Late-night taco truck

When Scott asked me if I wanted to take a drive to Oakland, I asked him if he had eaten and if we could go to the taco trunk. With his answers, I said yes.

We got in his car, drove across the bridge, dropped off some ski equipment, and navigated our way around Lake Merritt to the intersection of International Blvd. and 22nd St., where the Sinaloa taco truck sits.

For someone who sports a “I Hella [Heart] Oakland” t-shirt, Scott had never been there. And, as silly as it may seem, I was slightly nervous, and not so much about the fact that it was 9:30 at night and we were standing on a street corner in an Oakland neighborhood that has a history of violent crime. But, rather, I was nervous that Scott wouldn’t like it, that he’d wonder why I’d drive across the Bay to eat from a truck in a dicey neighborhood.

I stepped up to the truck, raised my head high, and ordered two carne asada tacos and an horchata for me, and a carne asada burrito and a Squirt for Scott. As we waited for our food, a man of questionable sanity kept mumbling stuff to us and gestured for us to look at his leg. I tried to pretend that he wasn’t there.

We took our food to a table nearby and dug in. My tacos looked small. There was no pilings of lettuce, beans, rice, sour cream, guacamole, diced tomatoes, or any other sort of extravagance you might find at a San Francisco Mission taqueria. There was no need to eat these tacos with a knife and fork either. These small tacos were tacos at their simple best: two warm corn tortillas that are chewy and just barely crisp around the edges, a small mound of chopped grilled beef, a dollop of salsa, a sprinkling of chopped cilantro, along with sliced radishes, a whole pickled jalapeno pepper, and a wedge of lime on the side. It was delicious. Scott’s burrito was just as simple, with just meat, cheese, beans, and rice. It felt like LA.

We finished up, cleared our table, gave the mumbling man with a story about a leg a dollar, got back in the car, and drove back to across the Bay Bridge. Scott thanked me for taking him there. And, I wondered aloud who else would have been up for a late-night taco truck run in the heart of seedy Oakland?

Lamb curry off test run #1

This time, I wasn’t drunk, but Prasad might have been. We were at his house, standing around in the hallway as people were leaving after watching the Superbowl on a very nice television screen, when we set a date in the spring for the next Curry Off. And, so, I would have a couple of months to prepare, to do test-run of curry recipes, to refine spice mixtures, and to learn how to cook lamb, since this time around it would be a Lamb Off.

Today, was Test Run #1 of lamb curry. (It was actually also the first time I’ve ever cooked lamb.) And, I invited Colin and Eleanor over to help me judge the worthiness of the curry.

The recipe was straightforward. Cook some chopped onions in some oil until brown. Add in chunks of lamb until brown. Sprinkle in ground black peppercorn, whole cloves, and green cardamom pods. Then, add a puree of more onions, garlic, and ginger. Cook that down until almost no liquid remains. Then, pour in some plain yogurt, along with some cayenne and ground coriander. After, add some water and garam masala and let it cook until the lamb is tender. Once it’s done, toss in some chopped cilantro and a drizzle of heavy cream. It was pretty easy, and I made some brown basmati rice with whole cumin seeds to go with the curry.

But, the curry was just okay. The level of heat from the spices was subtle, as were the spices themselves. And the lamb was tender and fell apart nicely when poked at with a fork. But, the curry itself was just okay; far from being a Curry Off winner. Its flavor lacked depth and distinction. It tasted more like an Irish lamb stew than an Indian lamb curry. There was no way that I would put this up against anyone’s curry. So, next week, I’ll try again with another lamb recipe and another hope at finding a winner.