by Chrissy Iley
I am just back from the LA Street Food Festival, an enormous event of the most exciting, new and adventurous food in LA. It sprawls across the Rose Bowl in Pasadena.
I remember going to the Rose Bowl for vintage chandeliers and lamps and rococo tables that light up. I remember that it was both blisteringly hot and blister giving.
The food fest though had so many exciting things to drink and taste, I didn’t notice the blisters ’til my return. It is hard to select highlights when there were so many good things, but some of my personal favourites were Badmaash (badmaashla.com).
Badmaash is an Indian gastro pub in downtown LA. They brought us their version of chicken tikka masala. Obviously I was interested to taste what has become the British national dish. I have never found it done well in LA. It’s always too bland, too watery.
This time it was great. They tell me that as much as they can, they are local, organic, sustainable. They were certainly delicious.
I had never heard of Kitchen Mouse Café & Catering (kitchenmousela.com) and at first there were no lines outside their stand. That was of course until people had tasted the vegan tacos with smoky maple tempeh strips and clever spicy slaw. Then there was a giant line circling right around.
It is hard to do vegan food at a food festival where the smell of smoking pig is everywhere. But they were standout. They have a café (5904 N. Figueroa St, Highland Park, Los Angeles, CA 90042) open 8am-3pm except Mondays.
We stopped for a cocktail at the stand set up by the 1933 Group who have various vintage style cutting edge cocktail bars all over LA. These cocktails were from their latest bars Sassafras and Harlowe. Both bars have a vintage feel.
We had the Captain Planet with Bols Genever, spiced watermelon and strawberry shrub and lemon. The clever people at Harlowe have rediscovered this traditional Dutch gin a favourite of old people in Holland and given it a new lease of life. I will be heading to that bar for more of the same.
I also liked Polka (polkarestaurant.com), Polish cuisine from their restaurant near Eagle Rock, LA. They served delicious potato and cheese dumplings with home made sour cherry juice.
I also enjoyed Doma (domakitchencafe.com), healthy multicultural cuisine. They served a wonderful kale salad with grapes, cranberries, cherry tomatoes and feta cheese with a tangy herb dressing. They also do a delicious waffle.
Best of all though was Salt and Straw ice cream (saltandstraw.com). They originated in Portland with the first ‘farm to cone’ ice cream shop. They are coming to Larchmont Village, which is fast becoming my favourite area in LA. They had by far the largest line of the whole festival. I suppose people were fearing that their hand-made-in-small-batches organic ice cream would run out.
I tried a sea salt ice cream with caramel ribbon, one of their most popular. It was incredibly exciting. People also delighted in coffee and bourbon and chocolate with gooey brownies. My favourite was the Asian peanut with marshmallow ribbon. It was a taste sensation. So much peanut, so much texture. Neither of them were sickly sweet. Apparently that’s something to do with the churning process and the 17 per cent butter fat. This creates an amazing canvas so that the flavours are really accentuated. They were the perfect cool down to such a hot event.