N.Z’s Smokin’ Guns | Food Truck Stops Here

Wow, I have taken quite the break from blogging. The winter is fairly sparse time to find food trucks in Denver. That being said, I am quite impressed with the tenacity of many trucks in keeping active through the winter- I caught up to several but failed to review them.

Strengthens my non-profound belief that the liquor sales laws in Colorado are beneficial to food trucks — all these microbrewery tap rooms that lack kitchens, and a ready army of fine food trucks to show up for dinner and lunch service on weekends. A wonderful symbiosis. I think this is one of the most fun things going on in Colorado (besides all that skiing, hiking, bicycling, dog owning, Subaru-rodding, and ugh that other thing…)

Recently in News

Street Food Phenoms is a new food truck team that’s popped up on Facebook for the new 2014 season. Members include Pink Tank, Steuben’s, Street Eats 5280, Capt’n Crabby, N.Z.’s Smokin’ Guns BBQ, Hey PB&J, Denver Cupcake Truck, and Coaches Scoop. Some of these are old members of the Denver Food Truck Row. Looking forward to seeing what these guys get up to and the events they will come up with. Follow them @ http://www.facebook.com/pages/Street-Food-Phenoms/
Announcement, of which I agree generously, that the Civic Center EATS, every Tuesday and Thursday (with some exceptions) during the summers in Denver’s Civic Center Park, will run longer this year. Look for a massive food truck gathering in the heart of downtown Denver this year from May 20th through October 9th. Awesome.
Speaking of the EATS, it was named one of the Top 10 “Foodie” spots in Denver. A high honor considering all of the fine restaurants here. I tend to agree due to the wide ranging collective menu, owner personalities, and the famous Denver sunshine at the EATS. Story is here: http://www.usatoday.com/story/experience/weekend/denver/2014/03/10/10-best-foodie-spots-denver/5897311/
I will try to post more updates! I promise. Stay tuned.

Garbo’s Grill – Key West, Florida – February 18, 2014

About a month ago, I was fortunately able to escape from that extremely cold week in Denver and get out to Miami, Florida to visit my wife’s sister and my brother-in-law. We snuck down to Key West for a night, and I couldn’t help but notice one of the top Yelp rated spots was a food cart! And I couldn’t resist heading there. Lucky my wife indulges my interests. In chowing food.

Garbo’s Grill is a now famous food cart spot for lunch in Key West. It is highly regarded on Yelp, and there you can find many reviews. So many. http://www.yelp.com/biz/garbos-grill-key-west-2. And look at that star rating. Wow. Walking up to the cart, you can see other people have used their iPhone devices to look it up too (that’s what I did!). Big crowd, but quick service. Only waited about 15 minutes.

Garbo’s Grill food cart located in Key West, FL on Greene Street near the old marina, end of Greene Street

The menu features several options. Burritos and Tacos come in Cayo Fish, Kogi Korean BBQ, and “Yum Yum” Shrimp varieties. The fish and shrimp come in a quesadilla format as well, along with “KP’s” Jerk Chicken and Mango Brie. Garbo’s also offers up hot dogs dressed up with various toppings such as bacon, jalapeno, onions, mango, Caribbean sauce, citrus soy dressing, carrot, srircacha.. well you get the idea. They also have a burger on offer. On pure seafood mode, we went for those options. The quesadilla was sold out early, so we went for the tacos. Caution: this place is busy. Get there before the lunch crowd if you are in that area! We ordered some of the Cayo Fish and Yum Yum Shrimp tacos.

During our short wait, we observed that these mobile food slingers were pulling raw, fresh fish from the cooler sitting out back of their cart and grilling it right there before throwing into the tacos and burritos. I salivated. We got our food, and, well here it is:

Cayo Fish Tacos – Fresh grilled Mahi Mahi, mango, cilantro, onion jalapeno, red cabbage, and house Caribbean sauce

Yum Yum Shrimp Tacos – Shrimp Marinated in Mango, Habanero, and Ginger, topped with house Caribbean sauce

This was some great food. Read the yelp reviews for more “great and awesome” synonyms. But really, we enjoyed this meal. It tasted fresh, nice flavors, a bit of spice from the jalapenos. And a good value for fresh food like this – about $9-10 per tray. There is a little shade just off to the side of the cart and a few seating options which were on high demand. The cart also pipes out some groovy tunes. Hah, groovy tunes (lame writing, sorry).

Garbo’s is usually parked at 603 Greene St, Key West, FL 33040. You can follow them at http://www.facebook.com/GarbosGrill

After eating these delicious street food offerings from Garbo’s Grill, we noticed a place across the street called Peppers of Key West. My wife loves spicy foods, so I indulged her wishes and we crossed the street into what is literally a bar that offers a sampling course, customized to your wishes, of various hot sauces and marinades. What a surprise– we had a lot of fun in this place. I recommend it! The entry fee for the entertainment is you feel obligated to buy a bottle of hot sauce. Not hard to pick one out given the selection. The worst part was our saucetender making fun of my profuse sweating. Ugh.

