TastyUp Trailer Tour Recap

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Admittedly I don’t get out to the Austin eateries as much as I’d like, so when I heard about the TastyUp Trailer Tour I was excited for the opportunity to try a bunch of new places in the span of a few hours. The lovely Addie Broyles and Jodi Bart put the event together, working with 16 of Austin’s trailer food establishments to create an experience we won’t soon forget. (There’s already clamors for another!)

I wasn’t able to hit all the places I wanted to go (read: all 16) but here’s a recap of those I managed to survive the lines for.

La Boite

The day started at La Boite, a cute little coffee shop housed in a recycled shipping container. (Incidentally, my friends are friends with the owners, and I was invited to the opening but I was in San Francisco for Foodbuzz Fest.) Along with our free French press, we picked up a mini chocolate croissant, a mini almond croissant, and a fleur de sel caramel macaron.

All three were wonderful. I loved that the almond pastry is doused in almonds instead of just having an almond paste filling like most I see. The chocolate croissant was a perfect bite, and the macaron was just wonderful. My son loved it. It makes me wonder why macarons are so hard to find here. Surely we can move past the cupcakes and open a few more macaron shops, right?

On the same lot is The Texas Cuban, where we picked up a quarter Cuban sandwich with plantain chips. To be honest I was kind of disappointed in this place. After placing my order it took a very long time for my sandwich to be made – I could see inside the trailer and they had to keep stopping to slice meat, etc. I think while I was waiting they even ran out of bread and couldn’t take any more sandwich orders! Considering this was an event that was planned, with over 400 people RSVPing on Facebook, it seemed strange that the were so ill-prepared to sell sandwiches longer than 1 hour.

The sandwich was good and so were the chips, but it seemed expensive ($4 for half the size they normally sell, usually $7) for a sandwich that didn’t stand out.

From there we headed to Gourdough’s, Brevita, and Odd Duck Farm to Trailer, all located in the same lot.

We decided to get two samplers Gourdough’s was offering for the tour, but next time I’m definitely getting the Funky Monkey (grilled bananas, cream cheese icing and brown sugar baste). Directly after ordering I hopped into the line that was already forming pre-opening for Odd Duck, so by the time I got back to the table I missed out on the bacon doughnut hole and the strawberry off another one. What I had was good, and it was nice to have sweet stuff between the savory.

I was looking forward to Odd Duck ever since I started seeing fellow Austin bloggers tweeting about it. Not surprisingly, the place ended up having to close its lunch service and only open for dinner, as the crowds that began appearing made the little restaurant run out of food! They were nice enough to open at 2 for the tour, and we were eagerly anticipating it.

Everything on the menu sounded great, but considering we had more places to visit after this, I just ordered the quail and the grilled ham and cheese. The small portions make it easy to order a bunch of food to create a fabulous meal, and I’m definitely going to be coming back here. I was so excited to try the quail that I forgot I was a blogger for a moment and began cutting into it before I remembered the camera!

Now this is a nice slice of ham on a cheese sandwich! No “deli-thin” here.

We didn’t buy a drink at Brevita but they were kind enough to be passing out samples. Which explains why today at work I had a mad craving for a dark chocolate mocha.

By this time my husband was getting tired from chasing our son around for three hours straight and we decided to visit just one more place before heading home. Luckily Franklin Barbecue is on the way, and it was far enough from the rest of the tour to be free of lines.

Sadly the guy ahead of us got the last of the brisket, but we made do with the pulled pork sandwich with coleslaw for me, and the Tipsy Texan for my husband, which was chopped beef with sausage. Man, I love barbecue, and I love how many options we have in Austin! Franklin Barbecue was great and their variety of sauces was interesting. Apparently they will be bottling them soon, and I’ll be picking up some of that espresso sauce. Mmm.

And what does one do after they stuff themselves silly with all of this?

I took a nap.