Gee, Street Food?

When a new lunch opens near the White House, it generates a decent amount of buzz, and generally crowds for at least a little while. Lots of folks work around there, and top lunch places are in high demand. As such, there was definite excitement when it was announced that a mediocre lunch place (Ecco Cafe) was being rebranded as a great-sounding “street food” place, featuring street foods from around the world.

As G Street Food (located on G near 17th NW in DC) opened recently, the buzz was still with it, and we quickly decided we needed to make it a priority to go there at lunch to try it out. When we arrived it was moderately crowded, but nothing more than Ecco ever got.

There's a big menu board when you first walk in to G Street Food and get in line. This contains specials, rotating features and staples. All of the stuff looked reasonably interesting, but we all agreed that there were not a lot of jump-off-the-page items and also not much that was very recognizable as street food. They have a sausage of the day with the highly recognizable Chicago hot dog on Tuesday, but the other days had bratwurst with kimchi and chorizo with an Indian-like sauté in a Middle Eastern saj bread. I find it hard to believe that those combinations actually exist somewhere on the street, as they seem a bit too cross-cultural.

There were lots of breakfast pastries, including tiny Montreal bagels, a tatine and pizza of the day, the Vietnamese pork sandwich bahn mi and a variety of other tatines, sandwiches and salads. Again, only several items really seemed like they would lend themselves to being street food (who gets salad on the street?). And absent were street food classics: burrito, quesadilla, crepe, Middle Eastern halal bowl, Asian dumpling and potsticker, Indian curry, samosa, Philly cheesesteak, Po Boy, Korean ba bim bop. I could go on. Instead what was there was eclectic if not esoteric, and just NOT ringing of street food to me. Even the presentation, in awkward paper bowls with no lid made portability – a street food must – very difficult and awkward.

What I ordered – the chorizo in saj – was actually very tasty. The chorizo was spicy and very flavorful, and served in the thin crispy saj bread with a terrific sauté of greens, paneer-like cheese, spices and chickpeas served with very good fries. It was a delicious meal, and the flavors melded together wonderfully in each bite. I was not complaining about that. Nine dollars for a sausage is a bit much, but it was tasty. But even this seemed like a combo of three cultures and a bit contrived for street food. Unfortunately, my compatriots weren't quite so pleased with the taste and preparation of what they ordered.

But for now, I'll say the taste and quality is good at G Street Food, but executing the key design – the design that's going to bring me and many others back again and again – is failing right now. Bring me AUTHENTIC street food treasures that I've never heard of from all around the world and dazzle me, but also keep me coming back with some of the street food that we know, love and identify with. Make me know – and not question – that its “street food” on “G” not just “food” on “G Street.”

The Hunt for Brigafood

Every 100 years, out of the deep mist, appears an enchanted Scottish village, or Indian food cart. And if you miss this magical moment, it shall be lost once again for 100 long, foodless turns of the calendar…

Call me Ishmael. Call me Tommy Albright. As long as you can find me Fojol! Fojol Brothers of Merlindia that is: a traveling Indian street food cart that bears the fictional moniker and serves up some incredible Indian grub to the working folks of Washington DC every hundred years when they appear out of the mist. Or so it seems.

This cart frustratingly bounces around DC, seemingly in a longer and more erratic orbit than I originally inferred when I was first told of the wonder of Fojol's food. The only clues as to their whereabouts are their extremely inconsistent and sparse updates of their Twitter page (on the day of only). Yet wherever their colorful truck, blaring hippie anthems to the surrounding streets and their patrons alike, happens to be, the word spreads like wildfire and the patrons arrive in swarms. The line quickly gets 20 or 30 deep or more and stays that way for the duration of that day's lunch.

My buddy Eric and I started searching for Fojol every day at lunchtime at least a month ago after we saw them one day in Farragut Square with an insane line. We were fools enough to bypass this alleged amazing experience and went elsewhere. After realizing our blunder we vowed to keep searching, every day at lunch, until we were as maniacally committed as Captain Ahab was to his quest for Moby Dick. But it would not elude us. Fortune struck just last Thursday when we were least expecting it. Fojol had returned to Farragut! Plus, we had noticed early and were able to get in line even before the word had completely spread. And NOW the magic would finally happen!

So simple though, was this magic. Fojol has four (seemingly variable) Indian dishes. Our day, it was chicken curry, buttered chicken, chickpeas and pumpkin. You can pick 1, pick 2 or pick 3, and they heap large amounts of each over basmati rice in successively larger biodegradable containers (with biodegradable plastic forks even) depending on your selection. I picked all but the pumpkin (sorry, had to play it safe: no gourd today) and was highly satisfied and impressed. It really was high quality Indian food, exploding with flavor, and in this context is just fantastic. It tastes amazing – it's why they're so highly reputed – but it's at least in part due to that sweet taste of victory for even making a Fojol lunch happen.

