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What’s The Best Street Food You Ever Ate? Tell Us To Win!
Lonely Planet has come out with a new guide to the world’s best street food – and, it’s a cookbook!
My weak “Twilight Zone” joke aside, The World’s Best Street Food really is one part guidebook, one part cookbook. The book identifies the planet’s top one hundred can’t-miss street treats, revealing their origins and the best places to find them. For the home cook itching to replicate these delicacies, recipes are helpfully tagged as easy, medium, or complex. And, of course, having the ingredients handy will help parents determine if these foods will be potentially problematic for their families, whether they’re trying them in the destination or at home.
While traveling snackers will no doubt find this guide handy, parents who may love street food themselves nonetheless may be reluctant to try out curious and exotic treats on their kids. So how best to minimize the risk to your kin’s digestive health? There are a few precautions you can take, says Robert Reid, Lonely Planet’s U.S. editor.
As a cautionary tale, Reid notes that while living in Vietnam he got food poisoning, “not from the street stands serving vermicelli noodles and grilled pork, or beef noodle soup, or banh mi sandwiches. But from a posh, air-conditioned Thai restaurant. It was excellent food, but no one was [eating] there. I probably got something that had been left out – a sauce, a dish, I don’t know.”
Among the lessons he took from this episode was that “busy street stands are actually more transparent than restaurants” and that you’ll likely have better luck with your street food if you “look for popular places where they’re freshly preparing the food. Not serving long-ago grilled barbecue on a stick. Street carts have to be fresh, as they won’t have refrigerators, so in many places you’re more likely to get fresh food.”
Once you start getting a feel for which carts, markets, and bazaars have the freshest food, what are some easy picks for young palates? Among Reid’s favorites are “burritos and tacos. Not just in Mexico, but San Francisco too, where they are a must. The Mission district there developed its own walk-away burrito – stuffed with rice and beans and now internationally known as the ‘Mission burrito.’ You can get them from simple taquerias, or ‘taco trucks’ across the Bay Area.”
Another treat that’s worth having your family experience beyond the confines of a convenience store or theme park is that deep-fried tube of deliciousness known as a Spanish doughnut or churro. “They’re fun to snack on [on] their own, but better if you get a hot chocolate to dunk them into,” says Reid, adding that “Madrid’s Chocolateria San Ginés is a legendary churro spot.”
Reid also recommends sampling different pizzas, not only in Rome, but by way of the guide’s Roman recipe, which he says is among several that will please young and fussy eaters.
Once you’ve found street vendors that you’re comfortable trying, the easy part is showing your kids that its okay to have a culinary sense of adventure, Reid suggests. “Kids might be more reluctant to try some of the weirder street foods out there, depending on their palate,” he says, adding that one way to shake things up on a vacation is to “skip your hotel’s free breakfast, go to a market, and line up to get a breakfast bowl of noodles (like laksa in Malaysia, pho in Vietnam, or mohingya in Burma), served fresh and hot and slurped up as noisily as you can.”
“Street food isn’t just good food,” says Reid, “but fun food.”
How to Win a Copy of The Book
Lonely Planet is graciously donating two copies of The World’s Best Street Food to the ShermansTravel Blog. For your chance to win a copy, submit a comment to this post by noon on Monday, March 19, letting me know what’s the best street food you’ve ever experienced, as well as where you ate it.
By submitting your comment:
– You will be eligible to win a copy of the book. I will choose two winners at random next week.
– You give me the honor of possibly quoting your comment (with attribution) for a potential street food sequel post (should you all send me enough material).
So show your love for street food! Shut your eyes, think about that glorious moment when a morsel of street food made you weep joyfully, and leave me your comment. Remember to indicate where you ate said street food, specifying the destination as well as the vendor location as specifically as possible.
Thanks, all.
Paul
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Nothing better than a real gyro off the streets in Athens, Greece!
Chang Mai opened my eyes to street food and a whole new culinary experience! The chicken pad Thai was simply awesome! (the deep fried cockroaches and glow worms weren’t bad either). I’ve never quite been able to master replicating those flavours back home.
I had the best fried chicken from a street vendor at the big market in Chichicastenango, Guatemala. Pollo frito por favor!
Cant go past a churro filled with dulce de leche anywhere in Brazil or Argentina!
Got to be Thailand. Particularly Bangkok. Still don’t know how they make simple rice and veg/meat/fish taste so amazing. And pad Thai cooked and served in seconds. Yummmmmmm!
