Welcome back to Good Taste, a tipsheet on eating well in the Bay Area. This week, we analyzed the menus of almost 100 creators bringing drinks and snacks to Outside Lands’ Taste of the Bay Area (Aug. 8-10 in Golden Gate Park) to make some obsessively specific recommendations. Bookmark this if you’re a local or visiting attendee.
The food at Outside Lands is as consistently compelling as the music lineup, and doubles as a kind of survey of the local food scene. Taste of the Bay Area, as the culinary portion is called, annually offers the best food options at any music or food festival that I’ve been to in California. Curator Tanya Kollar, who shared her monthslong process with Good Taste in a 2023 interview, ensures that there’s a diverse mix of new and returning restaurants, pop-ups, food trucks, and other mobile vendors. Among those are numerous vegetarian, vegan, and gluten-free dishes.
I’ve covered the food on the field every year that the festival has happened since 2009 (its second year), so I’ve got some time-honored strategies to help you get the most out of the experience as well as specific picks to try.
Early bird gets the snack
Despite the number of offerings, it’s not a bad idea to eat at the places that personally appeal early in the day or while big acts are performing. Lines tend to get long in between sets, especially in the evening, but the music is generally audible from the food booths. If you hear about a limited edition special, assume that it’s going to sell out well before it gets dark.
Stick it
Food on a stick is an ideal option when stopping for too long to eat might get in the way of your music schedule. Enticing sticks this year include Haight Street restaurant Sandy’s hush puppy corndogs with corn and jalapeño red remoulade sauce, Sunset spot Stix’s Korean cheese or Fruity Pebble Korean corndogs, and Lulu Palestinian restaurant of Berkeley’s knafeh on a stick for dessert.
Wrap it up
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Oakland’s Jordanian restaurant Shawarmaji will be back with their chicken and falafel wraps, which pack a ton of flavor into a long and svelte package. It’s a good one to share. And Lebanese pop-up Ilna, a new vendor this year, is coming with an intriguing sounding kafta burger crunch wrap situation.
Send noods
My plan is to satisfy my inevitable craving for noods with Filipino pancit noodle dishes: Oakland’s FOB Kitchen for Chef Janice Dulce’s veggie pancit and SF/Oakland restaurant group Brenda’s French Soul Food for garlic crawfish pancit. Brenda’s is actually a first time vendor this year, though owner Brenda Buenviaje did spend several years on stage with bounce icons Big Freedia and Katey Red and whimsically tossing free beignets into the crowd and shaking powdered sugar on dancers’ asses. They’re both festival OGs for real.
If feeling flush by then, the typically high-ticket Dungeness crab surf & turf garlic noodles from Oakland’s Chef Smelly would also really hit the spot. Be forewarned that this particular line is significant later in the day.
Burger time
The Taste of the Bay Area lineup has plenty of burgers, including some with international flavors. Mission Street Burgers will be the go-to for a classic cheeseburger as well as a housemade beet and quinoa burger. Saluhall newcomer Smish Smash will serve signature smashburgers as well as the renowned special dac biet smashburgers, which counts white American cheese, jalapeño, Thai basil and pho aioli among its ingredients. Oakland’s Wahpepah’s Kitchen is also bringing back their bison burgers with blackberry aioli.
Crucial tacos
Another perfect portable food, there are some reliable tacos to try at Outside Lands. A personal favorite is El Garage, the former Richmond garage and then restaurant that’s now popping up regularly at Berkeley Bowl. El Garage unquestionably made birria de res and quesabirria tacos popular in the Bay Area, so that’s where I beeline to at the festival.
Other certain-to-be delicious tacos to consider this year include tacos al pastor from Larkspur restaurant/Alemany Farmers Market mainstay El Huarache Loco, SF restaurant Otra’s crispy fried fish tacos, cauliflower al pastor tacos, and bacon and egg breakfast tacos; and the customizable ice cream tacos from the Rocko’s Tacos truck.
Girl dinner (and wedding bites)
Pantry Pigeons will once again be on hand to offer local cheese and charcuterie plates in Wine Lands and now the VIP area, too. And this year, there’s a new option after getting married at the festival’s City Hall area to purchase a reception package with a Guittard Chocolate cake, wine, and charcuterie.
Daily Sundaes
It’s too early to know if it will be rainy, foggy, or uncharacteristically sunny on the festival weekend, but the good news is that ice cream sundaes are appropriate for any weather. This year, my hit list would include the new Dubai chocolate sundae from Charles Chocolates on the Polo Field and the hot fudge parfait at the Humphry Slocombe truck (her name is Betty).
Fun bevs
Kitiya will once again offer fresh young coconuts served with a cocktail umbrella, a joyful and hydrating item to drink in Golden Gate Park whether it’s sunny or foggy. I’ve also got my eye on chicha morada from new vendor and Peruvian pop up Michoz, the ube milkshake from the Marley’s Treats truck, Abanico Coffee Roasters’ hojicha morro latte, the Respectable Bird truck’s calamansi iced tea, new VIP booth Poorboy Coffee’s brown sugar lattes, caramel boba milk tea by Sunset District Korean restaurant um.ma, and matcha lattes and boba teas by SF chain Little Sweet, which I drink regularly. And in the, ahem, green category, the 21+, cannabis-focused Grass Lands area usually includes some vendors offering THC-infused water and other mass market fizzy lifting beverages.
Hot tots/fries as meals
Eaters will see a lot of loaded French fries and tater tots at the fest and those are always good to split. Potential highlights to look for this year: Precita Park Cafe’s loaded nacho tots, loaded Korean bulgogi beef tots by The Alice Collective, Reem’s California’s Arab-style garlic fries (which had lamb last year), loaded banh mi fries and Spam fries by Saigon Sandwich, and loaded gyro fries by mobile vendor Kabob Trolley.
Sandwiches
There will be countless sandwiches to try, but I’m already lusting after Cajun fish sandwiches and fried shrimp po-boys from SF’s Gumbo Social, Vietnamese pho dip sandwiches from Bodega in the Tenderloin, and the classic Outside Lands treat, a lobster roll from Woodhouse Fish Co.
Super splurges
The last few years of Taste of the Bay Area have seen an uptick in high-roller offerings. This year’s headline-grabbing newcomers are the global restaurant group Nobu with mixed sashimi chirashi bowls, chicken katsu donburi, rock shrimp tempura, and shishito peppers with truffle miso, and SF’s The Caviar Co. with Caviar Hot Dogs with Pickled Shallots and Kaluga Hybrid Caviar on Firebrand Pain Au Lait Buns in the Wine Lands area of the festival.
“I just want a banana”
In past years of the festival, I have seen a booth selling fresh fruit in an area near the Panhandle stage that’s not part of Taste of the Bay Area. If you don’t want to spend much and just want something simple like a banana or an apple, you may be able to find it there.
Free samples
This is kind of an aside, but in a festival situation, free samples can feel like small kindnesses. Two product activations with samples that are mentioned on the festival website are NERDS Gummy Clusters and Be LOVE electrolyte beverage, which both seem like they might come in handy for little sugar and mineral rushes during the long day.
Also, when covering the food vibes each year, I over-order so that I get lots of pics and videos and always offer big portions of leftovers to strangers. Their excitement of receiving something delicious for free is always a fun part of my weekend in the park. If someone offers you fries or half of a sandwich on the field, it may be me!
Tamara publishes the California Eating newsletter, and has just launched the Food Book Club.
