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         xmlns:georss="http://www.georss.org/georss"><docs>This is a RSS file. Copy the URL into your aggregator of choice. If you don't know what this means and want to learn more, please see: <span>http://platial.typepad.com/news/2006/04/really_simple_t.html</span> for more info.</docs>
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<link>http://www.platial.comhttp://www.platial.com/map/Oakland-Taco-Truck-Crawl/1882</link>
<title>Oakland Taco Truck Crawl</title>
<description>From this article in the San Francisco Chronicle:

http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/chronicle/archive/2006/01/25/FDGOSGQ21G1.DTL

Others are on the map, too.</description>
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<item rdf:about="http://www.platial.com/post/36871">
<link>http://www.platial.com/post/36871</link>
<title>Tijuana taco truck</title>
<description>
        <![CDATA[
        1308 International Blvd.
Oakland
From the Chronicle article: "For one thing, the area sprawls, and some places -- like Tijuana, the bustling seafood place with its trademark bowls of radishes on every table -- lie outside the core."

"At Tijuana, up in the more Vietnamese stretch of International at 13th Avenue, seafood has been the thing for 40 years. Waitresses in tight, short skirts and ponytails deliver big bowls of caldo de mariscos "7 mares" to tables set with bowls of radishes, house-fried chips and two good salsas -- either roasted red chiles, or fresh -- and Tapatio and three other bottles of hot sauce. This is a popular dish, although the fish sometimes has a frozen taste.

"The mariscada Tijuana guisado de mariscos is the star of the show, a 14-inch share-with-a-group platter with green-lipped mussels, fresh crab, sweet scallop, octopus and shrimp, all tossed in a garlicky brown sauce that benefits from lime, salsas or hot sauces on each table. "<br /><br /><a href="http://www.platial.com/post/36871">Map this on Platial</a><br /> 
        ]]>
        </description>
<georss:point> </georss:point>
<dc:creator></dc:creator>
<dc:date>2006-02-25 08:55:30.348104+00:00</dc:date>
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<item rdf:about="http://www.platial.com/post/36872">
<link>http://www.platial.com/post/36872</link>
<title>World Cup Coffee (aka "Tamale Queen)</title>
<description>
        <![CDATA[
        World Cup Coffee 510-436-7455
San Francisco Chronicle article about The Tamale Queen:
http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/chronicle/archive/2006/01/25/FDG6AGQM251.DTL
"[S]he makes good on the title. Her masa delivers fresh corn taste with no bitter edge. And her fillings -- green chiles and cheese, spicy pork, chicken, shrimp -- need no extra sauce to punch up the flavor."

From the article about taco trucks: "Typical of the go-getters of International Boulevard, Maria Martinez opened World Cup Coffee two years ago (see story, Page F5).

Espresso drinks were slow to take off, so Martinez started selling her plump, well-spiced tamales at $2 apiece, filled with lots of charred green chiles, or chicken with black beans and red chiles. Tamales now make up most of her business, and the sign outside her Fruitvale Avenue cafe, a block off International just across from the Ojo de Agua taco truck, reads 'tamale queen' in huge letters."<br /><br /><a href="http://www.platial.com/post/36872">Map this on Platial</a><br /> 
        ]]>
        </description>
<georss:point> </georss:point>
<dc:creator></dc:creator>
<dc:date>2006-02-25 08:59:11.555348+00:00</dc:date>
</item>
<item rdf:about="http://www.platial.com/post/36874">
<link>http://www.platial.com/post/36874</link>
<title>LA Torta LOCA No 1</title>
<description>
        <![CDATA[
        LA Torta LOCA No 1 510-532-7105
From SF Chronicle article: "It's the chorizo-stuffed pambazo (big grilled sandwich) and huitlacoche huaraches (super-thick oval tortillas) from Mexico City, dispensed all day long from the busy window of La Torta Loca. "

"Some of International Boulevard's best food is fast and portable -- 'comida rapida' -- starting at the busy La Torta Loca window, just south of the new Fruitvale Village development around the BART station. A steady stream of people -- laborers on cell phones, kids, shoppers, couples on a date -- swing by all day for Valentino Torres' Mexico City-style food.

"That means fat, grilled, meat-stuffed tortas and their bigger cousins, pambazos, made from a softer bread that's filled, slathered in chile sauce and grilled to a crisp.

"The torta Milanese, stuffed with a breaded pork cutlet, is the most popular item here. But aficionados head for the pambazo filled with La Torta Loca's famous chorizo, with potatoes, red sauce, crema, the whole pinata. It's enough for a family of three.

"La Torta Loca also specializes in masa boats of various shapes -- huaraches and sopes topped with whatever you choose, including the black fungus called huitlacoche and fried squash blossoms."<br /><br /><a href="http://www.platial.com/post/36874">Map this on Platial</a><br /> 
        ]]>
        </description>
<georss:point> </georss:point>
<dc:creator></dc:creator>
<dc:date>2006-02-25 09:02:56.24221+00:00</dc:date>
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<item rdf:about="http://www.platial.com/post/36878">
<link>http://www.platial.com/post/36878</link>
<title>El Huarache Azteca</title>
<description>
        <![CDATA[
        El Huarache Azteca 510-533-2395
3842 International Blvd. (between 38th and 39th avenues); (510) 533-2395. Open 8 a.m.-9 p.m. Sunday-Thursday, until 10 p.m. Friday-Saturday.
From the SF Chronicle: "Otaez's original site, a few storefronts north, now houses the Chavez family's popular El Huarache Azteca, known for its weekend barbacoa de borrego (lamb) and its thick masa sopas and huaraches. The two storefronts, with their colorful paint jobs, make this a neighborhood focal point."

