Food truck season!

By Heather Schuer

Food trucks to me are an indication that summer is here. It’s this amazing realization that there actually IS a season after winter, as hard as it is to believe sometimes in this state when we can still see (as tiny as they are) snow flurries on a Friday afternoon in May, as we did last month.

I’ve recently moved to Fargo, so this past month I was more than ready to try out the food trucks this city has to offer. So here they are, the food trucks of Fargo.

Chef Mobile

This was the first food truck that I tried. They have a variety of monstrous sandwiches and wraps with thought-out ingredients. Some of their most popular sellers are the Mad Hatter,Philly Cheesesteak, and the Johnny Apple. The pulled pork nachos are also quite popular (and look very tasty). I’m the world’s slowest eater, but I think I consumed the Mad Hatter in about 32 seconds. The sandwich, which includes eggs, bacon, pulled pork, and pepper jack cheese, also has this wonderful raspberry BBQ sauce. Quite. Satisfying. And also perfect hangover food that I wish I could have delivered to my doorstep. Chef Mobile has a lot of homemade sauces for their sandwiches and I really appreciate the fact that they don’t rely on the usual (and quite frankly overused) Sriracha mayo like so many places do. Their prices range from $7.00--$8.75, and they also sell goodies such as cheese curds, wonton twists, and chili cheese fries.

Where: Message them on Facebook to find out where they’ll be for the week. They are great about responding. They really are true to their name and will change locations quite frequently, either being in places such as the parking lot of Discovery Benefits or outside a hotel.

Accept Credit Card: Yes.

The Hot Dog Peddler

I visited The Hot Dog Peddler on a Thursday night when they were downtown among a bunch of classic cars roaring through the streets. But for the record, they are most often parked outside their usual hangout at The Windbreak, where they are located year-round and they are well-known for serving hot dogs with cream cheese (I mean, come on, it doesn’t get any better than this!). 

I tried the Monster Polish dog. This thing is HUGE! I went for it and had them load this baby up with almost all of their toppings, including grilled onions, relish, Sriracha, jalapenos, sauerkraut, and of course cream cheese. I was in hot dog heaven, loving every minute of each bite as it got messier and messier, onions falling off with the cream cheese melting. In the end I needed half a stack of napkins, but it was worth it.

They also have grilled hot dogs for $5.00 and bratwurst sausages for $6.00. And on top of the cream cheese for free, you can also add mac & cheese and bacon for $1.00 each. Who doesn’t want a hot dog topped with cream cheese, bacon, and mac & cheese?

The Hot Dog Peddler was started by Bronson Lende and his wife Erin. They drew inspiration from the street carts in Seattle when they were living there in 2011. That same year, they moved back to Fargo and started selling outside of The Windbreak at bar closing time, during off months of the festival season.

Definitely check them out for their popular cream cheese and grilled onions hot dogs, especially if you have late-night cravings!

Where: Usually parked outside of The Windbreak or Fort Knox at night, in addition to cruising Broadway and other local events. Hit them up on Facebook and they will respond usually within minutes!

Accept credit card: No

Luchadores Taquiera

This food truck is spectacular. Their sauces are original, their meat and presentation is beautiful, and their guacamole is some of the best guacamole I’ve ever had. Yes, that’s right.

Let me first talk about the menu. They serve authentic Mexican tacos for $3.50 each topped with cilantro and raw onions. You can build your tacos however you like, first by picking either corn or flour tortillas. The tortillas come fried, so if you don’t want them this way, just let them know. From there you can choose either chicken, pork, beef, or potato and cheese. In addition to the cilantro and onions, you can top off your taco with a choice of four different homemade sauces: Sriracha crema, poblano crema, avocado crema, or tamarind.

In addition to these wonderful street tacos, they also serve quesadillas, taquitos, and flautas for $5.00 each. You can build your quesadillas like you build your tacos. The taquitos and flautas are both rolled-up pieces of goodness.

But the guacamole. Wow. This is really some of the best guacamole I’ve ever had. Guacamole can often times become the worst thing to me when it has too many onions. I prefer more flavor to come from garlic and cilantro. Luchadores Taquiera hits the right balance. It is a perfect ratio of ingredients. I couldn’t stop eating this guacamole and I didn’t even need chips after a while; I just started eating it up by the spoonfuls.

Where: Fargo Brewing Co.

Accept Credit Card: Yes

Taco Brothers

This food truck recently won Best Food Truck award by HPR readers. Taco Brothers (or better known simply as Taco Bros.) is truly here for us residents of the F-M area. This truck is open 6 days a week for lunch and dinner, and late nights on Fridays and Saturdays. What a relief to move to a city and find out that I can get tacos at 1:00 in the morning that aren’t from Taco Bell. What I was more excited about in their menu is the sopes. I ordered a chorizo sope that was out-of-this world on the taste-o-meter. I can’t tell you how excited I get over sopes and the fact that this food truck is available 6 days a week and I can get my sope fix almost every day if I want to.

