The boom of Vancouver street food continued this year with the introduction of 12 new food trucks. I embarrassingly haven’t had the time to venture out to sample from the many culinary trucks of Vancouver. Furthermore, my self-imposed weekday diet restriction sort of impedes on my ability to gorge during lunch time….but I would make the occasional exception. This particular Spring day, the sun came out in full force and we escaped from our gray office cocoon to bask in it. We decided to trek to the corner of Seymour & West Georgia to try out the Guanaco Truck.
The colourful food truck was started by Jose Manzano, who originally worked in the local North Hollywood industry. He humbly began his cooking career by treating the crew members to his El Salvadoran food. And then with some encouragement, entrepreneurial spirit, and seeing a very unique niche opportunity, his ‘on set’ lunch sharing became a mobile business. It’s also a family affair with his mother and sister helping out with all aspects of the food truck operations.
Jose’s food truck serves a good variety of food for those with small to large appetites. The menu is an array of Salvadoran comfort food of Tamales, yuca frita, pasteles, and pupusas. There’s also a selection of sweet chilled drinks to quench your thirst like the traditional Horchata.
I admit it…I’m no expert on Salvadoran food but whatever I ate was good, hearty, and coma inducing filling. For my sunny lunch, I ordered the Ayote Pupusas.
A pupusas is a thick hand made tortilla, made using a maise flour dough, which is usually filled with a blend of cheese, meats, beans and sometimes vegetables. My Ayote pupusas was a combination of savoury refried black beans, cheese and zucchini served Yuca frita, curtido (pickled slaw) and salsa de tomate (fresh tomato sauce).
The pupusas was piping hot, doughy, chewy, and very cheesy. It reminded of me of the Chinese green onion cake but thicker and chewier. The citrus side of tomato sauce and pickled slaw helped cut into the cheesiness. The yucca frita (fries) was crunchy like regular thick potato fries but a bit more on the starchy side. I also went for the Horchata ( beverage made of morro seeds, ground cocoa, cinnamon, sesame seeds, nutmeg, tigernuts and vanilla) as my post lunch dessert.
If you need some sunny colours on a rainy day or pretend you’re in a far off exotic place, come by and chow down at the Guanaco Truck.
Guanaco Food Truck
Seymour & Georgia from 11:00 – 3:00 pm