"Up the street at El Huarache Azteca, Saturday and Sunday are the days to order the platillo de barbacoa ($12) at El Huarache. Be sure to take meat-eating friends, because you get a huge pile of shredded, slow-cooked lamb to pile on tortillas with rice, beans, nopales, cilantro and salsa."<br /><br /><a href="http://www.platial.com/post/36878">Map this on Platial</a><br /> 
        ]]>
        </description>
<georss:point> </georss:point>
<dc:creator></dc:creator>
<dc:date>2006-02-25 09:08:24.411628+00:00</dc:date>
</item>
<item rdf:about="http://www.platial.com/post/36879">
<link>http://www.platial.com/post/36879</link>
<title>Otaez Mexicatessen</title>
<description>
        <![CDATA[
        Otaez Mexicatessen 
3872 International Blvd. (at 39th Avenue); (510) 536-0909. Open 6 a.m.-10 p.m. daily.

From the SF Chronicle: "Waiting for a weekend table at Otaez, out on Oakland's International Boulevard, can be exquisite torture. Steaming bowls of caldo de pollo rush by, trailing a heady chicken-chipotle cloud. It's a sheer act of will not to follow along and make quick friends with the people who ordered it."

"Every seat is full for lunch on a typical Saturday or Sunday at Otaez, one of the oldest and best-known Mexican restaurants on International Boulevard in Oakland's Fruitvale neighborhood. It's down-home Mexican cooking, saucy and good."<br /><br /><a href="http://www.platial.com/post/36879">Map this on Platial</a><br /> 
        ]]>
        </description>
<georss:point> </georss:point>
<dc:creator></dc:creator>
<dc:date>2006-02-25 09:09:48.637345+00:00</dc:date>
</item>
<item rdf:about="http://www.platial.com/post/36880">
<link>http://www.platial.com/post/36880</link>
<title>El Centenario</title>
<description>
        <![CDATA[
        El Centenario 510-261-8696

From the San Francisco Chronicle: At 48th Avenue, this small divey place may feel a few long blocks too far from Fruitvale's bright lights, so a sunny lunch may be a good way to start. (And you'd have the added bonus of being able to check out the matching ostrich or eel boots and belts at Botas Durango next door, or the arts and crafts on display at Josefina Lopez's cultural center and shop in the same block.)

Ana Rosa Leon, who comes from Jalisco, opened La Cenaduria almost four years ago after running two restaurants in her hometown, Autlan, and then cooking at Fruitvale's El Taco Zamorano for eight years.

The menu is as long as the place is small, so check the specials on the white board and seek advice before ordering. If you talk to Leon, she'll steer you right to her whole grilled snapper (filete de pescado), served with either a powerful garlic sauce or El Diablo, a deep-flavored red chile sauce. Both are fantastic, and you can wash them down with a glass of Spanish Muga rose.

Pozole, birria, carnitas -- these are common dishes, but Leon's aren't cookie-cutter versions. The best example of her regional approach is her pollo mole pipian with nopales, a well-spiced stew of chicken in a thick green sauce rich with pumpkin seeds, chiles, garlic and cumin.

Like most places in the area, she makes her own thick tortillas daily with fresh masa from La Finca.

Everything comes with radishes. Why radishes? "I don't know -- it's traditional," Leon says. <br /><br /><a href="http://www.platial.com/post/36880">Map this on Platial</a><br /> 
        ]]>
        </description>
<georss:point> </georss:point>
<dc:creator></dc:creator>
<dc:date>2006-02-25 09:30:34.042193+00:00</dc:date>
</item>
<item rdf:about="http://www.platial.com/post/36881">
<link>http://www.platial.com/post/36881</link>
<title>El Taco Zamorano Catering Truck</title>
<description>
        <![CDATA[
        El Taco Zamorano Catering Truck 510-532-9121<br /><br /><a href="http://www.platial.com/post/36881">Map this on Platial</a><br /> 
        ]]>
        </description>
<georss:point> </georss:point>
<dc:creator></dc:creator>
<dc:date>2006-02-25 09:35:12.687211+00:00</dc:date>
</item>
<item rdf:about="http://www.platial.com/post/36877">
<link>http://www.platial.com/post/36877</link>
<title>Mariscos La Costa taco truck</title>
<description>
        <![CDATA[
        From the SF Chronicle: " This isn't a truck, more a big mobile home on a foundation, with its own parking lot, palm trees and a pristine covered patio -- but you still order at the window. It's popular, especially for camarones and other seafood items."<br /><br /><a href="http://www.platial.com/post/36877">Map this on Platial</a><br /> 
        ]]>
        </description>
<georss:point> </georss:point>
<dc:creator></dc:creator>
<dc:date>2006-02-25 09:06:29.96834+00:00</dc:date>
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