Last night I made it to the food trucks at Burbank High
School with my friend Thom. Once a
month, the school sponsors a food truck round-up in the parking lot next to the
football fields on the second Thursday of the month. Apparently the event benefits the school’s
culinary arts department. This is the
second month we’ve gone. They try to rotate
different trucks through, but unfortunately there were a couple of repeats this
time – but only two repeats out of six trucks isn’t too bad an average, I
guess.
Our choices were Thai, waffles (savory or sweet), crepes,
burgers, or comfort foods. I opted for
the crepes truck, Ooh La La (www.oohlalacrepes.com)
since they offered sandwiches as well as crepes. You had a choice of the filling on a roll, or
in a crepe. What drew my attention was
the Philly Cheesesteak. I’ve been jonsin’
food a good cheesesteak, so I thought it was worth a shot.
Of course, I did order it on a roll….somehow it just seemed sacrilege
to have it as a crepe, but I might be willing to try next time I come across
them. Now, to me, cheesesteaks are very
thinly sliced beef that is seasoned and cooked on a griddle. I’m not a fan of grilled onions, so I had
them leave them off. They also offered
it with a chipotle mayo – again, to me sacrilege. So I ordered it classic style without onions. What I wasn’t prepared for was the fact that
when they call it steak, they aren’t kidding.
The sandwich came as slices of sirloin that were not thin,
but not thick either, seasoned and griddled, topped with provolone (some people
prefer American…..or Cheez Whiz...shudder).
I was incredibly hungry, so I just started chomping down and wound up
remembering to take a picture when I only had a bite left (see below). The sandwich was actually very flavorful; a
hint of onion flavor from being cooked on the griddle with other
sandwiches. And the fact that it was
more thin slabs of steak than thin slices wasn’t really a detriment. The beef was tender, so it was easy to bite
into. As a more modern take on the
cheesesteak, I would definitely give it a thumb’s up.
Thom and I also shared some chili cheese fries from the Prime
Time Cuisine on Wheels truck (www. facebook.com/primetimecuisineonwheels). The truck itself offers a mixture of American
and Mexican comfort foods, and some fusion thereof.
If I had to rate the dish, I’d
give it 2.5 stars out of 5; just a tad near mediocre. The fries were relatively well cooked, and
fresh, and the chili had a moderate amount of heat, but they topped it with
what I refer to as ballpark nacho cheese – essentially melted Cheez Whiz. Not my favorite thing. It wasn’t awful, just not up to snuff,
especially for any truck using “cuisine” in its name.
One other thing to note is that at
this monthly food truck event, they invite local bands to come play. This week it turned out they had invited the
kids from Neighborhood Rock School in Burbank to come and play, which is one of
the schools the charity I do some work with (Rock School Scholarship Fund)
helps support. It was nice to see them supporting
the kids and giving them a chance to showcase some of their talents.
