February 21, 2011
My food truck fantasies
Fransk dog as served by Danish pølsevogn. (via Street Cuisine)
have been evolving over the past week, which began with my confessing to having entertained the notion of converting my Honda Element into a food truck. A friend asked what I’d serve.
“Pasties,” I replied. “Spicy pasties.”
Then I got thinking. Ooh, yes. And empanadas. And samosas. And calzones. And pierogis. And knishes.
But I got sidetracked by an art project.
I got all excited re-creating and photographing . . . “Wieners on a Plate.” You can read about “Wieners on a Plate” and see one of my half-assed art photos here.
Okay, here’s what happened next: my “Wieners on a Plate” imaginings led me to a brief obsession with the Danish pølsevogn (loose translation: wienie wagon) and its offerings (hence the photo that illustrates this post). I began to imagine a move to Brooklyn, where I would hawk fransk dogs from a pølsevogn as Lucy Foley sang “Sugar in My Bowl”:
But then I got thinking, What if I used my food truck fantasies to finance a road trip traversing a larger, grander reality?
Start out in Brooklyn with an assist from Lucy. Then head out west and hire a midget chef to stand in the back of the Element and cook wieners on a hot plate plugged into the rear outlet, whence he would dish them out with a merry smile and a friendly wisecrack uttered in a voice reminiscent of the John Waters superstar Edith Massey.
I know it would be illegal and unlicensed and all, but I would stay on the move –on the lam — and would connect up with various friends in various places, friends with knacks for making pasties, empanadas, samosas, calzones, pierogis, and knishes. Rake in the cash and move on.
Ya think?
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You’re seriously living in the wrong state.
Joel, that’s been true ever since I was born and for every state I’ve inhabited.
The midget chef has a Diane Arbus feel. Also, I commend you on your Danish translation. That’s the kind of work that is sorely needed for Danish films right now.
Boners, indeed.
Lucy, many years ago my ex-husband met the (early 1970s incarnation of the) midget chef Little Oscar. He was tripping (my -ex, not Little Oscar) and en route to the grocery store when the Wiener Mobile drove into the store’s parking lot and out popped Little Oscar.
Also, I thank you for your commendation. My grandmother was born in Denmark.
What marvellous timing.
Lucy, I think we could sell a lot of sausage if you were to stand alongside the wagon and sing about needing a hot dog for your roll.
Okay. Are you sure people won’t get sidetracked?
If it’s of any use, I can sing a version of Hound Dog in Danish, which could really very easily be turned into Hot Dog, should the need arise.
There might be some confusion.
I need to think this through.
I’m counting on a vague excitation emerging from your singing of hot dogs and rolls, Lucy — a stimulation that will prompt a rush to the counter to purchase sausage and bread.
Okay, my latest scheme is to collaborate with a friend on a stealth organic heirloom vegetable truck. I mean it. Kind of. But don’t tell. That’s where the stealth part comes in.
Not to take anything from Lucy, but I have a wiener song, too.
“I know a weiner man
Who owns a hot-dog stand,
He sells most anything
from hot-dogs on down.
One day I’ll change his life,
I’ll be his wiener wife.
Hot Dog!
I love that wiener man.”
Or, “Hot dog, I love that weiner. Man!”
Or, “I sure will be disgusted/If this dog ain’t full of mustard/Don’t want no excuse/It must have lots of juice/I want a hot dog for my roll”
Sheila! That’s nasty!
*snort.*
Here ’tis, Rick, in all its nasty glory.
My goodness!
Hot DOG!
I’ll say!
Oh, you nasty man! (courtesy of Lucy Foley)
Actually, courtesy of Harvey Fierstein. Somehow, I feel we’ve come full circle. I strive for that moment when something ties the comment thread together. Peace.
Ah. Lucy, I was fixing to mention Fierstein! And George White’s Scandals (1934).
The thrill of it all.
Yes, peace. Thanks for the thought of it, Lucy.
I still haven’t given up on my taco cart dream. Mine would be on the back of a rickshaw, or maybe a donkey-pulled cart. Problem is Romans aren’t big on street food or anything besides Roman food for that matter. And I didn’t act on it in NYC back before they had Calexico and all the others that have since proliferated.
A goat-powered food cart?
Goats are too smart/ornery to be pulling someone else’s cart. Speaking of goats, I have a few goat shots to add to the Goat Rodeo, put one yesterday, more to come. Though India is really about the cows, they are lovely creatures.
That is a handsome Delhi goat.