Something from Eat Real Festival 2011 - Oakland

I missed the first two Eat Real Festival and wasn't keeping it up with it until hubby told me last night that today is going to be the last day for this year's. So we woke up early this morning and found our way there.

We parked on one of the event parking just next to Jack London Square. It cost $10 but I think it's worth every dime of it. I guess being one of the earlier visitors did pay off. It's only a few steps a way from the festival itself.

First we noted the empanadas and the long line next to it. They looked so yummy so I made a note to stop by. I wanted to check out the rest first before deciding on what to eat. There's only a limited amout of space in my tummy so I had to be choosy.

The Eat Real Festival is like a gathering of street food vendors in the area (San Francisco, South Bay, Oakland, etc). It also promotes eat fresh, local and sustainable food. It gives local food stores a chance to come out and meet the potential customers. And for food lovers like me to come to one place where all different food trucks come into one place. Awesome. You don't even have to track them down one by one anymore.

Sam's Chowder House
This truck featured New England clam chowder, mini po' boy shrimp and mini lobster roll. When I got in line I only meant to get their clam chowder. But then while waiting I saw people with the lobster roll and they looked so delish. I just had to give it a try.

For $5 each, I'd say the mini lobster roll was a damn good value. You got chunks of lobster meat. Way more than I could imagine. And it was yummy. The clam chowder was good but not hot enough (for me) and a bit smaller than what I wanted it to be. But they made up for it for the lobster roll. :)

Curry Up Now
This truck offered tikka masala burito and deconstructed samosa. Each with different varieties of topping. We got a chicken deconstructed samosa. It was the second best items we tried for the day (after the lobster roll). The dish had an open up samosa and then topped up with chutney and some chickpea curry with a sprinkle of tiny samosas on the side. Cute and yummy at the same time. It offered different taste altogether. Sweet, spicy, and tangy with a hint of lingering heat left in the mouth afterwards.

El Porteno
This is the empanadas stand that I saw when we just arrived. I made sure to spare room in my tummy for these empanadas. The line was pretty long but it moved every now and then. I didn't see the menu for this but I was thinking of getting a chicken and beef. Turned out that for this event, they only offered carne (beef), champinones (mushroom) and the banana with cream. So heck, we tried each and every one of those. The total bill for three empanadas came to $12. Later on I found out that it was $5 each for the chicken and beef. Pretty steep. They did packed them up with lots of filling though.

There were quite a few other stalls that looked interesting but we simply didn't have room to fit in our tummy. Chairman Bao's truck featured five spice pork belly, crispy garlic tofu, and braised pork shoulder. There was an African cuisine stall that featured slow cooked chicken with spinach and chicken cooked in coconut.

http://eatrealfest.com/event/Oakland/California/2011