NYC Food Truck Lunch: Hunter's Stew From Old Traditional Polish Cuisine

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As we've said many times, Twitter is a good way to find out about a food truck's Daily Special. There's usually a sign on the truck, too, but with Twitter, you don't have to go there to find out.

Last week, when it was still cold, we stopped by the Old Traditional Polish Cuisine truck to check out their version of Hunter's Stew. This dish is a new one that's not usually on the menu. It cost $13, a few dollars more than most of their other entrees.

You could see care was being taken in the preparation of our lunch. We couldn't see what ingredients went in or in what order, but we could see the Hunter's Stew was cooked in a cast iron skillet over a flame. It also took about 10 minutes to cook, which was about double what other people waited who ordered one of their regular dishes.

Opening the container, the Hunter's Stew contained pieces of kielbasa, a little bacon, cabbage, sauerkraut, mushrooms, carrots and onions.

On top of the container were two slices of what seemed like a seedless rye bread, but was somewhat lighter in taste. The slices were huge, each almost as large as the Styrofoam container itself.

Lunch was a nice mix of the ingredients just mentioned, but as is our usual complaint, we would have liked more meat (kielbasa and bacon). The kielbasa was cut into much smaller pieces than in the photo of Hunter's Stew posted on the truck. It doesn't matter what type of stew we're talking about, there should be large pieces of meat in it.

The cabbage, sauerkraut and veggies were tasty, and there was plenty of sauce in which to dip the seedless rye bread. The sauce was slightly sweet and vinegary, with obvious use of paprika and other herbs and spices.

Just  in case there wasn't enough to eat, they also slipped a pierogi into our lunch. With lunch being a hunter's stew, of course it was a meat pierogi, which we seriously enjoyed.

This was a hearty meal for a cold, rainy day. Hopefully, there will be fewer of these days until next fall, but if you need a solid lunch to hold you over for a long time, the Hunter's Stew fits the bill.

You can find Old Traditional Polish Cuisine on Twitter here, on Facebook here, and their website is here. They hit the usual food truck lunch spots in midtown, downtown and Brooklyn, so keep an eye out, especially if you enjoy kielbasa and pierogies as much as we do.