Food Truck Fest Serves Fewer Eats, More Good Time

I have a confession: I haven’t been to Long Wharf Park a) since the very first food truck festival (cringe) and b) since it was declared a ​“food truck” paradise (cringe even more).

So when the boss asked me to head to the city’s third food truck festival Saturday and engage in one of the seven deadly sins — gluttony, in case anyone is confused — I jumped at the chance for several reasons: The first being food; the second being a chance to test out the new cycle track (quick review: thumbs up); and third, the promise of a gloriously beautiful day.

The plan was to eat a lot of food and write about the four or five items I enjoyed the most. But when I arrived at Long Wharf and took a stroll past each truck to see what my options were and where I’d most like to start my feasting, I quickly realized there simply weren’t as many food options as there had been during my first festival. This also is the first year that the festival is a one-day-only affair. The previous two years it lasted for two days.

I bumped into city Economic Development Administrator Matthew Nemerson and chatted with him about why there were so few trucks this year. He cited the weather, the explosion of food truck festivals and other events, and the fact that majority of the regulars who vend on Long Wharf decided to sit this year out.

“Only one of our regulars is here,” Nemerson said. ​“I think the regulars wanted a day off. I think a lot of them are re-tooling and getting ready for the ordinance coming in July. I think we have a lot of people testing out the market to see if they want to be part of the lottery.” (Nemerson said the lottery is coming up this month; those interested vending in the newly designated special district should contact the economic development office.)

Nemerson said there were about 21 trucks — by the time I arrived the number on site was 18 — plus another nine or 10 stands providing everything from beer to fidget spinners. An estimated 5,000 people had made their way through the city’s food truck paradise by the time I’d arrived there at about 2:30 p.m. With music pumping from one end of Long Wharf and dragon boat races — moved from the early morning last year to the late afternoon this year — happening at the other end, the crowd kept getting bigger.

Fewer trucks and thousands of people meant that there were definitely some lines. Since I didn’t have a whole lot of choices, and I quickly surmised that my eyes were probably bigger than my stomach, I decided to go with what looked most interesting on the menu. A couple of trucks had fried fish and barbecue; I can get that already in New Haven.

But fried turkey wings? That spoke to me.

After securing a lemonade from another truck, I hopped in line that was a least 20 people deep. It turns out that line was for Jesse ​“J‑Hop” Hardy’s barbecue truck. I only got a glimpse of Hardy, but he and his team were working fast and furiously to get out french fries covered in chopped barbecue and pulled pork, spare ribs and of course turkey wings.

I’ve had all manner of turkey wings — baked, barbecued and smoked — but never deep fried. I liked the concept, but I think I would have preferred if they were saucy and spicy.

Sticking with the fried theme, I made my way one truck over to Christiano’s, which promised every manner of fried sweet treat including Oreo’s, Twinkies and mini-donuts. Cotton candy was an option, but that was not available fried.

While I am a Yankee by birth, I was bred in the South, home of all things fried — pickles, chicken, chitlins, you name it! And though I’ve been to a number of state and country fairs in my lifetime, I’ve never had a deep fried Twinkie.

Again, I liked the concept, but the reality was not my favorite culinary experience. You have to time eating it just right. If you dive in too soon, you’ll probably burn the skin off your mouth, but if you wait for a second too long, the Twinkie soaks up all the grease. I mean, I still ate it, but I probably won’t do that again.

By this time I needed to cleanse my palate, and I was still on the hunt for something truly delicious. I headed over to the truck farthest from the entrance, Yardbird & Co., only to discover they’d sold out of food.

Nemerson said that had happened quite a bit Saturday signaling that trucks, which were charged a $250 fee to participate in the festival, likely did good business.

“Clearly, some of these trucks are doing much better than they imagined,” he said. ​“I think it’s always a balance. So this year we experimented by not charging a fee [for the public] to come in, and we got more people, once the weather turned.”

Nemerson said it is possible that if the event had added just another 10 trucks, that they might not have done as much business. But he said the city is happy with the decision not to charge an entrance fee to the public.

“One thing Mayor Harp has really emphasized is that city has to be used by the people of the city so the model of not charging makes a lot of sense,” he said. ​“It’s a good crowd — a great New Haven crowd.”

I followed my Twinkie with some low cost, but tasty Al Pastor tacos from Holy Guacamole. I had tried their tacos when their guacamole green truck braved the rain at this year’s Art Walk, so I knew they would be tasty and they did not disappoint.

I capped off this food extravaganza with some plain Jane, vanilla soft serve from the North Pole Ice Cream truck — soft serve that magically never seemed to melt. I don’t even want to know what’s in it that kept it from melting. But the festival was a great kick off to all the upcoming summer events in the city and I look forward to all that comes next —weather pending of course.