Chinatown Outposts: Food Truck Edition

Food trucks have saved my life. They’re cheap and fast—especially if you eat during non-standard hours, which I often do—and the good ones dish out fresh and tasty food to boot.

There are no less than ten trucks around Penn that serve Chinese food or something like it. Mao Pao, P.I.—the abbreviation for Principle Investigator, also know as my boss—recommended Kings Wok and Yue Kee, as did my partner in lunchtime crime, Bento Box Girl.

As a general rule, the food truck you want to go to is the truck with the longest line. This rule holds true for King’s Wok, a nondescript truck parked at the northeast corner of 33th and Spruce. Located adjacent to the hospital, most of the truck-goers order in Chinese. Having now been there a dozen or more times, I’ve come to the conclusion that if you order “Hot Spicy Bean Curd” it’s not nearly as spicy as if you order “Mao Pao Tofu.” Just sayin’. Either way, it’s only $3.75. Please take note, vegetarians, that this dish does contain chicken; the chewy texture adds interest since the tofu is soft, not deep-fried. Sweet green bell pepper compliments the heat of the aromatic sauce of garlic, ginger, cooking wine and soy sauce. It’s a lesson in xian-wei—translated, literally, as “”fresh taste”—which is better know, in Japanese, as umami, the flavor referred to as savoriness. In short, it’s tasty as hell. The vegetable/chicken/beef/shrimp chow fun ($4-4.50) is some of the best I’ve had. The broad rice noodles are chewy, not too greasy, and the sauce is interesting but not overwhelming.

Yue Kee is one weathered old truck located on 38th Street between Walnut and Locust . It’s power generator sounds like a lawn mower and the woman who takes your order is the Soup Nazi of lunch trucks but gluttony is worth the punishment, right? Per the advice of Mao Pao, P.I., I tried the Crispy Spare Rib Tips. They were both sweet and spicy while, as promised, nice and crispy. The scallion chicken is next on my list.

I really wanted to like The Real Le Ahn. It’s located across the street from Le Ahn’s, giving the impression that there’s some real animosity and chutzpah going on. (In truth, the owner of The Real Le Ahn gifted her sister with Le Ahn’s, but I prefer my fictional version of the sibling politics at work and like to imagine that the name is supposed to be as snarky as it sounds.) The Real Le Ahn is good—that is, if you like the same gelatinous, soy sauce concoction dumped on everything from lo mein to kung pao.

None of these trucks give out fortune cookies but, if they ever do, I think they should all read “Your wait in line will be shorter next time.”


Kings Wok
NE corner of 33rd and Spruce Streets
M-Sa 11:30am-7pm

Yue Kee
38th Street between Walnut and Locust
11am-9pm