exception of Hamura's saimin on the island of Kauai, I am not a fan of Hawaiian food.  I am beginning to adopt the opinion of Greg Proops (comedian) as it relates to Hawaiian food.  You should check out his stuff sometime, but in general, he says that Hawaii is just a tropical Alabama.  This meal shows it.  There is very little cooking, only heating.  You cook rice and eggs, but it is no special feat.  You brown the sausage - I'm still not impressed.  No cool sauces, nothing.  It isn't horrible food, but it is not unique or particularly exciting to the palate.  To quote one one of the priests from Nacho Libre "Where are the flavors?" So, I make this post to call out Hawaii and say - come on.  Step it up.

Second, the rice looks like boobs.

Thank you for reading today.

Da Vinci's - I never thought they could do pizza in a truck

I'm running out of food trucks.  If I don't track down BBQ Boy pretty soon, I'll have to move off of the food trucks and onto regular stuff again.  

So, DaVinci's.  If Sloppi Jo's is the epitome of the proper use of new marketing techniques to bring really good mobile food to people all over town, then DaVinci's might be an example of overselling it.  

First, the food was ok.  The pizza seems to have been done pursuant to the NY slice 'o' pizza technique - where every pizza is a cheese pizza, but then it is reheated with your toppings when you order it.  It was fine.  Not bad, but not special.  

What stands out for me, is that this is a super new, high tech truck.  It has references to twitter and a web site on the side.  The wrap for the truck is obviously expensive and modern.  

Unfortunately, it's also soulless and boring.  Somehow, the appearance of this truck, makes me not want to eat there.  

So, let's recap.  The food was fine.  If it is near my office, I might stop by and try their salads.  The food was not, however, noteworthy.  

The people were nice.  I have no problem with the service. 

The marketing, however, seems to have out slicked itself and become either a distraction, or it writes checks the food can't cash.  

Stuff I learn - photographing fireworks

 I am interrupting my stream of food truck posts, in order to share newfound knowledge that I recently acquired.  By recently acquired, I mean "last night."

'Tis the season for fireworks. Photographing, has always sounded like fun.  I tried last year, and failed miserably.  Now, with another year of photography practice under my belt, I am trying again, with much better success.  Here is what I have learned so far:

1. Settings

For these pictures, I set my ISO at it's lowest setting (200 on my D40).  This should reduce noise and hopefully help keep extraneous stuff out of the shot.

I turned my aperture to its smallest setting, 29 I think on this particular lens.  I figured this would allow me to have the whole field in focus, as opposed to just some of the explosions being sharp.  I might experiment later with actually trying to focus a certain distance and opening the aperture up a bit.

Set the shutter to "bulb" or manual.  I use a remote to open and close it.

It's weird, as I write this, because I am saying that in order to shoot in the dark, you want to set your camera to settings that make it look like you are not trying to let any light in at all.  In a sense, you are.  You only want the brightest stuff coming in, and you don't want any noise.

I put the camera on a tripod, and picked an area of sky to shoot.  Then, I used the remove to open the shutter, and left it open until fireworks started.  Then, when I though I had a good amount of action recorded, I close the shutter and let the camera process - which took a very long time.

Here are some results:

This shot highlights a problem, you have to time your shutter release so that you have composed a nice, clean image.  Here, I left the shutter open too long, and the next mortar came through and uglied up a nice shot with a white, fiery trail.

It is weird to frame a shot, not knowing where the action will be.  It is also weird to just leave the shutter open, trying to imagine how the picture looks as you stack explosion after explosion on top of themselves.

If you leave the shutter open too long, the sky isn't as black, and the shot can get too busy.




I also noticed an interesting phenomenon, look at this shot.  It looks like little heartbeats in the fire trails.  It looks faked, but it absolutely is not.  I assume it is the result of the shock wave of subsequent blasts after these had already exploded.

That's what I learned last night.  Hope it's helpful.

Haulin' Balls - awesome name, awesome balls.

Haulin' Balls.  You must agree, this is an awesome name.  The fact is, it's an awesome truck.  

