Midtown Lunch

There are a few long-running food trucks in this city that have somehow managed to never be reviewed by Downtown Lunch, either because of infrequently parking down here or never tweeting their location (or doing it two hours after most people eat lunch). Bian Dang is truck that we’ve not written about, although we did check out their offshoot Fun Buns cart when it debuted last year. The truck’s been parking in the Financial District occasionally again after most trucks were unable or unwilling to come down here due to disaster recovery vehicles and equipment everywhere, coupled with a lower supply of office workers.

This is really the perfect time of year to eat some Taiwanese comfort food, so I was more than happy to pay the truck a visit when they were parked on Water St. earlier this week.

Everything on the menu sounded delicious and it was hard to decide what to order (chicken leg? pork chop? beef stew?) so I went went with the thing I’d never tried before: fish cake (tianbula) over rice for $8.

The large, flat fish cake sat over a layer of rice with a ladle of their delicious sauce underneath, made of minced pork and pickled mustard greens and pixie dust. I would eat this straight up any day. I liked the fish cake (which definitely requires a fork and knife), but I guess was expecting a little more seafood flavor. Then I spooned some of the pork sauce on it, and all was forgiven.

Most of you have likely already checked out this truck, and will always favor the chicken leg or pork chop, but perhaps next time you will stray toward the fish cake or one of their other specials.

Bian Dang Truck, on the Web and Twitter