A Typical Day on the Kogi BBQ Taco Truck
Editor's note: We've been fascinated with the cult following that the Kogi BBQ Taco Truck has built up in L.A., so after today's Q&A with the truck itself, we asked Kogi team member Alice Shin for an inside look at a typical day on the truck. Ride along with her and Mark Manguera, below.
Photographs by Eric Shin from Flickr
Los Angeles-based taco truck Kogi BBQ started roaming the streets last Thanksgiving with the intention of spreading Korean-inspired tacos, burritos, drinks, and more to the hungry late night masses. Unexpectedly, the taco truck quickly garnered lines of hundreds willing to wait up to two hours (the average wait being 45 minutes) for Korean-Mexican dishes—such as tacos filled with spicy pork, spicy barbecue chicken, or Korean short ribs—created by chef Roy Choi. It may seem crazy to wait that long for a taco, but then this isn't your typical taco truck.
Take a peek into the daily routine of a full-time Kogi staff member, like founder Mark Manguera, to get an idea of what it takes to run the Kogi truck. It's a 9-to-5 job, but not in the way you'd expect.
9 a.m.
Rise and shine.
9:15 a.m.
Check emails and calendar for events and meetings.
10 a.m.
Follow up phone calls and emails.
11:30 a.m.
Organize the next business day.
12 p.m.
Meet up with the team.
12:30 p.m.
Head off to the markets to shop for veggies and all those limes while someone else goes to massage the meats with marinade.
3 p.m.
Arrive at the lot and organize the truck.
3:15 p.m.
Start prep—chop onions, blend sauces, grill meats.
3:30 p.m.
Check voice mails and emails and follow up calls.
4 p.m.
Reorganize the next business day.
5:30 p.m.
Truck leaves the lot.
6 p.m. to 2:30 a.m.
Lots of twittering, grilling, order taking, and general Kogi madness.
3:30 a.m.
Clean out truck, wash it down and leave for home.
4 a.m.
Come home to check emails and voicemails.
5 a.m.
Beautiful sleep....
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10 Comments:
This is great! MORE KOGI!!!!!!
Nebagakid at 10:39PM on 02/11/09
only four hours of sleep?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?!?! There goes my fantasy of running a truck of my own. That's crazy.
simon at 12:19PM on 02/12/09
This is awesome, I loved getting a behind-the scenes look. I've been really curious about these guys ever since I heard about them on the radio--Good Food I think was the program.
cakespy at 12:52PM on 02/12/09
Awesome!
Christina at 4:06PM on 02/12/09
I'm sure must be mindboggingly awesome, because if it's not... waiting outside in a line for food for two hours borders on insane! (oh yeah, I want some!)
kaares at 5:23AM on 02/15/09
I'm going to track down that truck and eat a bunch of what they got . What part of L.A. do they serve ?
shipwreck at 4:10PM on 02/16/09
I've gotta try it!
ddvierra68 at 6:45PM on 02/16/09
@shipwreck: Alice says this:
They can check out our weekly schedule to the right on our site. Our regular stops are at the Doheny and Golden Gopher in Downtown LA, in front of the Japanese American National Museum in Little Tokyo, the 4100 Bar in Silverlake and The Brig (bar) in Venice Beach on Abbot Kinney and Palm.
Since we're nomadic, it's good to check in every now and then to see if we change up our spots and arrival times. Also, we're almost always 30-40 minutes late to every location due to traffic or unforeseen crises and circumstances.
We're also open from Tuesday-Saturday, sometimes Mondays, but THERE'S NO USE TWITTERING ON SUNDAYS BECAUSE THAT'S OUR ONLY DAY OFF. (and yet people still twitter: "where are you???") Not yelling, just flabbergasted why people don't check the schedule on the website and see that we don't work on Sundays... or expect to tweet us and have us truck on over: "I'm in San Diego - the cross streets are ____ and ____ -- kthnx!"
roboppy at 11:51PM on 02/16/09
roboppy , thanks for the heads-up you're great ! we're just figuring out how soon we can get up there
shipwreck at 3:04PM on 02/19/09
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efader at 5:11AM on 09/22/09