This is one of those food trucks that I had to stalk a bit in order to track down.  However, they are quite good at using the internet and social media to make themselves accessible  One day, they were just blocks from work (at El Cortez), and I was able to talk a few partners and associates to all go with me.  

First off, I took a picture of the chip rack, because Haulin' Balls has chips in spicy varieties that I have never seen.  This was a good sign.  

What do you buy here?  Balls.  Balls of meat.  I got the Thai balls (they had a clever name, I'm sure) and the bbq pork balls (also, they had a clever name that I have forgotten).

First, the BBQ balls:

pulled pork bbq, with sauce and sauce, pickle on the side.  It was quite tasty.  Good texture, good preparation and great execution.  These were not a disappointment at all.

Second, the Thai balls:

These were, I think, a combination of meats, very well spiced, served in a lettuce cup with sriracha hot sauce and a vinegar type slaw.  These were quite amazing.  Light tasting food, with great flavors.  These were very satisfying.

Haulin' Balls is doing a great job of serving great food you won't find anywhere else (I have not bumped into a restaurant that specializes in balls 'o meat).  Check them out, they're great.

Sloppi Jo's - Great, unique truck food

As I mentioned before, I have fashioned myself into something of a food truck hunter.  They are a weird quarry.  Those that use social networking properly, are easy to find.  They have a website with an always-current schedule.  Or, they have a twitter feed with frequent tweets to identify where they are and where they will be.  Maybe they will just have a Facebook page, where they frequently post on their wall, and even respond to questions from other "friends."  Those that don't, are like the Loch Ness Monster.  Learned of via vague rumors and brief glimpses reported by untrustworthy sources.  There is really no reason for a truck to be hard to find, unless it doesn't want to be found.  I wish they would all learn this lesson.

Sloppi Jo's does a pretty good job of staying visible, at least as far as the internet goes.  I guess they'd have to, since one of their most common stops is behind the Palms Casino.  

I was able to track this truck down, and chat with "Jo" (I think it's actually Jolene) when I went out there.  

First, here's the truck.  Sloppi Jo's is one of the new trucks.  The old generation were white, with small lettering, which, from a distance, were undistinguishable from others.  The new ones have whole-truck designs, that make it easy to distinguish from any distance.  I guess I am saying that marketing/branding 101 principles are finally being applied to food trucks.

Let's talk about what I ate.

Here is my entree.  It is red chile, with grilled onions and a fried egg.  If you know me, you know I don't like onions.  However, I will eat them fried (along with about anything else).  To me, this dish exemplifies the beauty and evolutionary advantage of the food truck.  This is a non-standard dish.  Red chili, is not common.  You can find it at a mexican restaurant, but not many other places.  Grilled onion and a fried egg?  That's originality right there.  Taste?  Delicious.  As I was chatting with "Jo", she told me that she only buys fresh Hatch Chiles, from New Mexico, at least for her green chile dishes.  When she's out, she's out until the next harvest.  

What does this have to do with the evolution of the food truck?  The food truck has limited space and facilities.  So, to succeed, it has to make each dish count.  This dish is unique, hearty, flavorful and good looking.  Perfect food execution of the strengths of the food truck.  It is also quick.  Onions take very little time to saute, same with eggs.  Red chile is really a stew that was made before the day began.  So, you get slow cooking flavor, in minutes.

For dessert, I got a maple-bacon cupcake and got Amy a brownie-stuffed chocolate chip cookie (a chocolate chip cookie stuffed with a brownie).  I loved my cupcake.  It was a maple cupcake, with maple frosting and bits of bacon.  On top of all that, I think some maple syrup was drizzled.  It was a tad messy, but it was very good.  It had the same hearty and food-y flair as the entrees.  Amy said the brownie-stuffed cookie was good, but didn't blow her mind.  

I really liked Sloppi Jo's.  She's got a great vibe, a great truck and has some really, really good food.  Sloppi Jo's isn't just making truck food, she's making food that will summon the foodies.