Millersville Cafe Market

May 17th kicked off the Millersville Cafe Market. This is an event that will happen every 3rd Thursday of the month until September from 5pm - 8pm. It's located in the parking area of Emerson Way Shops, just north of Fall Creek Parkway. It's right by the Fall Creek Trail so Mike and I rode our bikes to the event. It was really nice to be able to do that!

So we were drawn to this event because Bier Brewery (our favorite brewery in Indy!) sent out a newsletter about Moveable Feast having sausages cooked in Bier beer. That was definitely something we could NOT pass up. And we ended up trying a lot more. This night featured NY Pizza Slice, Circle City Spuds and Grub, and a bunch of other vendors. (See the list here!) We decided to just try Moveable Feast, 3 in 1 Restaurant, Ivey Spice, and Garrett's Bar-B-Q.

Moveable Feast

So I know this looks boring, but I just wanted to try this as plain as possible so I could really taste the sausage. I didn't want to ruin it with a bunch of toppings like I did at Food Truck fest. Anyway, this was really tasty. A must for me with sausages is that the casing has to snap as soon as I bite into it. This sausage definitely did. It was super juicy, and you could actually taste the beer! I have it in my head that they used the Kolsch to cook this in, but I could be mistaken. Either way it was delicious. I should have asked if they made the sausage in house. I also really liked that they gave you a wheat bun. I felt less guilty about eating every bite. :-)

I took home a copy of their menu which looks pretty tasty. The only thing I was disappointed by was their hours. They are only open Monday through Friday and close at 4. Since I don't work close, it's very unlikely I'll get to try this place at their location. I asked them if they do or will have a dinner night like once a month, but they said no. :-( Maybe, I'll just take a day off and then go... ;-)

The Info

Moveable Feast

5741 E. 71st St. 

Indianapolis, IN 46220

 http://www.facebook.com/profile.php?id=1473084801#!/pages/Movable-Feast/366201438010

@indyfeast

3 in 1 Restaurant

So this place is CLOSED and only does events. Fortunately, their website is very up to date with where they'll be and it looks like they have lots of events planned!

If you know me, then you know I LOOOOOOOOVE tamales. Most of the tamales in Mexican restaurants in Indy have been a huge complaint of mine! I don't know why I continue to order them when I know I'm going to be disappointed. Anyway, this tamale did not disappoint! There were 2 choices: chicken or pork. We went with pork. It came out plain, and I topped it with tomatillo salsa and cheese. The texture was a little soft, but I think that's just from being stored in a warmer. I forgave the texture because it tasted so good! The corn was sweet and the pork was flavorful. I'm glad I added the salsa and cheese. All the flavors came together really nicely! I also tried a pupusa. I'd never had one of those, but it was basically like a stuffed pocket. It tasted like the same dough used to make corn tortillas. It was stuffed with cheese and chicken. We topped it with a red sauce and slaw. This time I probably could have done without the toppings, but the slaw texture was a nice balance. I will get food here again!

The Info
3 in 1 Restaurant
3in1restaurant.com

Ivey Spice

So by the time we were ready to try Ivey Spice, they only had 1 thing on their menu: the beef patty. This was fortunate because I probably wouldn't have tried this. I know it doesn't look super appetizing in the picture, but it was actually very good. The best way I can describe it was that it was very comforting. 

The guy didn't know what this dough was, but it tasted like biscuit dough stuffed with beef and some sort of salty (good salty!) gravy. I don't know. It wasn't amazing, but there was something very comforting about it! Like something I would have had as a kid. (Well, not me since I only really ate Korean food...) Online research shows that they mostly do catering and concessions, but looks like they're going to soon open a carry out location. Next time you see Ivey Spice, give them a try!

The Info

Ivey Spice

2158 N. Central Ave. (address on website)

Indianapolis, IN 46205

iveyspice.com

Garrett's Bar-B-Q

This was all right. We ordered the pulled pork sandwich. It had good smokey flavor, and it was moist, but not juicy enough. Luckily the sauces were good because we used a lot of it. I really liked mixing the hot and sweet. I liked that they gave a lot of meat and that there were not any huge chunks of fat. 

Pappy's in St. Louis is my standard for bbq. So because of that this was just all right, but compared to King's? This was great! I'm really happy to see more and more bbq options around town other than King's. Have you tried Garrett's before? What did you get there that you liked?

