Street Food in New Orleans
Found in food trucks and fine dining establishments alike.
Related recipe: Duck and Butternut Squash Beignets from SoBou
Although street food has been around throughout the millennia, in the past few years and with the advent of social media like Twitter and Facebook, the lure of cheap, freshly made “good-to-go” food has awakened and attracted the palates of throngs of new followers.
The phenomenon has crisscrossed the country, as have many of these chefs and their mobile kitchens to participate in events like last month’s Food Fest—formerly called “New Orleans Roadfood Festival,” in the French Market.
Street food has long been a part of New Orleans culinary culture. In more recent times, think Jazz Fest. However, soon after its founding, the European settlers bought or exchanged foodstuffs as well as finished dishes with Native Americans.
In the 1800s, both slaves and free people of color, primarily women, sold calas (fried rice cakes) out of large baskets balanced on their heads. Sugar cane stalks were sold on the street, and the French Market continues to sell a variety of eats to passers by.
In the early twentieth century, Bernardo Hernandez emigrated to New Orleans from his native Mexico. After working as a chef in the French Quarter, he saved enough money to start his own business, making and selling hot tamales with his wife Rosa from a cart in the early 1920s.
Now their grandchildren carry on that tradition. Lisa and Bernie Jolet recently resurrected the family tamale business with a pick-up truck and attached cart. Mamita’s Hot Tamales is named for what they called their Grandmother Rosa.
Old Style Tamales, operated by Joy Bowe for the past thirty years, sells their tamales from carts on New Orleans’ West Bank. The company also prepares orders of wild game tamales from meats supplied by the customer.
Lucky Dogs, with hot dog vendors on seemingly every other street corner in the French Quarter, began serving New Orleanians and visitors in 1947. Lucky Dog even operated carts for a short period in China, possibly the outdoor food market center of the world, according to long-time manager Jerry Strahan. “Beijing street food is really cheap,” he noted.
Although street food has always been accessible in the city, New Orleans’ food truck community actually jump-started in the months following Katrina. With most restaurants closed and their staffs displaced, food trucks provided cheap, easy eats for workers and returning storm refugees. In addition, some parts of the city were without power for months.
While most of those early foodie wagons were known as “taco trucks,” the current collection of food trucks represents a wide array of ethnic and thematic offerings.
One of the so-described taco trucks that began during those chaotic months after the storm has definitely made a mark as a huge local favorite—the wildly painted, can’t miss Taceaux Loceaux.
Alex del Castillo and wife, Maribeth, saw an opportunity, and seized upon the food truck idea. They haven’t looked back since. TL’s popularity includes catering gigs at private parties, food truck soirées, and regular stops at popular evening spots.
Some Taceaux Loceaux menu choices: Seoul Man, a Korean-style bulgogi chicken taco with shredded cabbage, cilantro, pickled red onion and sriracha aioli; Kermit’s BBQ, a sweet and spicy pork and mango taco; Carnital Knowledge with slow roasted pork, shredded cabbage, radish, cilantro, and chipolte aioli on corn tortillas; AIEEE! An andouille sausage taco with sautéed jalapenos, Serrano and chipotle peppers, spicy beans and rice, green onions, crema and sauce picante. Many other options are available including vegetarian tacos and soups.
The del Castillos admit to being influenced to get into the food truck game by Nathanial Zimet’s success with the “big purple truck,” Que Crawl, which did a thriving afterhours business on weekends at Tipitina’s on Napoleon Avenue.
Zimet and business partner, James Denio, were spurred on by their many followers to open Boucherie, one of the city’s most continuously busy and popular restaurants. While the Que Crawl still makes appearances at festivals, catering gigs and other events, many of the items Zimet prepared in his mobile kitchen—like collard greens, BBQ, pulled pork cake with slaw, boudin balls, and crispy grits fries—can be found on the menu at Boucherie.
The craze has also inspired Booty’s, a newly opened, casual Bywater eatery offering guests street food tastes from around the globe all from the same menu. Owners Nick Vivion and Kevin Farrell jumped on the idea of inexpensive comfort food from other cultures.
“We’re trying to reflect the flavors and textures of dishes from around the world,” said Vivion. “You can’t just hop on a plane and travel to all these places, so we thought it would be fun in a walkable, bikeable neighborhood like ours to offer an entry point into all these other cultures.”
Booty’s Chef Greg Fonseca, a born-and-raised New Orleanian with chef credits at Rio Mar and John Besh’s American Sector, is totally with the program, dishing out empanadas with smoked pork and chimichurri; Japanese yakitori; Ecuadorian shrimp ceviche with tomato, peppers and onio; Vietnamese Banh Mi po’ boys; bulgogi Korean beef lettuce wraps with house kimchi; zeppole—Italian fried doughnuts with powdered sugar—and a selection of many other small portion sized items, often served on a stick, in a cone, or for consuming by hand.
The magic of street food’s appeal has not been lost on mainstream restaurateurs and their chefs. Domenica Executive Chef Alon Shaya, a native of Israel, moved to the U.S. as a youngster but spent a lot of time abroad in his native country on repeated visits. “I fell in love with kebabs,” he said, “and falafel (a blend of ground chick peas, parsley and spices mixed together into small balls and fried) right there on the sidewalk. I could pick from fifteen different salads to put on top. For street food, it can be every messy,” he said.
Shaya is going to share his love for Israeli street food when he and Michael Solomonov, an Israeli-born, 2011 James Beard award winner, co-host an Israeli street food seminar for the New Orleans Wine and Food Experience, May 22-25.
If you can’t wait for the seminar, falafel and other middle Eastern delights can be found on the Fat Falafel food truck which is another stand out in the current crop of kitchens on wheels.
By the end of this month, noted Chef Neal Swidler’s new restaurant, Lucky Rooster—featuring Asian Street food, will be opening in the Warehouse District. A former chef de cuisine at both NOLA and Emeril’s Delmonico and a veteran of the initial Mike’s on the Avenue, Swidler is passionate about cooking Asian food.
“Asian street food is a natural since so much of it seems to be evolved from what regular working people in Asia eat on a daily basis,” he said. “The marketplace in Asian cultures is still a big part of daily life; we are just beginning to re-embrace that here in the states with our farmers markets.”
Swidler continued, “Our menu is an Asian ‘best of’ and offers food primarily from Vietnam, Korea and China—but you will see items from Thailand and Japan as well. We will have handmade dumplings and all of our noodles will be made in house—scratch cooking is the core of all great cuisine.
“The food is snacky but substantial, affordable and interesting, and designed to be shared or enjoyed alone. We’ll have a whole section of bao [steamed buns], bahn mi [Vietnamese po’ boys], soups and salads.” In true street food mode, Swidler notes that he loves the fresh bright assertive flavors and the unstuffy presentations.
The Commander’s Palace cousins Ti Martin and Lally Brennan along with partner Tory MacPhail, describe their newest establishment, SoBou, as “street food inspired.”
MacPhail and SoBou Executive Chef Juan Carlos Gonzalez put their heads together to come up with an array of dishes, many derived from Gonzalez’ experiences in his native Puerto Rico.
Dishes such as crispy pork cracklins’, fries and yellowfin tuna tartare, pineapple ceviche with basil, and avocado ice cream—are served in cones; while shrimp and tasso pinchos appear on a stick. Among other street-style treats are oyster tacos with pineapple ceviche, corn fried mirlitons, pickled jalapenos, and sweet corn aioli on a grilled tortilla topped with ghost pepper caviar; crispy boudin balls; burgers; butternut squash beignets (click for recipe); crispy chicken drumsticks and grilled alligator sausage.
Gonzalez sometimes translates his street inspired creations for the sake of presentation. “I look at it both ways,” he said. “Some dishes are more playable than others. In a restaurant environment, it’s all about presentation. People eat with their eyes before they even take a bite. You want diners to be charmed and enthused about their order.”
Gonzalez is a big fan of Cocinita, which translates to “little café,” a food truck owned by fellow Commanders Palace alums, Rachel Billow and Benoit Angulo. Angulo, a Venezuelan chef, missed the vibrant late night street food scene in his native Caracas, the “calle del hambre.”
One night he and Rachel talked about getting a food truck and the couple just decided to “go for it,” she said. “It was so exciting, our first night—in front of the Rendezvous Tavern on Magazine Street (where Rachel and Benoit first hatched their mobile kitchen plans). “My parents drove all the way down from Chicago for the opening.”
Gonzalez and a lot of their Commander’s Palace pals were there, too. “Street food is playful,” said Gonzalez. “It’s fun and easy to eat and allows people to taste a variety of small items.
“Plus,” he continued, “it’s informal food; it’s fresh, quick and it’s cheap.
“Someday I’m going to have my own truck,” he laughed.
Details. Details. Details.
Current menu offerings and locations all of the trucks mentioned in this story can be found on Facebook.
Booty’s Street Food
800 Louisa Street
New Orleans, La
(504) 266-2887
Lucky Rooster
luckyroosternola.wordpress.com
SoBou
310 Chartres Street
New Orleans, La
(504) 552-4095