Sometimes in this job, I mean hobby, you gotta go where the adventure takes you. Had faithful blog reader and one-time (so far) guest reviewer Eric e-mail this morning asking about meeting up for lunch. I said, "Name a place in Orange you want to go to and I might be able to go."
He said, "What's that place Nancy recommended to you?"
"La Casita. Let me call her and see if she can go too."
So I called up Nancy Luna, the Register's Fast Food Maven, and she said she was actually just leaving her office to go to a Kogi BBQ truck stop that happened to coincide with the opening of the new Yogurtland in Anaheim on Euclid. Ended up going to that and Eric, Nancy, and I are going to meet up at La Casita another time.
When I arrived the Kogi truck wasn't there but when that thing comes driving up everyone pulls out their camera to snap pictures of it. Somebody told me that Wing Lam of Wahoo's fame was there but I didn't specifically notice him. A line immediately formed and even though the truck arrived an hour and twenty minutes late it was still another 30-40 minutes before we got our food. I'm not complaining since because of some legal loophole they couldn't sell anything from their truck at this stop but gave it away for free. Each person got two tacos of their choice and their special little watermelon/cheese side dish that reminded me a lot of what Kantina used to serve. I was hoping to finally try their kimchi quesadilla or their rare-as-a-Bigfoot-sighting Hawaiian Jalapeño French Toast, but, once again, we were limited to two tacos this time. Again . . . not complaining.
Nancy and I also met up with "OrangeCountyGal" (@OrangeCountyGal on Twitter) and had her as our line buddy and she got to hear all our food blogger yammering about which companies and restaurants are good with working with food bloggers and which aren't and other various and sundry things that only a food blogger would care about.
Now Kogi is known for "tweeting" its locations but somehow this stop passed under the radar and didn't get officially tweeted by them, or unofficially for that matter. I happened to pick it up from Nancy's Twitter account and retweeted it on the @ocmexfood twitter account. Yes, it annoys me that Twitter has taken over the world but sometimes you can get good information from it.
Click here to read about my other Kogi encounter or here to read about all the Korean/Mexican fusion food in the county.
Hawaiian Jalapeno French Toast might even be rarer as at least there is film of Bigfoot. But I can attest it's real!
ReplyDeleteGood point. Look at all the photographic evidence for Bigfoot.
ReplyDeleteUggghh....This Kogi thing is soooooooooooo played out. We get it. Long lines, only on twitter, fusion between Korean & Mexican, tasty, sometimes run out of food.
ReplyDeleteYou know those songs by Coldplay you used to love...Until they played them on the radio every single minute? Kinda like that.
So many undiscovered places I would love to hear about. Where is the best Menudo? Where is the best hard - fresh fried taco? Who has incredible chips and salsa? Are their regional cuisines of Mexico that most people are not familiar with that would be interesting . How about a place like this in Orange county http://www.cemitaspuebla.com/ . its in Chicago but I bet there are similar types of unknown places and Mexican cuisines in Orange County!
The other thing that I think that would increase traffic and comments on this blog would be for you to comment more about the actual food. Describe how it tastes. Textures, smells, tastes. Does it taste like something else that we can reference in our minds? Did it taste good or bad? Sometimes I feel like this blog is more of an "announcement" site or picture site.
I love Mexican Food and you seem to have a passion for it. I just think with a few tweaks, this blog could be fantastic.
Diamond Dog, I'm still waiting for you to do a guest review. This blog started out mainly as a place for me to put up pictures of restaurants I had gone to. If I don't absolutely love food from a place I might not talk about it because I'm also not trying to slander it. I am not a Kogi fanatic. I have been to their truck a grand total of twice and I went yesterday mainly to catch up with Nancy on some stuff. But I did give it a mention because I can tell from my site traffic analyzer that people are still very interested in it.
ReplyDeleteI should add that the content that is now on the site is not exactly representative of all the content that will ever be on the site. You seem to think if I haven't mentioned a certain subject by now that it means I'll never mention it. While at the Kogi stop yesterday I told OrangeCountyGal about all the content that is coming. One of those things is a comprehensive entry on where to find menudo.
ReplyDeleteI asked Kogi about the lack of announcement for the OC Visit yesterday and they DM'd me back and said, because it was a 'Special Event' that they couldn't sell at they didn't tweet it. That makes sense, you don't want HUGE lines for an event for free food, and you don't want to disappoint people because the lines just too long for it as well.
ReplyDeleteAs for the comments about your site, keep doing things the way you want to, it's your site. Sure things could make it better, hell I know a lot of things that could make mine better, but there is a certain time when a hobby becomes a chore and I never want my sites to become a chore!
Diamond Dog, one of the entries I have coming soon is about a place that has good hard - fresh fried tacos.
ReplyDeleteDan brings up a good point though: this is a hobby, and it pays like one, and sometimes the most I can do is to put up some pictures and a little text. Having said that there is still value in your suggestions and maybe what you've seen so far here is only a small taste of bigger things to come.
yum! we love kogi! the sliders are awesome too!
ReplyDeletexoxo, K
yeah, i've got to try their sliders sometime
ReplyDelete