The Info

Garrett's Bar-B-Q

5502 Emerson Way

Indianapolis, IN 46226

www.garrettssmokehousebarbeque.com

So next 3rd Thursday (June 21) check out the Millersville Cafe Market! Not only will you get some really great food, you can buy from the vendors and listen to the band!

http://millersvillecafemarket.org

Mmm...Food Trucks! Part 3

Ok...NOW I'm finally concluding my food truck post. I'm continuing the list form.

5. Mable on the Move
This food truck was all about bringing you "high quality, made from scratch, honest, natural food". I decided to steer away the healthy salads and soup and went for the grass feed, all beef, organic hot dogs.

They offered sauerkraut. I normally only put sauerkraut on brats, but I thought maybe they knew something I didn't. I also added banana peppers and a bit of ketchup. I skipped the mustard (bleh!) and relish. I didn't think the hot dog was bad! It was pretty good actually. While I liked the bun since it had seeds on it, I would have preferred a smaller bun. All that bread was too much. Mike didn't think this hot dog was special. He doesn't say it, but I know he uses ball park franks as his standard. If you're going to charge more, it better taste better. I think I made a mistake this time with my topping choices. I would order this again, but with ketchup only. And next time, I will try out their salads and soups. I've heard good things about them.

The Rating

The Info
Mable on the Move
www.mableonthemove.com

6. Spice Box
Can you believe there are multiple Indian food trucks in Indianapolis? P couldn't! I really wanted to try everything on the menu, but we decided to just try the spice wrap with the green (hot) sauce. The Spice Wrap has marinated chicken and onions wrapped in a roti. Roti is an Indian flat bread. I didn't notice that at first, but P pointed out the fact that they were using that instead of just a tortilla. I thought this was really good. I thought the flavors tasted fairly authentic, and it was easy to eat since it was a wrap. Pretty perfect for food from a truck. I probably won't seek out Spice Box because I'm a piggy and rather stuff myself with a buffet, but if it's there I will definitely stop by!

The Rating

The Info

Spice Box.

www.spiceboxindy.com

7. Byrnes Grilled Pizza

So if you read Serious Eats, the picture of the bottom of the crust was my attempt of being a serious food blog. lol. I think Abby thought I was crazy because she had no idea why I wanted her to lift up the pizza so I could take a picture of the bottom of it. 

Anyway, the one slice of Byrnes Grilled Pizza was some great pizza. The pizza Abby ordered was a specialty pizza with no sauce, cheese, ricotta cheese, tomato, peppers and spinach. Pizza's pretty subjective. The reason why I really liked this pizza was the ratio of toppings to crust. Since I don't care much for bread/crust, I clearly like to taste more of the toppings than crust. Speaking of the crust, it actually wasn't that bad. It was thin, clearly from the pictures. The edges were crispy, and there was a faint taste of char. Even though there was a lot of cheese, nothing was too greasy or caused the thin crust to get soggy. I really liked this pizza. Unfortunately, don't go looking for a daily from Byrnes. They are only available for catering by appointment only. So...if you plan an event and hire Byrnes Grilled Pizza, please send me an invite! ;-)

The Rating

The Info

Byrnes Grilled Pizza

www.byrnespizza.com/

8. Little Eataly

Ok, I think this is the BEST name for an Italian food truck. Little EATaly. It just makes me smile. :-) It's like having a dog named "Beans". Just makes you smile every time you say it. Don't believe me? Just try it. ;-) Beans.

This is actually the 2nd time I've tried Little Eataly. The first was after the Super Bowl. Mike had their meatball sub, and I thought it was really comforting. What I still remember about it is that I thought the sauce was really tasty. It wasn't too thick or thin. It wasn't overly sugary and had a good amount of tomato flavor without tasting like straight tomato sauce. So if you have the opportunity to order this, I would recommend it.

At the Food Truck Festival, P ordered the fried ravioli and Abby ordered some sort of lemon pie. (There's a reason why I don't remember the name. Oh, it's the Italian Oreo per their website.) The fried ravioli tasted pretty good. It was overly greasy or mushy. They gave you a small cup of sauce to dip the ravioli in. That was decent. My favorite part was probably the dusting of parmesan cheese all over. I didn't like Abby's dessert thing. It was dry, and the flavors didn't come out at all. Whatever they were supposed to be. I would not recommend this. 

