In recent years, food trucks have enjoyed an enormous popular resurgence. No longer just suppliers of convenient, come-to-you meals for industrious factory and office workers, food trucks have evolved into serious avenues of culinary fusion and exploration. Vietnamese food is among one of many cuisines gaining greater on-the-street exposure thanks to food trucks.
At the helm of one these Vietnamese food mobiles, the Nom Nom Truck, is a team of entrepreneurial-minded twenty-something year olds with a taste for fast and delectable dining. Servicing the Los Angeles area, the Nom Nom Truck is primarily known for bringing banh mi curbside, though they also serve Vietnamese-inspired tacos. Its founders are Jennifer Green (half-Vietnamese) and Misa Chien (not Vietnamese, but that’s okay). The pair graduated from UCLA and both wanted to share their love of banh mi to an expanded community of food lovers.
Of course, while Nom Nom Truck’s welcomed emergence into the gourmet food truck has been in part facilitated by their youthful re-branding of Vietnamese cuisine, let’s not forget that there are still many veteran hands pushing for a greater visibility of fast Vietnamese cuisine. Lee’s Sandwiches, arguably one of the most recognized banh mi franchises in America, started out as a family food truck business in the 1980s before becoming the banh mi juggernaut it is today.
There’s also the punnily named Phamish truck (it works on so many levels!), founded by Lisa “Mama Love” Le and her sons, which also serves the LA area. Phamish isn’t quite as established as Lee’s Sandwiches (it only began operations in 2009, while Lee’s Sandwiches has been around for much longer), and it’s not yet arrived at the popularity of Nom Nom Truck, but it too is gaining a loyal fan base. Phamish also offers goi cuon, pho, and bun, in addition to banh mi, on its menu.
Nom Nom Truck, Lee’s Sandwiches, and Phamish are all California-based. Do you know other Vietnamese food mobiles you think deserve recognition in America or across the globe?
Yummy! Goi cuon, pho, bun, banh mi . . . I’m so jealous of all the Vietnamese food mobiles in Cali. We don’t have them here. I can only envision how good it would be to have banh mi during lunch break. I’m trying to imagine eating banh mi thit nguoi right now, but it tastes like peanut butter and jelly.