Chaat in India. I could eat some right now!
After battling terrible jet lag hitting the streets of Ho Chi Minh City first thing in the morning for fresh Banh mi sandwiches. Wonderful fresh french bread baguette with pate,spicy pickled vegetables cilantro and a fresh fried omelette. There was no better way to start off my morning.
balık-ekmek by galata bridge istanbul
This post instantly made me think of the Ugandan “rolex”. Thought the name suggests hawkers might be selling cheap knock of timepieces the reality is altogether more delicious. A thick, doughy, heavily seasoned chapati fried in oil is topped with a thin omelette speckled with wafer thin slices of onion and green pepper. The chapati is then rolled into a sausage and stuffed, rather oddly, into a thin plastic food bag. Enjoy scalding hot as the oil seeps through the bag onto the ground below. Ask for another. I hope to see the rolex, or at least some form of Ugandan street food, feature in the book!
Don’t miss to quote the fabulous ‘Frittatina’ down in Via dei Tribunali at Pizzeria Di Matteo, Naples, Italy.
Usually less known than pizza, it is a few hundred grams of bucatini pasta, cheese, meat and green peas all breaded and deep fried. Just a little piece of fried heaven!
Specializing in baked potatoes, the Kroshka Kartoshka (literally baby potatoes) stalls dotted around Russia’s capital are a simple, yet delicious snack. For under $2, this substantial spud is sure to fill you up. Add cheese and additional toppings for mere pennies.
Street roasted chicken in Bethlehem, Israel. Lunch was late and the chicken smelled so good
I come from Tuscany so I can only say: the best street food ever is the “lampredotto sandwich”. It is a unique sandwich with this “kind of trippa” inside. It is very tasty, cheap (3.50€) and it is the institutional Florentine food. You can find every where in Florence, expecially close to the most beautiful squares. Keep in mind: you can find it only in that city. This is a photo: http://experience-tuscany.thriftytuscany.com/wp-content/uploads/2009/04/lampredotto-tuscan-street-food.jpg
There’s nothing like street food in India… there’s so much variety that it’s hard to pick a favourite… Kabab rolls, pay bhaji, street chinese (Indian style), kacchi dabeli, vada pav (the Indian burger)… I can’t stop!!
But I think I will go with the roadside chaat stalls that serve the bhel, pani puri, aloo tikki, ragda pattice…
It’s a delight to see them make it in front of you – In a few minutes you will have a mix of spiced potatoes, puffed rice, chick peas garnished with different chutneys, coriander, spices and a dash of yoghurt. Yum!!
India is a country of great food and more a billion foodies. In the small town of Pune, 3-4 hours drive inland from Mumbai, opposite the train station there is a very small corner shop right on the road called Shiv Kelash. Their pista kulfi is beyond this world!
first and most memorable street food experience: Sate Ayam, beach market sanur, Bali, indonesia.
Mmmm, the best street food I’ve ever had is in Portland, OR. They have a ton of delicious food carts but my favorite is called the Whole Bowl, where they only serve one dish. Its a vegetarian bowl with rice, beans, avocado, salsa, olives, sour cream, and “crack sauce.” I want one now!
Anywhere in Thailand, the fresh dried squid on a cart with garlic and chili sauce.
At almost every corner of residential areas and outside school gates in Manila, one can find a vendor with a small grill who sells a selection of treats – pork ears called “tenga” (my favorite), pork blood called “betamax”, chicken head called “helmet”, chicken intestines called “isaw”, and chicken feet called “adidas”.
Anything at the Food Truck Fridays in Cathedral Square Park during the summer in Milwaukee, WI. Tacos, crepes, pizza, pitas, sandwiches, and my very favorite – a “Bomb ‘A’” Asian taco with grilled chicken in a savory sauce from the Tiger Bite truck!
ITALIAN MARKET RIGHT HERE IN PHILADELPHIA – SO MANY FRESH AND DELICIOUS CHOICES :)
I have never tasted street food like that cooked at the evening street stalls on Jalan Alor in Kuala Lumpur, but the chili garlic prawns and “carrot cake” nearly brought tears to my eyes.
Try any noodle dish on Nathan Road in Hong Kong (Kowloon), and you won’t be disappointed. There’s an enormous variety, from meat and fish to vegetable mixtures, hot and spicy to mild and bland.