Keith's five favorite food trucks at Taste of Cincinnati

The vendors at this year's Taste of Cincinnati include a lot of great restaurants that I already know about. The Tickle Pickle, Deme Kitchen, Fortune Noodle House and Sweets & Meats among them.

So this year I decided to focus on a few vendors I’m not familiar with: Namely, the food trucks. There are quite a few of them located , just past Procter & Gamble on TK. Here you’ll find trucks selling everything from Mexican street tacos to Chicago Italian beef. Did I try all of them? If so, I'd be filing this story from the ER right now. But I did try quite a few of them on Saturday and there were five that really stood out. Read on to learn more.

The winner: Three Sisters Fry Bread from Indigenous Chef

Do yourself a favor and stop by the Indigenous Chef food truck to try their Three Sisters Fry Bread. Owner Kris Best, who is a descendent of the Mohawk people of southeastern Canada and northern New York State, says fry bread is traditional Native American dish named for the three sisters of corn, squash and beans, who cannot live without one another. The fried flatbread is topped with sweet potato hummus, bison, black beans, vegetables, corn salsa and wojapi sauce, a sweet and complex traditional Native American sauce made with blueberries and spices. I also recommend their bison empanadas and their succotash empanadas. 

Runners Up

Greek pimento cheese from Twisted Greek

I didn’t get a chance to try Twisted Greek’s Greek Wrap Supreme, which earned a bronze medal at this year's Best of Taste food truck awards. came in third place in this year’s Best of Taste food truck competition. But I really liked their Greek pimento cheese with pita chips. Made with Kasseri cheese, it had a tangy, perfectly salty taste that seemed to one-up many pimento cheeses I’ve tasted.

The black-and-white cupcake from SugarSnap!

I’m not much of a cupcake guy. But the black-and-white cupcake from Alexandria-based SugarSnap! (a riff on New York’s famous black-and-white cookie) might change my mind. Owner Elizabeth Romero-Lipscomb’s Belgian chocolate cupcake hit all the right notes: Moist, chocolatey, and unforgettable. It’s topped with luxurious vanilla bean buttercream and dotted with rich Belgian chocolate chips. While I only tried the black-and-white, I'm sure all of Romero-Lipscomb's other cupcakes are just as tasty.

The pupusa from El Chevito

Yes, I thought El Chevito, a family owned Salvadoran food truck, was from Cheviot. Close. Its home base is Sayler Park, but the woman working the window on Saturday told me I’m not the only one who thinks that. It doesn’t matter where the truck hails from, their pupusa, stuffed with pork, beans and cheese, had a deep corn flavor that shows they care deeply about what they're doing.

The Crab Bake from Dine-in Hawaiian

Maybe it’s because I’ve been on a Hawaiian kick lately, but I loved this little cup of crab sticks, sushi rice, cream cheese and teriyaki sauce. To me, it tasted like really good sushi in a cup (maybe they're onto something here). No wonder it won a silver medal at this year's Best of Taste awards.

Like I mentioned up top, I only scratched the surface of all the food truck offerings this year. Let me know what your favorites were by emailing me at kpandolfi@enquirer.com