And the buzz was certainly in force. As the line grew and grew, we were hearing the whispers on the street, in our building, everywhere. Everyone wanted some of that hype. Did they desperately want one of their famous mango lassi popsicles? Did they yearn for some of the delicately flavored Indian fare, piled high? Or were they secretly and perhaps insanely obsessed with finding that little, musical street food truck before it faded into the mist of Farragut Square for another 100 years, or possibly forever? Or perhaps their nickname was Ahab and that was enough?

Severely mixed literary metaphors or not, there IS something to get excited about this lunchtime experience. So hunt with me. Mine starts again today.

…Or you could miss out on THE experience of well, the next HUNDRED years.

Streets of New York

I get three whopping days in New York City this year. Not nearly enough time to do everything I want to do, see everyone I want to see or eat everything I want to eat. From a foodie's perspective, I certainly had to make it count while we were there over Labor Day. While the island of Manhattan is loaded with restaurants, bars, dives, joints and haute cuisineries, there is no better way to know you're in New York than to go to a cart and get some unbelievable street food. There is lots of competition in this market, so these places have to be good to survive. And they're good. The street food in New York is unparalleled in quantity and quality on the east coast and perhaps the world, so I need to take advantage when given the chance.

Take something basic yet beautiful I did for lunch on Saturday. I found a cart with gorgeous Italian sausages on the corner of 33rd and 7th avenue. We're talking nearly foot-long, and with beautiful color, texture and caramelization. The guy takes one, splits it lengthwise down the middle and throws it inside-down on the scorching hot grill and presses it with an equally scorching hot iron. After its fully grilled and smoking, he puts the split sausage on a bun half its size and squirts it generously with spicy mustard. That's it. The sausage is crispy and juicy, spicy and tangy, and just oozing with incredible grilled flavor and juices. Mixed perfectly with the spicy tartness of the mustard, each bite is a fabulous morsel worthy of savoring. Just a pleasure to eat, devour rather.

He also had some divine-looking kabobs that were thick and juicy, shiny and caramelized from whatever marinades they'd been cooked in. I was tempted to go back and get a grilled kabob, as they were so beautiful and the guy's grill was so perfect. As I walked on, I saw he had a longer line forming as it was rolling closer to lunch. I'm not surprised. I think I have a nose for quality. Or maybe you just get quality wherever you go in Manhattan.

Street Food Culture

Whether they like to admit it or not, my office is full of foodies. Or at least lunchtime foodies. The people I work with, young and less young, nearly all have a tight grip on the nearby lunch places and their ups, downs and other redeeming qualities. They don't always show excitement about these places, but there was definitely a little buzz when we heard about the upcoming G Street Food. But why blame us? When a generic, mediocre fast-food Italian lunch place (Ecco on G Street near 17th NW in DC) is being replaced by the new, novel, and delicious concept (street foods from around the world) of the founder and former owner (Mark Furstenberg) of arguably the area’s best lunch place (The Breadline on Pennsylvania Ave near H St NW), a lot of folks will pay attention.

And there is definitely some curiosity about this new joint opening in August. Just how wide will he spread his cultural wings? The article above mentions a lot of European-influenced street food, which is a great start. But it would be criminal to leave out Asian and Middle Eastern street foods, including Chinese, Indian, Syrian, Lebanese and Israeli. They're all incredibly rich and diverse in their street food and I'm sure there are street delights from these cultures that I haven't even heard of yet (but hope to). Between Chinese dumplings, Indian samosas, shwarma bowls, Middle Eastern cheese and meat pies and falafel, these cultures' most popular street foods even translate to the streets of New York City. Not to mention the classic New York, Jewish street food, knish.

In this country, New York, New Orleans and Chicago have incredibly rich street food heritages. Not a coincidence, in my opinion, that these three cities probably have more character than any other US city I’ve been to. DC could use a little more character. Not that forcing street food into a lunch place will give DC culture, but G Street Food could at least make us strive for that level of richness and community that street food culture can bring to a city. For a city filled with people from all over the globe, sometimes it feels like we’re all trying to be the same instead of proudly celebrating and sharing our differences. But I’m just asking for small steps. Mr. Furstenberg will certainly have his work cut out for him with so many street foods to represent, but he could be in for a welcome surprise if the closet foodies, closet New Yorkers and closet cosmopolitans of the DC area open up and embrace the spirit that he is subtly hinting at.