Food trucks, glorious food trucks

So there's this show on the Food Network that always makes me hungry. Its called Eat St. and essentially, they go around the U.S. and Canada visiting amazing food trucks and profiling their delicacies - everything from Mexican to gourmet chicken wings to vegetarian cuisine, all at a street corner near you.

The food on there always looks so gourmet, so fresh, so different from the ordinary (these 'food truck chefs' seem to always come up with their own sauces, their unique spin on dishes and like to use fresh ingredients.)

All this to say that, aside from ice cream/fry trucks, I don't think I'd ever seen one of the new generation of food trucks - until I moved to Hamilton.

Our first interaction with Hamilton's burgeoning food truck scene was last summer at the Festival of Friends in Ancaster. The newest and most popular kid on the block, Gorilla Cheese, was there (the name of this truck is fantastic). Hubby, of course, had to partake (sadly, I don't eat cheese so I probably won't ever get to taste the delicacy that is Gorilla Cheese, unless they can throw together some lactose-free variety!) Needless to say, he agreed with all of the praise other people had heaped on Gorilla's version of these classic sandwiches.

We then started to notice more and more 'food trucks' around Hamilton - such a noticeable change from Toronto, where I don't think I had even seen one (apart from the aforementioned fry/hotdog/ice cream vans). In Hamilton, we even noticed bakery food trucks parked outside of the mall - I mean, who doesn't want a cupcake when they're shopping on a Saturday morning?!

I know its not exclusively a Hamilton thing, but this city does seem to have more than its share of these delicacies on wheels (as evidenced by the Sew Hungry event that pops up every so often on Ottawa Street - we keep missing out on this one, but apparently, we didn't have to wait for this event to experience a whole crew of food trucks in one spot!)

Essentially, hubby found out via Twitter last week that several food trucks were gathering in a certain spot on the mountain and we got in the car and headed out there. Yes, recently, we went to our first gathering of food trucks and had dinner. A good number of trucks showed up to the event, including one serving Schnitzel, another offering Greek food, a couple of BBQ/Southern trucks and of course, Gorilla Cheese.

We opted to try out one of the newer food trucks - Dirty South. I chose the chicken tacos, while hubby had a pulled pork sandwich - they do have an awesome looking chicken sandwich made with WAFFLES - but neither of us felt we could handle it that day! Anyway, the food was great, the place was packed and it was great to see so many Hamiltonians gathering to try out the tasty local food truck fare for dinner. Other than the cupcake truck (which is so yum!) Dirty South might be my new fave restaurant on wheels.

A few days later, we ran into more food trucks at the Dundas Cactus Festival (which I'll talk about in another post), but if you have a fave local food truck, please feel free to share your thoughts in the comments below!

Food, glorious food

Its still freezing out, which means those yummy fruit + veggie stands I mentioned earlier (you know, the ones in Vineland, Beamsville, Niagara) obviously have yet to open for the season. While I chomp at the bit for that time of year to arrive, we still have to get our nice, fresh food somewhere.

I'm looking forward to checking out the revamped Hamilton Farmer's Market this weekend, and will report back with my thoughts (and maybe a photo or two!). http://www.hamilton.ca/CultureandRecreation/Arts_Culture_And_Museums/HamiltonFarmersMarket/

For staples though, we've been going to No Frills over the last couple of weeks (I can confirm, its the same as the No Frills in Toronto or anywhere else for that matter....) you know - basic and cheap.

However, one welcome find (to us, anyway) was the random discovery of Lococo's on Barton Street http://www.lococos.ca/ ....we were driving around last weekend and there it was...being curious types, hubby and I decided to check it out.

I was confused at first - Lococo's seemed like a strange hybrid of Costco and Sobeys to me (ie: not quite sure what it was trying to be), and we (perhaps naively!) were fully expecting to have to take out a Costco-like membership before checking out. We were surprised to learn that it is actually a fruit/veggie wholesaler, open to the public (hence, the giant portions of meat!) and very reasonably priced. The veggie selection is also excellent (I think a lot of it is local as well.)

We've had to try out a few restaurants so far, as a result of the unfortunate breaking-down of the oven in our temporary rental place (we'll talk restaurants and Hamilton house-hunting in later posts). For now, the grocery quest continues.

Looking forward to hearing your thoughts on great grocery stores in Hamilton (for staples or fresh stuff!)