MasterPlanning!: Taco Trucks and Danger Dogs
by Tony Chavira
Carne Asada is Not a Crime! read shirts distributed last year in protest of L.A. county supervisor Gloria Molina’s restrictions aimed at reducing the number of taco trucks that roamed around the county. Apparently, evil taco truck drivers were parking their goods right outside of legitimate eating establishments, and that naturally took business away from said establishments. Eventually restaurateurs worked themselves into a tizzy and confronted their county supervisors, wondering “if we have to go through the trouble of getting a license, going through 1,000 inspections and permit reviews, and risk our financial futures, then taco truck guys should either do the same or be forced out of the neighborhoods!” Of course, cutting all taco trucks out of their neighborhoods would really piss off workers and locals who are used to walking down the street to chow down on their tasty fare, so the county supervisors wrote out a rule that still allows taco trucks to hang out, as long as they change location every hour (or else face a misdemeanor charge of $1,000 and/or jail time).
On the other hand, street bacon-wrapped hot dog vendors (let’s call them Danger Dog Vendors, since the unindoctrinated seem to think they’re going to get sick if they eat them) are absolutely illegal when they’re not permitted. And without doing any research whatsoever, I’m going to make a semi-educated estimate that 99% of them are not permitted and therefore not legal. They’re forced to move around, they have to constantly carry their ingredients with them everywhere, some of the grills are made from old shopping carts or small portable gas grills, and cops hassle them every which way to Sunday, but so what? Have you ever come out of a club at 2 am, an all-day concert, or a night of heavier drinking with friends and bumped right into one of these Danger Dog Vendors, rolling a bacon-wrapped hot dog over in its greasy bed of sweaty onions and green peppers? How can you resist? For God’s sake, they even warm up the bun in more grease for you!
These are only two examples of the many types of street food that you may or may not argue are slightly overregulated in Southern California. For the permitted and creative, the industry can be incredibly lucrative. Have you tried either Kogi Tacos or Coolhaus Ice Cream Sandwiches? In fact, even Johnny Rockets is getting in on the mobile food action. Yes, for the lover of safe, gentrified mobile chains and charming overnight food fads the sky’s the limit ... as long as your favorite truck has a mobile permit.
And yet no matter how well the Kogi’s and Johnny Rockets of the world may be doing, the true innovators of street food (i.e. people who just pick up the ingredients and hit the streets hard every night to make ends meet) will somehow be punished and, in some ways, looked down on. I’ve heard all the derogatory terms for the taco truck you can imagine, “roach coach” included, and calling bacon-wrapped hot dogs “TJ dogs” scratches right into the skin of the problem with why people are nervously hesitant to dive right into unlicensed street food (and thereby are so willing to impose heavy rules on the traditional taco truck or Danger Dog vendor).
So let’s not beat around the bush any longer: it’s half an issue of food gentrification and half an issue of racism. Yup, shameless and unfounded racism. Imagine if hipster-savvy downtown sausage place Wurstkuche were on the street cooking up the same huge bacon-wrapped, onion-grilled hot dogs for two dollars: you’d have lines that stretched for blocks with people waiting hours just for a little taste. The hype machine would explode as Los Angeles denizens would plan far in advance to fork over their cold hard-earned cash to the Wurstkuche mobile hot dog phenomenon (I’m giving you the outline for a business plan here, Wurstkuche). And yet, the little Mexican lady on the corner strikes a sense of unnerving fear in the hearts of those who do not consider themselves “adventurous” simply because she’s unlicensed. Or maybe its because she’s Mexican. They could, in fact, be exactly the same sausages as Wurstkuche’s and could, in fact, be cheaper. So why aren’t people flocking from near and far to grab a dog or two from her conservative, quickly assembled grill? Why do the same people who would never eat from a taco truck get so much thrill from lining up to try Kogi BBQ tacos from their trucks?
What it boils down to is that our fear of getting poisoned severely outweighs the excitement and enjoyment of eating delicious delicious street food. Terrence Powell of the Los Angeles County Health Department was quoted on reason.tv saying, “Bacon is a potentially hazardous food.” Well, aren’t all foods potentially hazardous in some way or another? You can choke on or be given undercooked food anywhere! How do most sane people react to those situations? They don’t go back and/or review it terribly to make sure no one does it again. And yet, from Yelp’s track record for Danger Dog Vendors, it seems that no one’s gotten sick, or if they have they’re certainly keeping their mouths shut about it.
From the “health standards” point of view, it’s perfectly understandable that undercooked bacon could be a potential hazard. That’s why I don’t undercook bacon on Sunday mornings, I demand to inspect the kitchen of every IHOP I visit, and I throw tantrums at Carl’s Jr. when the bacon on my burgers aren’t especially crispy. To make sure that their bacon isn’t potentially hazardous. How much more transparent do we need our bacon-cookers to be? Poor street vendors depend on us, just as everyone else in the food industry does, for our purchases, and we can see how cooked their bacon is with our own eyes. For the sake of all that’s holy, how much more inspection do you need? Do you want the city to hold your hand in the restaurant and take the first bite from all of your meals to make sure they’re not poisoned also? If taco truck vendors made bad food, truck vending would’ve died off a long long time ago. But when the mood strikes me, I can’t help but rush the truck for two orders of tacos al pastor with a Coke. Each bite is spicy, greasy, chewy, and mouth-moisteningly perfect. That’s what should matter most, not whether or not they have a permit to serve. If there’s a line and people are genuinely enjoying it, that’s good enough for me.
We need to break free of our fears, because delicious food is simply delicious food. You can get sick from something you eat in a five-star restaurant or a Starbucks just as easily as you can get sick from something sold on the street. So don’t let someone scare you into telling you what you can or can’t eat. If you want it, just get it. It’ll taste that much more delicious, and the slight dash of danger really gives the taco a kick.
www.racaia.com | tony@fourstory.org
Comments
No comments yet.
