Portland is a town where food carts and trucks abound. They’re just about everywhere, and there are special areas designated for them. In the southeast, there are a plethora of these “pods”. So what did I do while I was there? I went on a food cart crawl with B! First, we stopped at D-Street Noshery. Yeah, these pods even have names! And I got me an Awesome Cone. What’s Awesome Cone? They take a waffle cone and put food in it. It’s as simple as that.
A few of the options of the night were already sold out, so I had to go with the chicken and dumplings awesome cone. And yes folks, this is exactly what it is. It’s a bigass waffle cone filled with a heaping helping of homemade chicken and dumplings. It was delicious! The waffle cone itself is sweet, which is a slightly bizarro contrast to the savory filling, but I liked it. It’s actually like having your dessert included with your entree. After you’re done heaping out the chicken and dumplings, you eat your waffle as dessert. They make the waffle cone to order, which takes a surprisingly long time, so these aren’t exactly fast food. I wonder how long of a wait there is when there’s an actual line of people. I don’t want to know!
We also stopped at this adorable mac & cheese cart. Everything is made is small batches, so sometimes, you have to wait, like we did. But that’s ok.
Mmm… my mac & cheese with fresh tomato topping. Creamy and delicious!
There was also an arepa truck where B got a veggie one. It smelled and tasted amazing!
There is also Oregon Soup Works, which is the soup version of Oregon Ice Works. They make 2 fresh soups a night. They were also decked out with all kinds of philly sports decals, so represent!
Pie! Where do all these cute little carts / trucks / trailers come from?
The best thing about these pods is that they actually provide seating! And it’s somewhat covered! You could even get a draft beer from this little truck. It is Oregon, after all!
Next stop – SE 43rd and Belmont. This was another pod with many more occupants. Lucille’s Balls. Hee! They make meatballs! Sadly, I think they just closed.
Euro Trash, definitely the most technicolored truck of the bunch. They serve a wide variety of food with some random european influences.
You gotta have a hot dog cart!
Lardo wins for having the cutest little food cart known to man. And for making everything with lard.
Their delicious and hot lardo fries, sprinkled with cheese and rosemary and salt. It’s served with a little curry ketchup. Yay! I was already stuffed at this point, with the giant cone full of chicken and dumplings and all that mac & cheese, but lard was calling!Last up, we went to Cartopia, at SE 12th and Hawthorne. There are only about a handful of big trucks here, but we mainly stopped by to go to Whiffies Fried Pies so B could get a couple of mini sweet pies, to go. They have savory and sweet pies and they’re mini individual pies. Alas, my weak and tiny stomach could not partake of any more food. Until next time!

Due to my giant flight delay, I only had one chance to actually eat in Albany. So on my second night there, I headed downtown to DP. This is actually in the Hampton Inn. That might make you think twice about eating here, but please, do not let that stop you. This place is good in my book. I dined at the bar and it happened to be happy hour. This is an impressive bar. The bartenders here definitely know their stuff. And it looks like they’ve won a bunch of local awards, which is quite deserved.
I had this cucumber martini which totally kicked my lame ass. It was super duper strong and whew, did this thing pack a punch. But it seemed healthy to me because I could taste cucumbers. That’s healthy, right?
Instead of bread and butter, DP does it right. They serve sourdough pretzel ball rolls with homemade whole grain mustard. First off, how cute are these things? And second off, they’re freakin delicious and warm! Please, someone tell me how to make these!
I got the soup of the day which was a potato and leek soup. This is one of my favorite flavors of soup, ever, and they definitely do it right here. It also had bacon in it. How can you go wrong with that?
The lobster ravioli. These kind of look a mess, but they tasted just fine. I actually found it cool that it was black pasta.
These were the pork dumplings, served in a chinese to-go box. Meh, on that presentation choice. There were two dipping sauces, the first brown one was just kind of gross, and the second one was a sweet chili sauce type which I greatly preferred. The dumplings themselves were just meh too.
The banana bread bread pudding! Yes folks, bread pudding made from banana bread. It was super good. If you like banana, I highly recommend it! The two bartenders that waited on me were awesome. They were friendly and helpful and gave me recommendations and were quite attentive. They also kept calling me young lady, which was hilarious. If I’m ever back, I’m going to jump in and try some entrees!

After a rough day with another rough day coming up, we just wanted to grab some quick and casual eats. Oceana is a very laid-back and casual seafood joint right off of Bourbon St. We got a table in the courtyard, which was a nice touch.
Yeah, we may have drank a lot. But then again, what else do people do in New Orleans, if not drinking and eating? I forget what the drink was on the right, but it was rather gross.
A pile of random fried stuff, including hush puppies, catfish, fries, and who knows what else.
These are S’s crabcakes. She said they were good, but good golly miss molly, they look gross. I don’t really care that much about presentation, but this just looks terrible.
I got the Cajun Jambalaya Pasta. Well, this looks like disgusting slop too, but it tasted just fine. It comes with shrimp and alligator sausage, onions, bell peppers, a Creole sauce, all simmered in fresh fettuccini noodles. I like slop like this. And I was just excited that it wasn’t fried.