Kimchi Taco Truck

The Kimchi Taco Truck stops in midtown for lunch during weekdays, and offers yet another take on the increasingly popular Korean fusion food genre. As one of the few food trucks still around midtown, we decided to check it out to see what all the buzz was about. That, and the mouthwatering photos the truck posted to it’s twitter. The truck offers a variety of tacos, “kim” cheese steaks, burrito bowls, and authentic Korean sides like spicy rice cakes. We opted to try the most notable menu item, the Kimchi taco. The menu was pricier than we’d hoped, but for $7 we got three kimchi tacos, choosing the Korean BBQ beef over the spicy pork and pulled chicken.


The taco’s came in a biodegradable box, it seems that all of the Kimchi Truck’s packaging is biodegradable, including their utensils, straws and bags. The tacos were packed full of beef and kimchi, and topped with scallions and cilantro. The kimchi was definitely authentic, pungent enough that it smelled through the bag and still left a lingering smell in our office. Adding kimchi to a taco is sheer brilliance, it went amazingly with the scallions and cilantro, and created a truly unique taste. We were sadly underwhelmed by the beef however. It was cut in smaller pieces than I expected and the texture was more like ground beef than Korean BBQ. The kimchi may have overpowered some of its taste, but the beef was a little too mild, and we could hardly taste it beneath the flavorful toppings. The soft taco shell was pretty standard, though a little tough sometimes.
Overall we found the kimchi to be the best part of the entire taco, while the beef was much blander than other Korean BBQ trucks like Bapcha or Korilla. Our advice: order a side of kimchi for $3 and get the rest of your meal somewhere else.

Quality Korean Food in a Cart

Bapcha food cart is Korean-style vendor on West 49^th Street and Avenue of the Americas. They serve a variety of Korean Barbecued meats, as well as some vegetarian noodle options. Their cart was pricier than I had hoped, but quality Korean food tends to be more expensive than most other New York street food. I ordered a Galbi Box for $8, thin slices of barbecued beef over rice and served with lettuce and egg. The chef drizzled hot sauce over the beef and a sweet type of vinaigrette over the lettuce. The beef was tender and well flavored, and the white rice underneath absorbed a lot of the flavor from the beef. The lettuce was a good choice when paired with the heavy barbecued flavor from the beef, giving the meal a good sense of balance.

The egg portion added an excellent touch of authenticity to the meal, though was blander than I had hoped. The beef easily stole the show, but would have been hard to finish without the other servings. The portion was slightly smaller than I had hoped, with only four or five slices of beef. In the end I was left over with extra rice, but the juices from the beef left it with a savory taste. For $8 I expected more food for the price, but the meal was delicious enough and demonstrated that Bapcha certainly knows it’s Korean food.

To order online from Bapcha click here.