Midtown Lunch

A couple of weeks ago the Bongo Brothers truck deviated from its normal parking spots in the Flatiron and other areas and came down to the Financial District. Now it seems they’re parking down here once a week so I thought I’d go try some of their food since we’re not exactly brimming with Cuban options, mobile or not. In fact, ever since the Qba Cuban Kitchen truck went back to New Jersey permanently, we’ve had to make do with Sophie’s or the odd generic deli that sells pernil. While I’m no Cuban food expert, I was pretty happy I went out of my way to eat here. 

I liked that this truck went a little outside of the box with their menu items that include the usual Cubano sandwich and ropa vieja but added on things like hot dogs and a burger that involves chorizo and fried shoestring potatoes. Ultraclay had already sampled a couple of those items so I went in another direction.

You can get a sandwich (mostly $7) or a platter ($9) and I decided to go with the latter. The choices are pork, mojo chicken or ropa vieja and they all come with white rice, black beans and plantains. My main question when ordering this was exactly how much food I was going to get for the price I was paying. Yes, writing for this site has made me have the mind of a fatty.

I need not have worried because this was a hefty container of meat and carbs. There was a pile of ropa vieja on top of a mound of rice, a small amount of black beans and a couple of plantains on the side. The meat was great – tender and with enough juice to soak into the rice below. I can imagine this would be as good or possibly better in sandwich form.

The black beans were great but it was hard to mix with the rice when there was a pile of meat on top of it. Plus, the sauce from the beans leaked out of the container so perhaps this isn’t the best packaging idea? There’s a reason why most places put the beans (and sometimes rice) in a separate lidded container.

It looks like Bongo Brothers is going to try to come downtown once a week, and it’s been mid-week the last two times, so if you like Cuban food take note. Next time, I’m ordering the frita.

Bongo Brothers truck, on the Web and on Twitter