Jentri Colello
Los Angeles has its taco trucks, Austin its chicken and barbecue vendors. And Madison’s Library Mall appears to be the food cart epicenter of the avocado spring roll.
With the new food cart season upon us, some of the longest lines on the mall have been for the three carts serving these hefty, burrito-sized rolls overstuffed with big hunks of ripe avocado, shredded cabbage, other veggies and protein add-ons, all drenched in a sweet peanut sauce. The cheapest is just $2.50; the most expensive $4.
These are not the diminutive appetizers of your neighborhood Thai restaurant. These are sui generis — so far as I can determine via persistent Googling, Library Mall is the only place in the U.S. where giant avocado spring rolls are even a thing.
The Natural Juice cart is the most generous with fresh veggies — spinach and red bell pepper were great additions. It also leads the way in protein add-ons — your choice of chicken, tofu, jellyfish, seaweed (all $3.50) or shrimp ($4). Jellyfish is chewy and a little salty; shrimp is mostly flavorless.
Luangprabang offers only avocado ($3). The cart often adds too much peanut sauce, though I find there’s often too much in all of the carts’ rolls.
The longest lines tend to be at Fresh Cool Drinks, which sells the avocado-only version at $2.50 and offers either a tofu, chicken or shrimp add-on for just 50 cents more.
They’re difficult to eat — the thin rice-paper wrapper can’t hold the generous contents, and sauce rolled inside makes it gloppy. Once the rice paper rips, not even the cellophane wrapping can save your meal from disintegration. Still, it’s not hard to see how these are popular on campus — they’re inexpensive, gluten-free and healthy. They’re fairly tasty, but if you have more than $4 in your pocket, consider trying something more exciting for lunch. There’s plenty to choose from.
Jentri Colello
Real thrills come from the mango salsa at El Grito.
New to vending on the Capitol Square this year is El Grito Taqueria, which launched late last summer and has been selling at pop-ups at Gib’s Bar and the Robin Room. Now it’s at West Washington Avenue and Carroll Street weekdays. Tacos are $3 each or three for $8, with a rotating menu of fillings. Opening day featured roasted carrot, beef brisket or pork shoulder fillings served out of the retrofitted vintage 1969 Fleetwing travel trailer.
El Grito’s real variation on Madison’s current cart tacos is its excellent sauces — the ancho brisket’s cacahuate (peanut) sauce, the pork’s tart mango and, best of all, the carrot’s pumpkin seed pesto — complete with toasted pepitas. El Grito serves no rice or beans, and the tacos are modestly sized. These may work better as appetizers paired with cocktails; as lunch, it feels unbalanced.
Cali Fresh, a relatively new vendor on Library Mall, serves more traditional taqueria-style tacos, burritos, quesadillas and chalupas, with a choice of chicken, steak, chorizo/steak mix, veggie or shrimp fillings. During a recent visit, shrimp had already sold out by 12:10 p.m. The chicken here comes in small chunks of white meat seasoned almost like a carne asada. It has a slight edge on flavor over the steak/chorizo mix, but the big spicing here comes from the three salsas — a thin red with a pleasant chipotle hit, an excellent guacamole and a hot green tomatillo. Two classic tacos with rice and beans will run you $7.
Masarap Filipino food is new to Library Mall but a veteran of Let’s Eat Out cart nights. Its lumpia are crispy eggrolls filled with pork or veggies; Filipino baboy-b-cue features tangy pulled pork. My favorite is the caldereta, a tomato-based stew that comes with tofu or chicken and shows Spanish influence with peppers, chickpeas and green olives ($7.50).
Linda Falkenstein
Buzzy’s Lake House
A new cart making the satellite rounds of office park lunchtimes is Buzzy’s Lake House. The pretty, cabin-style cart even features a guest book for patrons to sign. Chef-owner Cynthia Heffling serves a healthy version of the simple foods people make at summer cottages. Several chicken and rice dishes are augmented by Rock Bar Tuna, a lively, lemony tuna salad with artichokes and kalamata olives; a summery cucumber sandwich or wrap; and daily specials. Slaws and potato salad sides round out the menu, and don’t leave without a packet of crisp home-baked chocolate chip cookies (3/$1). In addition to noontime appearances at Covance, University Research Park and American Family (see the cart’s Facebook page for schedule), Heffling expects to join Let’s Eat Out evenings starting in June.
City street vending coordinator Warren Hansen has had to move some carts around to avoid construction on Mifflin Street and near St. Paul’s site on Library Mall. The Capitol Square now has a new cluster of carts at East Washington Avenue (including the Pickle Jar, serving barbecue sandwiches and pie) as well as El Grito across the Square. More new carts continue to roll out as the weather warms. Stay tuned.
