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National Geographic's Gorgeous Food Truck Photos Find the Beauty in Street Food

The anthropological mag digs in.

The Coolhaus Truck
The Coolhaus Truck
Gerd Ludwig/National Geographic
Farley Elliott is the Senior Editor at Eater LA and the author of Los Angeles Street Food: A History From Tamaleros to Taco Trucks. He covers restaurants in every form, from breaking news to the culture, people, and history that surrounds LA's dining landscape.

Never one to be late to the party, National Geographic goes in this month on all things food truck, scouring Los Angeles for the city’s best gourmet trucks and photographing the results to amazing effect. Even a few non-gourmet operations (TacoZone and Moriscos Jalisco, anyone?) land on the eye-popping list, while the rest is a mishmash of the old — Dogtown Dogs, Komodo, Kogi — and the relatively new, like Guerrilla  Tacos and CVT Soft Serve.

Mostly, the piece by David Brindley discusses the genesis of food truck culture — yes, there’s lots of Roy Choi talk —and the numbers game being played today by entrepreneurs trying to figure out if the mobile dining scene is still for them.

There are still growing food truck movements in smaller cities across America (and internationally, apparently), which means the trend isn’t going away any time soon; in Los Angeles at least, it’s simply been re-folded into the complex street food landscape.

Many of the city’s essential trucks are represented in the absolutely beautiful NatGeo spread, which features photos from Gerd Ludwig and a video to boot. Check out the whole National Geographic piece this way.