I had also tried ordering a tamale, but they were out. They told me they make them on Sundays for the week and to come back on a Monday, which I did and I was not disappointed. This was the biggest tamale I’ve ever had in my life, and for only $3.50! The only problem is they sell out of these so fast that you won’t have much luck getting one after Monday. They started doing tamales on Mondays for the slow day of the week, but these things are so popular and amazing that they sell out the same day (also resulting in Taco Bros. never really having a “slow” day).

The owner, Octavio Gomez, started this food truck in 2012 and told me that his tamales were his “foot in the door” to getting a food truck started. He was working temp jobs, but because these jobs weren’t enough money to make ends meet, he started making tamales. He got a Facebook page going and sales were good and more and more people were liking the page. The momentum continued, and through the chance of renting a food truck for the summer to try to make it, he did.

“So as you can see I owe the tamales for everything -- that is why no matter how labor-intensive they are I owe it to them that I got to where I am now because of them. Of course I couldn’t have done it without my family but like I said, the tamales were a foot in the door.” I already loved this food truck’s tamales, but hearing that story made me love them even more.

Where: Parked behind Empire Tavern 6 days a week. Mon-Sat from 11am—3pm, dinner from 6pm—10pm, and late night on the weekends from 1am—3am.

Accept Credit Card: Yes

Pete’s Smoked BBQ

Pete’s Smoked BBQ is a husband-and-wife duo who started their truck due to Pete’s hobby of smoking meat that “got out of hand.” They have a great menu that consists of some key choices over the lunch hour when they’re selling.

They offer a choice of a $5.00 or$10.00 meal with choices including a Mini Pete or a Big Pete with either chopped chicken or pork (which is their best seller), spicy chicken drums, and smoked Polish sausage.

The $10.00 meal deal includes a monster cookie from Jen’s Breads that is a meal in itself (and also gluten free). They also sell all of their food a la carte as well, and once in awhile they have $7.00 Memphis ribs.

Pete makes all of his own rubs and each meat has its own unique rub. He takes the time to use real fire and real wood, as he told me, and that there are “no shortcuts, no microwave in my truck.” The couple is super friendly and invited me inside their truck. It was very clean and simple, nothing complicated about it. Their reverse-flow smoker is right next to the truck, where they are permanently located so that he has the electrical hook ups that he needs.

They gave me a little sample of everything and I enjoyed all of it. The chopped pork was fantastic and the dry rub on the chicken was excellent. Pete wouldn’t tell me his BBQ secrets, but I will say the dry rubs are definitely Pete’s own and they are superb. As Pete told me, “People want real food from real people.” I couldn’t agree more.

Where: Main Ave and 34th St., Fargo, Tuesday-Friday from 11am—2pm, or until they sell out.

Accept Credit Card: Yes

Gigi’s Ice Lollies

This is the one food truck that I didn’t get a chance to try because of the commercial kitchen fire that happened a few months ago. But Square One is back up and running, so it shouldn’t be too long before we see Gigi out!

I communicated with Gigi over Facebook to learn more about her truck and her business. She is the sole owner who had had a lot of experience working in the food industry in college, but she never thought she’d be running her own food cart. Her most popular seller from last year was the Spiced Rhubarb & Pomegranate flavor (which she’ll be bringing back this year) and also the Frozen Hot Chocolate and Strawberry Basil flavors are always huge crowd pleasers, which she tells me will always be on the menu. She is always bringing back The Sophia, which is “a thin mint cookie surrounded by sweetened coconut cream” (sign me up!).

Gigi says that “it is really important to us to buy from local food vendors and grocers who offer organic ingredients. We love sourcing from Natural Grocers and Sydney’s. If we can’t get an item from a local supplier we make sure we buy from suppliers whose business practices align with our own.”

With Gigi being a “one-woman show,” she admits it’s hard work and that she can’t always be at every single event or function. But she says she wouldn’t give up owning Gigi’s for anything. She loves “making treats for people and seeing the smiles on their faces when they eat my ice lollies. It is the best job I’ve ever had.”

Where: Check out her Facebook page or send her a message to see where she’ll be located. She’s very responsive and active on her page.

Accept Credit Card: Yes

I can’t wait to try Gigi’s wonderful iced concoctions. And with the end of my food truck tours and sampling, I was pretty satisfied with the offerings Fargo has for food trucks and enjoyed learning more from the owners and why they love doing what they do. They are passionate about their food, and you will taste it in each bite.