Langston Grille on Wheels

Everything I got was cold. Food is not being held at the right temp on this truck, which is a health hazard.
Also, what they refer to as «dirty rice» is not real dirty rice. dirty rice is supposed to have sausage and ground chicken livers in it. This has neither. Actually, it had no meat in it at all and tasted nothing like true dirty rice.

I literally just stopped eating my (cold) sandwich mid-​bite to pen this review.
Langston Grille on Wheels showed up at State Department today. I’ll admit, I’m a bit of a creature of habit with food trucks — there’s so many that are ‘meh’ out there right now I sometimes have trouble choosing something new over an old and reliable favorite. On this particular day, I did decide to venture out, though, and checked Unilocal first (of course!) and saw that their average rating, even though only a few reviewers, was 4 stars. Good enough for me… even though their chalkboard on the side of the truck seriously needs to be redone. I could barely read the items — very faded and haphazard writing. The chalkboard was also unreadable due to water having poured down the side — my co-​worker and I suspect the truck had been rained on and no one bothered to clean it up.
They had choices — on one side of the menu were ‘dinners’ which came with meats and a choice of sides, and then sandwiches (most had po-​boy written next to them; the pulled pork had what I think was ‘asian bacon’ written next to it). I chose the beef brisket po-​boy and a side of mac and cheese. The portions were pretty good — sandwich was of average size and they gave me a good amount of mac and cheese.
Let’s start with the sandwich. It had a good amount of meat and pickled vegetables, but that’s where the positives ended. It was COLD. Not even lukewarm because I stood out at the trucks waiting for co-​workers cold but cold as in pulled-​leftovers-​out-​of-​the-​fridge-​not-​too-​long-​ago cold. The sandwich also featured pickled vegetables (which was a surprise to me, and an unwelcome one, as a veggie hater) but I actually found that they enhanced the sandwich — maybe because the rest of it was lacking in flavor. The meat was ok — I found it to be a bit bland but it wasn’t terrible. The bun reminded me of cheap ones I’d picked up for a tailgate party not long ago.
The mac and cheese? Thankfully, it was warm, but just bland, bland, bland. Could have used some serious salt and pepper.
My coworker ordered the collard greens as a side, and he fared slightly better — he reports that they were tender but not mushy but there were pencil-​diameter stems in abundance, which to me suggests sloppy. On the plus side, they were warm.
Perhaps I’m missing something here that other reviewers had, but I don’t think I’d return.

I wanted a different lunch and it doesn’t get much different than ox tail. You heard that right! You get it over their rice which is very tasty.
Ox tail is kind of like a pot roast. Be ready to chew the meat out of a good amount of bone. The flavor is impressive though! It’s a nice truck and I would recommend trying it.

I’m predicting this food truck will do well. By itself, the sound of mid-​day reggae music blasting from the truck is enough to make the army of Washington wonks, interns, lawyers, lobbyists and non-​profit types forget for a minute about the dull lives that await them back at their cubicles.
Ok, let me stop.
Really though, the jerk chicken I had for lunch the other day was quite tasty. For a mere $ 11 bucks, I got 6 small and oddly shaped, but meaty chunks of chopped, bone-​in chicken, dirtied up with that heavenly jerk seasoning. This, sitting on top of some equally dirty white rice, was rounded out by a side of lightly fried plantains and a can of strawberry iced tea. For $ 11 Bucks!
While the chicken, spicy but not too much, seemed to have been prepared somewhere else and brought out to the truck, it was served up fresh and hot. So there was minimal waiting. My order came up within about one minute of me ordering it and paying for it with my credit card.
The kind brother who was out on the street slinging menus and helping customers complete their orders told me that they have a brick and mortar location over in the Benning Rd. area. I don’t imagine your average downtown food truck customer will venture over there for some good Jamaican cuisine, but they will surely be missing something if they don’t pay a visit to this mobile food truck. I will definitely be back to try each of these menu items: stew chicken, curry chicken, curry goat, oxtail stew, escovitch fish and curry shrimp; not to mention the deep fried beef and chicken patties.

I am in love with the curry chicken and peas and rice meal for only $ 8. There was so much in the takeout box that I ate some for lunch, dinner and saved some for tomorrow’s lunch.
I hope this place is at metro center next week because according to the truck fiesta website, it doesn’t exist anymore (although I ate from it today).
The staff was friendly and came out to the line to take your order to speed things up. I appreciated that and my total time at the truck. was less than 10 mins.
I definitely recommend this truck.