I really, really want to try their penne a la vodka. Anyone else try this? Did you like it?

The Rating

The Info

Little Eataly

www.littleeataly.com

This FINALLY concludes Mmm...Food Trucks! Thanks for reading! If you're Facebook friends with me then you know that Scratch Truck tweeted a link to my blog! Exciting! But on a side note, I wanted to bring something up. I was very surprised by the number of food trucks (these didn't have tip jars out) that were sooo surprised when I gave them a tip. Is it just me? Even if there isn't a tip jar, I believe you should tip the food trucks. Because even if they are the owners, they provided you a service and product. I don't think the 15-20% rule applies, but the least you can do is give them a dollar. What do you guys think? Maybe I should just ask Siri...

Mmm...Food Trucks! Part 2

I'm finally concluding my food truck post with the trip to the First Friday Food Truck Festival at the Murat. (It'll always be the Murat to me.) We were kind of all over the place, so this post is going to be in list form.

1. Seoul Grill Indy
Obviously, if there is a food truck serving Korean BBQ, I have to try it. Obviously. And, obviously, I'm going to be critical of it... That day, their menu had a rice bowl sampler with either bulgogi (steak) or deji-bulgogi (spicy pork) with a variety of Korean sides: kimchi, radish kimchi, picked daikon... I tried the bulgogi, and I have to admit it was pretty good. Not bad at all. Overall, the whole thing was just that - not bad..except for the kimchi. It was horrible. I appreciate that they make all their food in house, so maybe I just got a bad batch? But that kimchi was just sooo bad. There was no spice to it and it tasted like straight vinegar. I really hope it was just a bad batch and they're not making people think that's what kimchi actually tastes like. Looking at the photos they have on facebook, it looks like they offer a number of other Korean dishes like Korean style wings and kimbap (Korean sushi rolls). So I'm willing to give this place another chance, but I'll probably just stick with making Korean myself or eating at a sit down restaurant.

The Rating

The Info

Seoul Grill Indy

www.facebook.com/seoulgrillindy

@seoulgrillindy

2. Smoke House

Unfortunately, I didn't get a picture of this gem of a food truck. It looked like a log cabin. Mike ordered the rib tips with baked beans. And I have to say, this was probably my favorite bbq in Indy. (My absolute favorite bbq is from Pappy's in St. Louis.) Way better than King's Ribs. Way, way better. Normally I don't like rib tips since you don't get a lot of meat, but these had plenty of really tender meat. There was a little too much sauce, but I didn't mind that. The sauce was tangy, a little sweet, with a touch of heat. Just the way I like my sauce. The best part for me was the very smokey flavor. Mmm. I love that. I would definitely eat here again!

P.S. The baked beans were really good too. It had bits of meat mixed in. So yum, but honestly, I haven't found baked beans I didn't like. I even like the canned Bush's Baked Beans. So you might not want to take my advice on the beans.

The Rating

The Info

Smoke House

Sorry, couldn't find a website or anything. Anyone know anything about it?

3. Nicey Treat

Nicey Treat was more of a dessert cart of homemade frozen popsicles. What makes them unique are their different flavors like avocado, Arnie Palmer, Pineapple Basil, and mango ginger. The flavors Abby, P, and I tried were Avocado, Pineapple Basil, and Strawberry Mint (Right, Abby or P?) Chili Lime. Anyway, all of the flavors were really good, even the avocado. They were really refreshing. From looking at Nicey Treat's website, I learned that they try to only use local seasonal ingredients. Their treats are gluten, dairy, and lactose free. 

The Rating

The Info

Nicey Treat

www.niceytreat.com

4. Some of This! Some of That!

There were a lot of cajun, creole food trucks! And since Abby and Josh had already tried Chef Dan's and didn't love it, we tried SOT!SOT! Josh got the crawfish po-boy and Mike and I split the catfish po-boy. Both po boys were huge, so you get a lot of food for the cost. And I really liked how that bread wasn't overwhelming. Normally, I end up throwing away most of the bread but I didn't have to do that with this po-boy. The fried fish was really crispy and didn't taste oily at all. I also liked how their aioli was just drizzled over the top. This added just the right amount of flavor without the added gooey mess. The only downside was that the service was SOOOOOOOOO slow. Hopefully, it was just because it was food truck festival and they aren't always this slow.

