Oddly enough most of these trucks seem hell-bent on serving sit-down food instead of the obvious choice for mobile ingestion: sandwiches! I don’t really get it. My best guess is that they’re trying to stand out by serving food you can’t get as easily as sandwiches, but in the process being incredibly short-sighted. Hell, most dedicated sandwich shops don’t have kitchens much bigger than a truck – talk about a natural (and literal) fit!

Finally I visited Schinitzel and Things (various locations, get the latest on their twitter account) and my dreams of ultra-mobile sandwiching were realized. They serve all kinds of schnitzel (pounded and deep fried meat) with a variety of condiments as a ‘platter’ or sandwich (aka ‘schnitzelwich’) for $10 or $8. This ain’t your regular cart food. It’s just as expensive as any fancy sandwich you’d get elsewhere in the city and I had high expectations.

I got my first wich, sat down and they were met immediately. The schnitzelwich is incredible: the schnitzel is warm and crunchy without being dry, the bread is soft and toasted, the sriracha mayo is gently hot. It comes in tin foil and the process of ordering, sitting down outside and being enveloped in crunchy chicken is fantastic. I haven’t tried the other meats since I’m so taken with the chicken, but I’d wager they are equally delicious. Once, the schnitzel was a little dry and not quite as crunchy, but that never stops me from getting excited when the truck is nearby (most of my coworkers don’t even bother to check their twitter, they just wait for me to get loud about it every week).

Go forth and schnitzelwich! You will enjoy every bite.

Deep fried quality:

Unopened:

Looking Inside:

Here’s their pitch: fried chicken is delicious; even better with delicious sauces. Okay, that’s how I describe it, I have no idea what their pitch is. It says “Glatt Kosher” where the pitch should be. Maybe it’s something like “Jews love chicken!”? Regardless, it seems like a winner, after all, let’s not be dividers: everyone loves fried chicken! Aside from the kosher-tax-inflated prices, it was very tasty. I tried the Spanish Schnitzel sandwich ($10) which is their lingo for chicken that’s pounded flat, breaded with spicy peppers, deep fried and put into baguette sandwich. I got mine with a side of spicy sauce, though it was more mayo-y than spicy. All together, the sandwich was delicious. The chicken wasn’t overpowering, wasn’t greasy and the other ingredients tasted pretty good (like sauteed onions and pickles) together.

My mind wasn’t blown, but I’d go back. If only the prices were a few bucks cheaper.

However, my trip wasn’t entirely fruitless. A few days after leaving Texas, I found myself in Portland, Oregon. Specifically, I found myself in a parking lot whose borders were crowded with street food vendors. This wasn’t a special street fair or festival, this was an every day street food paradise, and apparently the city is loaded with similar parking lots. I thought New York had a respectable number of tasty food trucks and carts; I was wrong. Portland is outdoing us by leaps and bounds. This one corner alone had Thai, Vietnamese, BBQ, Mexican, Middle Eastern, Cajun, pizza…and Czech. Of course I had to try Tabor, the Czech cart (SW 5th St. & Stark St.), especially when I noticed its signature item: the Schnitzelwich.

The Schnitzelwich ($6) features a pork or chicken cutlet, deep fried, on a ciabatta roll from a local bakery, topped with lettuce, sauteed onion and both a red pepper spread and a generous smattering of horseradish sauce. Though the two sauces are intensely flavorful, the real burden of the sandwich rests on the meat – if the schnitzel were tough or the breading soggy, it just wouldn’t be worth eating. But Tabor fries each cutlet to order, and the result is a schnitzel that is fresh and crispy, perfectly balancing out the sauces. I wish I’d had room for their other offerings – goulash, dumplings, and a fried cheese sandwich – but the Schnitzelwich was a perfect midday meal, enjoyed in the company of other happy food stand patrons.

Freshly fried schnitzel with memorable sauces puts this sandwich high in both strategy and execution.

Did I mention that Tabor is adorable?

Eating on the street:

See the crispy fried goodness: