March 4-6: Los Angeles, SW Regional Barista Competiton

South West Regional Barista Competition
6063 W Sunset Blvd.
Hollywood, CA
Welcome to the Iron Chef of barista competitions, this three day event is a pre-qualifier to the United States Barista Championship. There are three rounds of judging for this event: the preliminary round, the semi-finals, and the finals. Competitors who advance to the finals will compete against six of the most highly skilled baristas in their region for the title of 2011 South West Regional Barista Champion.

The top six finalists from the #SWBaristaChamp will move on to compete in the #USBC. That winner will represent the United States at the World Barista Championship, which will be held in Bogota, Colombia June 2-5, 2011.

The Coffee Bean & Tea Leaf® is proud the sponsor the 2011 #SWBaristaChamp for its second year at Siren Studios in Hollywood, CA. Known for its popularity with the tinsel town in-crowd, this privately owned gourmet coffee chain stays true to its roots, infusing the #SWBaristaChamp with some laid back Southern California comfort and fun.

Last year’s event turned out over 600 people throughout the weekend, welcoming gourmet food trucks, live music and some after parties you couldn’t miss.

This year @theCoffeeBean plans to double the attendance, and to feed the masses, they’ll be bringing in LA’s hottest gourmet food trucks, like @ButtermilkTruck, @ManilaMachine, @NomadTruck, @Sugar_Babies Cupcake Truck and more. Again, @theCoffeeBean is set to deliver live musical performances and after parties to celebrate the baristas, the competition and of course to have some fun!

The first 100 people to check in with Foursquare at The Southwest Regional Barista Competition will receive a Coffee Bean bag of swag and coffee goodies. Tweet with us live before and throughout the event @baristaguild, @theCoffeeBean and #SWBaristaChamp to stay on top of the latest event details, food truck arrivals, live bands and after party locations

Tue 2/8: #BowlingBlowout at Lake Forest with 12 Food Trucks!

W. LA: Lee’s Philly, Che Truck, India Jones, Lomo Arigato, Chunk n Chip

Every Monday there’s a gathering at 10601 W. Washington Blvd. It’s pretty far from Orange County (over an hour with decent traffic) so I took advantage of my day off to check it out with Karen and Martin.

Karen started us off by going to Lees Philly and got the Gogi beef taco, and I went to India Jones for the Samosa, an order of nan bread, and a chicken “Frankie”, a roti rolled up with curried chicken, cilantro tamarind chutney, chopped onion and egg.

Martin went to (Argentine) Che Truck and ordered the grilled chimichurri steak salad, and I got the pork empenada (the el Fidel) to split with Karen.

The empenada was a little too spicy for Karen, so we also split an order of noodles from Lomo Arigato.

For dessert, Martin and Karen split the Goober Doober,  boo-yah made of a chocolate chocolate chip cookie + chocolate chip cookie that sandwiches a mint chocolate chip ice cream.

Gogi beef taco from Lee’s Philly



Samosa from India Jones
The chicken “Frankie”
Nan from the India Jones Chow Truck

 

Chimichurri steak over salad from The Che Truck




The El Fidel empenada from the Che Truck
Lomo Arigato’s noodles



Chunk N Chip



The Doober Goober boo-yah

Irvine: Piaggio on Wheels

It’s wonderful to be back in Orange County! Today’s weather is supposed to be in the 80’s, and I’m wearing a t-shirt, jeans  and flip flops.

Karen and I took today off from work to recuperate from the trip. For lunch we drove to Irvine for Piaggio, who was parked on Discovery near the Spectrum.

Karen had her usual two empenadas, chimi rice & zucchini. I had the skirt steak taco with chimi sauce,  caprese empenada, with rice & veg, and two pulled pork sliders.  Its great to be back home!!

Sunny… with no chance of snow!
Two empenadas with chimi rice and zuchini

Pulled pork sliders

Argentine steak taco and empenada with chimi rice & zuchini

REDONDO BEACH: Sneak peek of the #SouthBayFoodFest on April 16!!

This is just A PEEK of the South Bay Food Fest.
Check back as more trucks will be added as soon as they’ve been confirmed.

SAVE THE DATE
APRIL 16th 10:00AM-4:00PM
follow @
1100 N. Harbor Drive at Redondo Beach , CA 90277

Denver: Walnut a GoGo

When we were walking through the Artist Walk, we came across this truck. They were not ready for service, so we took a few photos. Unfortunately, we were unable to make it back later.

 
one of many trucks I found at the Denver First Friday art walk
 

Apologies for the format change

My old Droid died on me and I had to reload all new apps on this new phone. The app for this blog is slightly different, such as posting the description first, then the photos. 

What I do is blog from my phone so I don’t forget the names of the food I had.  The new app seems to shuffle my pictures, so It won’t be any logial order until I edit them on my laptop at home.

I hope you don’t mind the new format, and reading my blah, blah, blahs before seeing the final product :=}

A piece of art at the Denver Art Walk

Denver: Basic Kneads Pizza truck

Our final stop at the Denver Art Walk was the Basic Knead Pizza truck.  The truck is a converted FedEx truck with a wood burning oven.
The truck can make pizzas to order, but unfortunately you can only get a 10″ pie, not by the slice.
We picked up two pies: a Margharita & “the Wise Guy”: Olive oil, Mozzarella, Sausage & Rosemary.




Basic Kneads Truck (@IKneadPizza)



The Margharita





Right out of the oven… the Wise Guy



Making pizza for the foodies with a smile!

Denver: Stick Food

After leaving Crock Spot, we found Stick Food. We picked a medley of items to take back to the hotel:
Waffle with nutella  (on a stick), Angus beef and chicken, and Mashed potato balls.

Mashed potato balls
inside the mashed potato balls
Angus beef & organic chicken
Waffle with nutella drizzed on top
Found them on Santa Fe & 8th Street at the Art Walk!