Eating My Way through the WFC Food Truck Court, Part 1 ft. Taim Mobile

To keep me on track with updating, I’ve decided to start a little series and have appropriately titled it “Eating My Way through the WFC Food Truck Court,” where I document, you guessed it, everything I eat in the new World Financial Center Food Truck Court. For my “inaugural” post, I’ll be highlighting my favorite falafel in the city that is now on wheels, Taim Mobile.

Now to give some background, I currently work in one of the towers of the behemoth office complex (and soon-to-be shopping mall) that is World Financial Center (WFC). Despite the tens of thousands of employees in this office complex, the food options prior to February 2012 were seriously lacking. There’s really only so many days I can eat the same Au Bon Pain soups and Cosi sandwiches, and I’m just not a big fan of spending $8-10 a day on a Devon and Blakely salad that will get me hungry in an hour – I don’t care how good they are or how much they chop the lettuce for ease of eating. What made it worse was renovations in the complex that eliminated even more places to try to get a decent lunch.

As such, when the news broke that a bunch of food trucks would be coming to fill the culinary void that is WFC, I kind of freaked and definitely made myself look like a complete fatass on Twitter. But it was for good reason – some of my favorite food trucks were finally going to be right outside the office instead of teasing me in their usual “Financial District spots” which are sadly so so far from WFC (I’m looking at you, Front St./Hanover Square/Governeur Lane). In any case, one of those favorites and the highlight of this post is Taïm Mobile.

NYC residents may be familiar with Taïm, and if not, you should be. After all, the original West Village brick-and-mortar outpost was only named the best falafel in the city and has incredible Yelp reviews. It’s also just incredibly tasty, with crispy-on-the-outside, soft-on-the-inside, jam-packed-with-flavor falafel balls stuffed into fresh pita with all the accouterments from the light Israeli and cabbage salads to spicy s’rug, mango Amba, and pickles if you ask for your sandwich with “everything”. Luckily for all of us who are too far/too lazy to trek it all the way to the west side, Taim’s mobile offerings maintain the same level of quality and taste (they are also expanding to a flagship shop in NoLita – East-siders rejoice!).

In any case, I was so excited that Taim Mobile would be part of the WFC Food Truck Court’s opening day, tweeting about them almost annoyingly. One of my favorite things to get from their menu is the falafel platter, which comes with a generous helping of creamy hummus, two sides of their delicious cranberry quinoa salad and Israeli salad, plus six falafel balls and an olive-oil/za’atar brushed pita. Naturally, I ordered the falafel platter from the truck, but after all that anticipation, this happened:

Really sad about my lunch. You left the falafel out of my falafel platter, @TaimMobile. Any chance I can get an IOU? twitter.com/jenbalisi/stat…

— Jen Balisi (@jenbalisi) February 6, 2012

What ended up being a hummus platter was definitely still tatsy and filling, but this was so typical to have happened to me after having hyped it up so much. However, it was also a great lesson in 2 things: 1) never set your expectations too high and 2) Twitter is the best way to solve these kinds of issues in real-time AND for brands/stores to show great customer service! My sad tweet to them got a quick response, and I returned to the truck the next week to retrieve my previously missing falafel balls. And it was delicious:

So do yourself a favor and get your falafel fix from Taïm. Go for the sandwich for a filling lunch, and if you’re a fan of pickles or mango-flavored things, get it with everything (which means pickles, s’rug, and amba sauce). Really hungry? Get the falafel platter. Not feeling the fried stuff? Go the healthier route and get the Mediterannean platter, hummus and/or salads. And get a smoothie with everything. They are delicious and have unique combos, like strawberry/raspberry/thai basil. Just make sure you check that your entire order is in there, or do what I did and just make it an excuse to go back for more.

Check when Taïm Mobile is at the WFC Food Truck Court here, or follow them on Twitter for all of their whereabouts.