Taiwanese pork chops and fried chicken (便當 Bian Dang Truck)

I bet you thought that I'd lost interest in writing about Chinese food that comes from trucks since I haven't done it in forever. HA were you wrong! My favorite kinds of food are Asian foods, and the best foods always come from trucks. Fact. Luckily for me, the 便當 Bian Dang Truck combines both of those things. Their niche? They make "traditional" Taiwanese bento boxes from which you can choose either pork chop, fried chicken, fishcake, or several other appetizers my forefathers often delighted in like 粽子 (zong zi). Basically they have several things going for them... the nostalgia factor, the fact that they make food from the Orient, and the fact that they do it all from the back of a flamboyantly colored truck (the greatest kind of coloring). Basically this is a truck that fries pigs and chickens and puts it over rice. In theory, this truck is packing so much win. When I caught wind that they were selling their pork chop and fried chicken dishes for $5 one week, I felt obligated to at least try it.



The menu! Again, The main things are the fried chicken leg and the pork chop over rice. They have 甜不辣 (tian bu la) too, but after trying it at Food Gallery 32... let me safely say that it tastes like crap. Do you know why people don't eat erasers? Because they don't taste good. That is basically what you're eating, an eraser that is brushed with oil and reheated in a microwave. If that sounds good to you, more power to ya! Get the fishcake. Otherwise, steer clear. The rest of the menu is pretty conservative in terms of Taiwanese fare. Sorry, I'll never be able to tell you how the 滷肉飯 (minced pork over rice) is solely based on principle. A dish that costs 60 cents in Taiwan should not cost $4. I don't care if it's NYC, that just doesn't gel with me.



Ah yes, the special of the week and the star of the menu. The pork chop over rice. There's not much to complain about in the base of this delicious construction. The rice is cooked properly, and when combined with the pork sauce/pickled veggie mix... well, it's awesome. There's not much to say about that. The pork chop is no slouch either, not the deep-fried kind you'll find at Hua Ji, 便當 Bian Dang Truck's version is tender, juicy, and slathered with a subtle yet noticeably sweet thick soy sauce marinade. Cooked long enough for the meat to separate easily from the bone, but short enough to maintain structural integrity, these guys know how to cook their pigs. At $5, I liked it enough to change my clothes, go back, and circumvent their whole "ONE DEAL PER CUSTOMER" nonsense. Yep, the stupid things I do for food.



Everyone knows that meals that consist of multiple types of meats are the best kinds of meals. Turducken, bacon chicken narwhals, McDonald's McNuggets (god knows what goes into those...). The Bian Dang Truck also serves something not listed on their menu known as "Porken." You're probably wondering... "what is this shit, and why isn't on the menu?" Well, it's basically a combination of their two most popular dishes, the fried chicken and the pork chop. Starting with a pillow-y soft bed of white rice, you drizzle on a heap of pork sauce and pickled vegetables, then you get half-a-piece of the fried chicken and half-a-piece of the pork chop... all for $8 (note: this deal used to be so much better when they'd give you the whole pork chop/chicken). Admittedly, it's not that great. The pork chop is definitely good (as it should be), and I've never met a bowl of rice w/pork sauce I didn't like, but the fried chicken was just... meh. It was crispy, but it was also flavorless and sort of dry. Add in the fact that the portion size to cost ratio isn't even close to that of other places in Chinatown, and I was a little bit let down. It's like eating an Entenmann's donut for the price of Doughnut Plant. I enjoyed eating it, I just wished I paid less for it.

Anyway... I'm not sure how to feel about the 便當 Bian Dang Truck. I think it's pimp that Taiwanese food is getting well deserved attention in NYC, and for sure they make a rockin' pork chop, but I really can't agree with the pricing structure (at regular price). I can understand that things in Manhattan naturally cost more, but man... I'd go back all the time if they toned back their prices just a bit. Also, they need to fix their fishcake. That shit is wack.
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Taiwanese people and bento

I wanted to write this post about a specific bento place that I went to, but realized how stupid the concept was. There's a billion of these places littering the streets of Taipei, so what's the point in writing about a generic no-name place that serves with the same menu as a lot of other places (I'll probably post about a bento box place in the future, so I'm going to make a disclaimer that I fully understand my hypocritical nature)? Anyway, a couple of days before leaving Taiwan, I was wandering around Taipei Main Station and was super hungry. Having spent most of my money on... well, probably something stupid, I just wanted a cheap lunch that wasn't from 7-11. When I saw this giant yellow sign that screamed 50 NT ($1.50) for bento specializing in roast meats. Cheap street meat... basically Taiwanese chicken and rice.



Sorry for the glare on the picture, I just wanted to show how pimp the artwork on their bento boxes are. Not that there's anything wrong with a silver aluminum bowl with a white cardboard top, but that artwork just screams 'classy.' No, seriously though, while it's nothing important, I've noticed that a lot of bento place in Taipei customize their boxes with their own artwork, to the point that I don't actually think they're using templates anymore. Pretty creative if you ask me...



I had a hankering for roast duck. For 50 NT, you get quite a bit of food... a serving of rice covered in 魯汁 (basically soy sauce used for marinating and roasting the meats), a portion of sliced roast meat, and 3 sides (randomly picked on the day as corn, bean sprouts, and vermicelli stir fried with tofu). The meat was clearly glistening of fat, major plus. It was tender, and fell apart upon being prodded with chopsticks. The sauce... was good, thick enough to coat the skin, and just sweet enough to take the edge of the oily skin. The sides were... uh, I don't remember, they're side dishes. All in all, pretty average in the grand spectrum of bento places. Seeing as this is a cookie cutter example of this kind of food in Taiwan, all I have to say is that, NYC would be a better place with fewer Halal carts and more bento places. A boy can dream right?
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