Seoul Town Tapas @ Breadbar on West Third

The wife and I went to dinner at Breadbar on West Third to try Chef Debbie Lee's Seoul Town Tapas, a pop-up concept restaurant with a twist on Korean Pub food. She was also a finalist for Food Networks "The Next Food Network Star" (season 5). Hadn't really heard anything about how her food/concept was being received (good or bad). Considering Breadbar is one of our favorite places in general, figure we can never go wrong.

Upon seating, for your pre-meal appetizer, they give you kimchee daikon radishes which were quite tasty and not too spicy.

For our first appetizer we had the Chips and Curry Bean Dip, which was really good, the chips were made from wontons, light and crispy. The bean dip had fairly smooth texture to it and the curry was definitely there, but not overkill. A good all around dish between the tastes and textures.



After the dip we had the kimchee citrus pork with roasted fuji apples skewers, which were very tasty and the pork with roasted apple paired nicely, mild but with flavor. Followed by Korean Rice Cylinders with maple smoked bacon and a jalapeno ponzu. Can't really go wrong when bacon is involved, although I didn't really taste much more than the bacon. Both of them had a nice ponzu dipping sauce. 

Next, we had the Chicken Meat Balls, which was probably one of our faves. It was almost like sweet and sour chicken in meat ball form with a caramelized outer texture. A little sweet and savory and good all the way around (pun intended).

We then tried the Korean Fried Chicken (dark meat). This was good, not great or exceptional, especially for $16. It didn't seem that different then regular fried chicken. I had heard later that there was a Soy Braised Chicken Breast on the menu that was really great, but it was rotated out for the fried chicken, maybe it will make a come back. 

Lastly, for dessert, we tried the Grilled Nutella and Blueberry Sammie. Pan de mie bread grilled with sweet blueberries and Nutella. Simple and great. Uh, yah, yum. My wife hasn't stopped thinking about it either.

Overall, I enjoyed the meal itself, even though I was expecting something a little more exciting (I think Chef Ludo set the bar pretty high for pop-up concepts). The prices were affordable though, the portions were, well, tapas style so it was more then enough for us, but we eat light. We're planning on going back at least one more time. There were plenty of other tasty sounding dishes to try. The pop-up was supposed to end on April 10th, but it was just extended to May 1st. You can find more info about it here.

Flying Pig

Still getting caught up on my posts. Going up later then planned.

After many months, finally tried the Flying Pig food truck. No line (love it when I can time it right) and the service was fast and friendly. Had the tamarind duck taco and spicy pork taco. I really liked them both. The duck taco was quite good, it was more shredded in texture. Had the tangerines, pickled beets and daikon sprouts. A lot going on, but nothing overwhelmed or overpowered anything else. Nice flavor balance between the pickled crunch of the beets, tangy/citrus of the mandarin oranges with tamarind duck. One of the more unique taco offerings as far as food trucks go.



The pork taco had a little heat to it, but with a richer flavor. It had shaved green papaya on it, I believe they said it had an adobo sauce on it as well. I got mine without the cilantro cream sauce, just not a fan of cilantro. That whole soap taste thing. I think this was a good example of less is more. Only a few ingredients in the taco itself, it didn't really need anything else.





I look forward to trying them again. I know I'll be getting both of these tacos again and definitely want to try the pork belly buns next time. Yummy oinky (and quacky) goodness.
Follow them on twitter here.

Yum Yum Bowls

Tried Yum Yum Bowls the other day. Mostly Thai style foods. I tried the Yellow Curry with chicken. I found it to be ok. The curry itself had some nice flavors going on, but I found the potatoes a bit on the starchy/under cooked side, the carrots were alright and the chicken was tasty, but also kinda rubbery. It struck me as late night delivery food. I'll probably try them again at some point, they had quite a few menu items, well priced and the service was friendly.

Uncle Lau's Island BBQ Food Truck

Chef on Wheels got a make over and a new branding, they are now Uncle Lau's Island BBQ.
I hadn't visited his truck in a little while with the surge of new trucks rolling out and the frequency that they are hitting the MTV area for lunch, AKA food truck alley, so I haven't been visiting my favorite trucks nearly as much. All of his food seems to be pretty much the same as before, not much in the way of menu changes, which is good. I usually get the pulled pork, which is really one of the best I've had in L.A. It has a really great moist, mild smoke, with light flavor. Satisfying, never disappointed. I haven't tried much else from him other then a couple of chicken specials, I just like the pulled pork that much. I will try some other things soon. They have a repeat customer punch card now, which is pretty cool. Ten sandwiches, 11th is free. Be nice if more trucks did that. Good and easy incentive. Follow them on twitter here.

Tasty Meat!

Tasty Meat, originally uploaded by LeandroF.

A little bit late in posting this, been a bit behind the past few weeks.

Tried the Tasty Meat! Food Truck. They do a Turkish twist on the wraps. I had wanted to try the Cuban sandwich, but it was sold out (wasn't the first time either). Appears to be popular. I tried the Chickwich, which is very gyro like. Pita wrapped marinated dark chicken, lettuce, tomato but with feta, tahini and tzatziki sauce. Wound up being a bit sauce heavy for my liking, but that's normal for me. Next time I would ask them to go light on the sauces. Chicken itself was, well, tasty. And it was filling. A little hard to eat due to the sauciness though.



They had said they were going to be getting a new wrap design for the truck, not sure if thats
happened yet.

Will definitely try them again, really want to try that Cuban sandwich.