Peppers of Key West — Greene, St. in Key West across the street from Garbo’s Grill.

602 Greene Street, Key West, FL 33040

http://www.peppersofkeywest.com/

http://www.facebook.com/pages/Peppers-Of-Key-West/

Not done yet! Right down the street at the corner is Kermit’s Key Lime Pie store… Perfect to cool your fiery lips, tongue, maybe prevent a heart attack…after the hot sauce explosion. Key Lime pie slices are just a couple bucks and are a Key West must try if you are there.

Kermit’s Key West Key Lime Shoppe is located just a half block down the street from Garbo’s Grill. If you still feel hungry after chowing fish tacos, this is a nice place to stop for a refreshing dessert.

200 Elizabeth Street, Key West, Florida 33040

http://www.keylimeshop.com/

http://www.facebook.com/KeyLimeShop

Well, that’s about it. Looking forward to an amazing season of getting more fat eating food truck grubs at the EATS every week, and finding these trucks at the can’t miss food truck gatherings and brewery tap room events. At the end, here are just two of my favorite photos from vacation in Florida. Thanks for reading!!

Fairchild Tropical Garden – Coral Gables, FL

A Bird. What kind? I can’t remember. But it was awesome looking.

Located at the Wells Fargo Center, 17th and Sherman, Denver CO on August 6, 2013 around 11:40AM

Decided to forgo the Civic Center Eats crowds today for an easy walk over to the Wells Fargo Center food truck location, at 17th and Sherman. Got an update over Facebook that the N.Z’s Smokin’ Guns truck would be there.

I ordered the Brisket sandwich with the spicy habanero sauce (trying to cut down on eating pork). The price was $8.00 and I also got a bottled water for another $1. After ordering, it was just a few minutes for the sandwich to be ready. The service was friendly and quick. They accept credit cards on a smart phone device.

Here is a look at the menu:

Menu shown at Wells Fargo Center, 17th and Sherman, Denver CO on August 6, 2013 around 11:40AM

The sandwich itself is served on a somewhat unremarkable roll. The roll is, however, nicely toasted and added a good base for the main feature- the brisket. According to N.Z’s website, all of their meats are applewood smoked. The brisket itself was tender, and thick cut. It was not dry, and had a very nice flavor, but not smokey at all. As far as brisket goes, it was comparable to some of the better brisket I’ve had, although I would not claim to be a particularly picky BBQ eater and it seems like there are a lot of good BBQ options around Denver. But this stuff tasted pretty authentic, and made for a decent lunch option.

The portion on the roll was generous and many pieces fell out during the eating process. I picked up these pieces with my fingers and ate them without shame. The meat comes with the sauce already applied, so you do not have an option (without asking, I guess) with respect to how much sauce you get. That being said, the amount of sauce was not overwhelming at all. It was enough to barely coat the meat and add the sauce flavor.

For being described as a “spicy” habanero sauce, it was a little bit disappointing on the heat factor to my likes. I tend to overdo it with the heat. This is entry-level heat from N.Z’s. The sauce was complementary to the meat, which I say is good– It was not the main attraction here, but served to highlight the quality smoking of the beef itself. Next time I try this truck, I will probably get the sweet sauce “Mild Mango” to see how that goes.

This is also just a meat and bread sandwich. There is not an option to add coleslaw to the mix. They do offer tacos that feature lettuce and cheese, which sounds interesting. Many of the folks that were also near the truck were getting the tacos.

In terms of value, I would grade this as an A-. Authentic smoked BBQ is always pricey, but $8 for a sandwich like this downtown is more than a fair deal. (You could go to Subway around the corner and easily spend nearly $8 for a corporate test tube sandwich with 5% of the flavor). The amount of beef on the sandwich justifies the price point. Notably, the pork option is a dollar cheaper.

Final thoughts: This is a truck where if you are wanting plain old authentic and tasty smoked brisket or pulled pork/chicken, it appears you cannot go wrong. However, if you are looking for something more adventuresome or gourmet, this may not be your truck. Personally, I will be going back to this truck as long as it is still roaming Denver.

Beef Brisket Sandwich with Spicy Habanero Sauce — Wells Fargo Center, 17th and Sherman, Denver CO on August 6, 2013 around 11:40AM

http://www.nzsmokinguns.com/

https://www.facebook.com/pages/NZs-Smokin-Guns/

Food Truck Stops Here

Denver Food Trucks & Eats Scarfed Down and Reviewed

Category Archives: N.Z’s Smokin’ Guns

February Trip to Key West & Scattered Denver Food Truck News

N.Z’s Smokin’ Guns – Wells Fargo Center 8/6/2013