food truck chasing, simplified

i had a really lovely friday off.  it started out with breakfast with MIL at our favorite local greasy spoon, where i oinked out with a plate of blintzes after chowing down on two eggs and some bacon.

oh, so good.  and then we decided to put off whatever needed to be done at home and stopped in for a relaxing mani/pedi.  by that time, it was time to pick up the bean from school, and after she had lunch and went down for her nap (during which i MAY have dozed off for a little bit), it was time to head over and scoop up the teen.  she was stoked to be surprised with a trip to the nail salon for her own pampering, and then i saw this:

um, YES.  i knew the hub wouldn't be interested in the least, but MIL would.  and that went for the teen's buddies rock-ell and softballa, too.  so somewhere around 6:30ish, we forked out the $5 for parking and pulled up here:

it'd been a while since i'd come here.  i used to like to come and drive the cars on the various tracks.  the girls were excited to try it, too - they could drive the "slick trax" cars without a driver's license.

the event was set up on the "grand prix" track, which is usually the most fun one of them besides the dragsters, which is over in about 3 seconds.  all of the trucks scheduled to appear were already there, although some weren't ready for business yet.

while MIL took the bean to find a table, i got in line for my favorite truck thus far.

this is one of the co-founders of the truck - she's in my junior league and co-chair of the committee i'm on.  she chatted with me as much as she could while she worked on orders, and comped me a yummy dessert.  yay!

despite the looks of that line, the wait really wasn't too bad.  i got to chatting with a couple of people while we stood on the grand prix track and froze our asses off, and the time went by pretty quickly.  the guy in front of me told me about a bar & grill out in anaheim that does a burger with half ground bacon, half ground beef - i think i may have to hit up some of my OC buddies to see if they want to indulge my bacon madness.  heh.

anyway, here's the fruits of my labor - er, wait in line.  one lobster roll, one crab - both with butter, no mayo.  the goods are flown in fresh from maine daily, or some craziness like that.  and they're kind of pricey, with the lobster being $11 and the crab $9.  but OH, so worth it.

back at the table, rock-ell had gone for dessert first - she was so excited to dig into her hawaiian shave ice.  i think i've created a monster.

the bean had managed to get her grandma to let her do the same, with a treat from this truck:

MIL had picked up a taco from the white rabbit truck, offering grub from my homeland, but after she got a bite of my lobster and crab rolls, she took off to get her own.

meanwhile, the girls had gone to stand in the ridiculously long line for the most popular truck at the event.  apparently, the grill 'em all guys had won the food network's "the great food truck race", and everybody wanted to hit up the celebrity truck:

they were gone for a really long time, but i'm thinking it wasn't nearly as long as the wait others had. one girl sat down next to us later on and said she'd waited for an hour and a half for her burger.  um, that's just nuts.  and i was gone when they returned with theirs and didn't get a picture.  they tell me that it was worth the wait, though.  the teen told me a tale of a burger with cream cheese, bacon and onions, and softballa had enjoyed her "hannah montana" burger, although i don't know what was in it.  i was glad to hear that they were having a good time.

MIL had stopped at another truck to pick up something tasty for me - a spam hand roll from the tapa boy truck (more offerings from the homeland).

and then she gave the bean the whoopie pie she got with her lobster roll.  she'd eaten some chicken and rice before we left, so she'd already had dinner (in case you were wondering).

i went for something to drink at the boba truck - a jolly rancher green apple milk tea, with mini boba.

and then the tantalizing smell of korean BBQ from the lee philly's truck got me.  two gogi beef tacos, please!

i was glad we got there when we did, because there was a crazy long line to get in by then.

this also meant really long lines for most of the good trucks.  rock-ell stood in one of them for a couple of tacos from white rabbit, while i opted to cap my night off with hawaiian shave ice (it's never too cold).

she and softballa decided to split another large shave ice after that, but they screwed up and gave them a regular size.  so to make up for it, they just gave them a second one!  sweet.

i left the girls to finish up and headed inside to catch up with MIL and the bean, who were happily playing games inside the warm building.  the $5 admission into the food truckfest included $5 in gaming credit, so it was essentially free.

MIL went back out to get herself a shave ice, too, and brought it in to share with the bean.

the teen and her friends came in, exhilarated from their run on the slick trax cars, and played a few games too.

it was a super fun friday night.  we were all tired from the full day, but the food truckfest was really fun.  plus, it's turning into a monthly event - "first friday."  i'm thinking that we'll likely return for more, especially during the spring and summer months.

and judging from this article in the local newspaper the next morning, we sure won't be alone.

too bad they didn't snap pics of US.  that would've made for a much better ending to the story.  oh, well. next time.