For the last several months, downtown Dayton has played host to a food truck rally on the first Friday of each month. We tried to go to the very first one months ago, but the crowds were absolutely insane, and we had a baseball game to get to. We tried again tonight, and found the crowds to be steady, but much more reasonable.
We sampled the fare from two trucks. From Hunger Paynes, I had an order of Reuben Croquettes (which were average) and fresh-made chips (which were far better than average). Then I did something a little different, and had food from a truck that was from a restaurant I’ve eaten at before. I found the fare offered by El Meson‘s truck to be nearly as good as that offered in their brick-and-mortar location. I had a Cuban sandwich and Katie had an empanada, and we were both happy with our meals.
In all, the First Friday food truck rally has been a success, and is giving the downtown area more of the life it needs to continue its renaissance. More people were arriving as we were leaving, and we were impressed with the number of businesses on the east end of downtown that were open, versus what we witnessed last year. If a comeback is in the works for downtown Dayton, it will be on the foundation of fun, innovative events like this.