Street Food Comes to Angeli Caffe

By Barbara Hansen Fri., Jul. 23 2010 at 8:07 AM

Categories: L.A. Restaurants, Street Food

Bill Esparza

Ricky Piña of Ricky's Fish Tacos

If you've resisted driving deep into unfamiliar terrain to get great street food, you can now find it closer to home, that is, if you live mid-city or on the Westside.

This Monday, July 26th, Angeli Caffe starts a series of Street Food on Melrose Mondays. First to appear is Ricky Piña of Ricky's Fish Tacos.

Piña comes from a family of mechanics who worked on the cars of Baja fisherman. Sometimes their only payment was the catch of the day, which they turned into superb tacos. Using the family recipe, Piña will turn out fish and shrimp tacos with all the trimmings for $3 each from 6 to 10 p.m. Angeli will supply the beer.

Behind this move to make street food more accessible are Bill Esparza of streetgourmetla.com and Evan Kleiman of Angeli. Says Esparza: "Street food is a good thing, and... a vital part of L.A.'s restaurant community and culture. The first pop-up ever was street food."

It's not yet been decided how often the street food Mondays will take place. Future sessions will include a Breed Street Reunion featuring three vendors from that now-defunct site. On other Mondays, Esparza wants to rotate additional Breed vendors. Sri Lankan food and shrimp tacos in the style of San Juan de Los Lagos, Jalisco, are also in the works, he says.

Angeli Caffe: 7274 Melrose Ave., Los Angeles; (323) 936-9086.