The concept of freshly-fried frites with a range of great dipping sauce is an elusive concept in the Southland. The beloved Benita's Frites couldn't survive, though people lined up for the product. Lately, Belgian-style fries made with care have started to come from food trucks; when Fresh Fries showed up at the Patchwork festival in Long Beach, I stopped by.
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Their fries are better than Frysmith's, and the toppings don't make the
fries go cold and unappealing as quickly as Frysmith's. The curly fries
with artichoke mayonnaise were crisp, hot and slightly grassy from the
vegetable matter in the dip. While I'm not usually a fan of sweet potato
fries, Fresh Fries' sweet potato fries with hummus really surprised me.
I'll have to remember hummus as a dipping sauce for sweet potato fries.
While I really enjoyed the food, I see two problems with the truck. The
first is that the portions are absolutely enormous. They're a good
value–$4-$5 for a large cone or basket of fries with a dipping sauce or
topping–but I couldn't finish the food I bought, even sharing it with
two other people.
The other problem is figuring out where Fresh Fries would fit into my
eating patterns. They're never around when I've got the late-afternoon
snack attack, and I've never seen them show up at the breweries' tasting
rooms (beer and fries, guys–get on that, please).
When I do see them, they're usually part of a mobile food court, and I'm
frankly not patient enough to wait on two lines, then have to keep an
ear out for two different voices calling my name.
The fries were quite good; I just don't see myself eating there very often. I'd make a bad Belgian.
Find the Fresh Fries truck on Twitter at @FreshFriesLA or at their website, freshfries.biz.