The Rating

The Info

Some of This! Some of That!

www.facebook.com/sotsot1catering

@SOTSOT1

Ok, I lied...I'm not going to conclude my food truck post. I have 4 more trucks to write about so there will be a Part 3. Hey, don't judge. There were 5 people in our group so we were able to sample a lot of trucks. :-p

Mmm...Food Trucks! Part 1

Obviously, this post is all about food trucks. I'm combining my trips to the First Friday Food Trucks Festival, a trip to Triton Brewery where Florribean Flair was, and an event at Bier Brewery that Scratch and Mac Genie were at. So I'll start there for Part 1...

Scratch...

...was freaking amazing! Mike and I ordered off the regular menu. He got the burger with poutine de Peru fries (fries tossed in Peruvian yellow pepper sauce with queso fresco), and I ordered the grilled cheese with the regular Poutine fries (Fries with gravy and mozzarella cheese curds). My food was definitely better. The grilled cheese had munster and colby jack cheese, braised short rib, carmelized onions, arugula and toasted honey white bread. Unfortunately, the cheese wasn't the focus of this sandwich, but it was still really good. The short rib meat was really tender and all of the flavors worked well. Mike's burger came with bacon marmalade, arugula and gorgonzola cheese. Even though Mike asked for his burger medium, it came out more medium well. It was still very juicy and flavorful. My favorite part was the poutine fries though. I think Mike preferred the Poutine de Peru because of the unique yellow pepper sauce, but I LOVED the gravy coated fries. What else is more comforting than gravy covered fried potatoes with cheese? Unfortunately, I just read on Scratch's website that they're taking the poutine fries off their menu for the spring/summer except as a weekly special. :-(

Mike and Josh also tried the Spicy Chicken Cone and Tuscan Chicken Sandwich. I didn't try the spicy chicken cone because it had a mango-jalapeno slaw and I'm allergic to mango. :-( I can't really speak much for this other than Mike liked this the best out of everything he tried. Even when we went to the Food Truck Festival, he considered getting the chicken cone again. Josh thought his sandwich was ok... to be fair, Josh didn't have the best initial impression of Scratch. At first he didn't like them because they cheated him out of some fries, but the guy at Scratch realized their mistake and actually brought a side of fries (with ketchup!) to Josh inside Bier. That was very cool of them, so all of us appreciated the customer service. 

The Rating 

The Info

Scratch Truck 

www.scratchtruck.com

Mac Genie is great when all I want are Carbs, Carbs, Carbs. Really, I think this is a great idea for a food truck. I know I wasn't the only one in college that craved mac and cheese after a night of drinking. And being good drunk food is a huge plus for food trucks. This was 2nd time I tried Mac Genie. I tried them for the first time after the Super Bowl. Then I tried their buffalo chicken mac. This time I tried their "original" mac and their Spicy Pickle. Everything I've tried here has been good mac and cheese. The pasta isn't too mushy and its full of lots of melty cheese instead of some artificial cheese sauce. I'd really like to see some more variety in their menu, but they have some really solid choices. In the end, this is an ideal place for Carbs, Carbs, Carbs....mmm...

The Rating

The Info

Mac Genie

www.genietrucks.com

With Florribean Flair, don't judge a book by its cover! It doesn't have a fancy truck, but that is no indication of how yummy the food is. Some online research shows that this food truck was created by the executive chef of Iozzo's Garden of Italy, and I LOVE that place! I ordered a sampler with a fish taco, jerk chicken, and a crab cake. I couldn't eat the taco because it was covered in mangoes. So everyone else tried it. I didn't hear any negative reviews of the taco except that Mike's bite had a lot more mango than fish, but it seemed like it was good. The jerk chicken was surprisingly very good! Full of flavor and had a really good kick! I thought it was nice and tender. I would definitely order this again! I also enjoyed the crab cake. Not bad for a crab cake in Indiana. This is a food not-truck that you should definitely give a try!

The Rating

The Info

Florribean Flair

www.florribeanflair.com

Part 2: Food Truck Festival...