Midtown Lunch

One day late last week I was absolutely starving come noon and that coincided with spying a new food truck making an appearance at the World Financial Center lot. Palenque, a truck serving arepas and other Colombian food, was going to be there, the weather was gorgeous and all of the stars seemed to be aligning for me to get meat-and-cheese-topped ground corn in my belly. That happened eventually, but during the hour-plus in between I realized that it really is important for food trucks to get their bearings before attempting to feed the hungry masses.

I’m not here to put down Palenque because it was, after all, their first time doing lunch service at the World Financial Center. It seems they normally park in places like Williamsburg which probably doesn’t equate to hordes of hungry office workers descending on you during their few brief moments of fresh air/lunch time.

This is a new-school food truck so in addition to the regular corn arepa you can ones made from brown rice and flax/sesame seeds or quinoa, and the toppings include cheese, beef, chicken, shrimp and vegan “sausage.” No matter what you choose, the standard toppings are arugula, white cheese, chipotle mayo, chimichurri sauce and guacamole. You can add tomato and green onion for an extra $1. Prices are between $5 and $9 for the arepas and there are a couple of sides and sweets for $2 or $3.

I went with the angus beef topping ($8) and a glass of agua panela  ($2). Later, after being handed what’s essentially a cake box, I opened it and was pleasantly surprised by the amount of beef on the arepa which is the size of a paper plate. That beef had been marinated and was really savory and I loved the chimichurri sauce. The downfall was the box which in addition to being comically large and hard to carry, did little to hold in heat. By the time I got back to my office the edges of the arepa that were not soaked in meat and sauce juices were cold and crunchy.

The agua panela is a sugar cane lemonade and ginger concoction that was really refreshing. I would totally get this on a hot summer day.

Now onto the issue with lunch service. When I got there, the mass of people waiting at Palenque didn’t seem any worse than at neighboring Schnitzel & Things or across the way at Taim Mobile. You have to wait in line to order from the window which took about 20 minutes, and then I moved over to the crowd waiting for food. All in all, I was standing there for slightly more than an hour. I know a lot of people such as myself cross the West Side Highway to eat at the trucks and we all have to rush back to the office. I heard people around me worrying about their boss discovering they’d been gone a long time.

I was told when I ordered that it would be a 20 minute wait for food and I asked if that kind of wait was normal for the truck. The woman taking my order shrugged apologetically and said they weren’t prepared for such a crowd. I think maybe the new trucks should talk to the more established ones before parking at the WFC lot or in other areas with a lot of office workers, and they would realize the crowds they would draw. On the Downtown Lunch Twitter feed (which you should really be following!), I suggested new trucks should go through some sort of boot camp to be ready for large crowds. I wasn’t joking.

The food was good at Palenque, and clearly there aren’t a lot of trucks selling Colombian food. Next time I’m in the mood for an arepa, though, I’m unlikely to go here just because I know the wait’s likely to be longer than I can be away from my desk. Also, I beg you to get rid of the cake boxes. A small pizza box would be an improvement, or better yet, something in the styrofoam department to keep the food hot and arepa from getting all cold and dried out.

I was told the truck will be back at the lot today, but won’t be there any set days of the week.

Palenque Colombian Food Truck, at the WFC food truck lot, on Twitter and the Web