Finding the Dos Hermanos Chapines Guatemalan food truck on Evergreen Way involved following a series of colorful "pupusa" flags off the highway around 93rd Ave, down a few side roads, and into a gigantic gravel lot that hosts a bus, a truck, and a trailer.
If I see a pupusa flag, I'm going to follow it; therefore, I loved this multiple-flag-highway-treasure-hunt with big pupusa payoff. I'll tell you about them in a bit, but first I'm going to talk about the empanadas, because this truck's are the kind of "crispy" and "stuffed" you've always wanted your empanadas to be. They are fat with a mixture of diced potato, chorizo, and bits of nopales. And they are crunchy. The kind of crunchy you can hear. The kind of crispy you can break in half easily.
Topped with raw cabbage, cilantro, and cojita cheese, the only thing you can do to enhance their crispy fat tastiness is to eat them inside the school bus' cactus-green restaurant. There you'll find three tables, a heater, Guatemalan decor, and a mini fridge filled with homemade green and red salsas.
The day had a magical feel to it even before climbing aboard the bus, because my friend and I had just left the National Beard and Moustache Championships in Everett*, where we witnessed a warm fringe community refer to their facial hair artwork as "lip and chin sweaters." The whole thing was sweet, and we were driving home filled with wacky beard joy when we saw the flags, then the compound, and then the inside of the bus, where we broke the crispy empanadas in half like communion.
A potato masterpiece, eaten inside a magical bus, on a misty green fall Saturday...the spirit of Samwise Gamgee was surely with us.
As for our pupusas--cornmeal cakes stuffed with cheese and loroco, a tangy, asparagus-y tasting green bud that thrives throughout Central America--they were grilled perfectly, and served with the signature pickled cabbage carrot slaw. Declared the national dish of El Salvador, I approved of this slightly thinner Guatemalan version.
The tacos were solid, too; I love a taco plate that assumes you want grilled onions and jalapeno peppers. The carne asada was tender, and the adobada--pork marinated in mild guajillo chiles, orange juice, vinegar and garlic--had a nice tang to it and paired especially well with the lime, onions, and peppers.
The National Beard and Moustache Championships may never come to Everett again (organizers rallied hard to get it here this year!), so your day probably won't be quite as mystical as mine was. But the treasure hunt, the cactus-green bus, and the Guatemalan food are there to work some kind of magic for you, every day, from 10am-9pm.
*Homework:
Check out the 2023 National Beard and Moustache Championship Gallery (I can't wait for the 2024 Everett Gallery to post!)
Dos Hermanos Chapines
9320 Evergreen Way
Everett, WA 98204
Open every day from 10am-9pm
206-710-3223
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