Prescott Night Market
18th St at Peralta Ave.
Oakland
Sept. 5, 2024
Thirsty, not a little sweaty, and determined to fill up on some fried and salty food: a perfect recipe for enjoying an evening at West Oakland’s successful new-ish night market, now in its fourth month.
First things first, a cold one with a frothy head. Not a beer, though, at least not yet: One of several trucks and stations at the market offered agua fresca. Cool!naria’s singular option of the day was a pineapple mint, which I was assured would not be too sweet, just fresh and refreshing. The paper cup, while not an ideal vessel, provided me a cooling and, indeed, not sweet lubricant. The thick foamy froth felt good against the icy, just-the-right-amount-of-minty water, but I wished for more pineapple. The fruit hid in the background of the flavors, a tiny hit of acid and juiciness, but more of a whisper than a word, which I would have preferred.
Juiced up and on to the good stuff: the baked good stuff. Rize Up, whose “whole thing.. you know, sourdough, fun flavors, all that,” as explained by the sweet young woman slinging said goods, had options in spades, exploring what a cookie or hand pie can hold. In my case, gochujang with sesame seeds and masala potatoes, respectively.
Precious pastry cargo packed into my backpack, I surveyed the scene for Best Vegetarian Meal That Is Not Pizza. (No shade to Citizen Pizza; y’all do great things.) Less for lack of options than for small signage and large crowds, determining what my choices were was not the easiest of tasks. Larger lettering folks, we’re blind and it’s busy out here! Luckily, Satay By the Bay, serving Singaporean street food, clearly marked their fried tofu as veg. So a short wait for a bowl, three inquiries from strangers about said bowl, and quick beer stop later I set up shop, filling up an empty picnic table in the completely lifeless lot housing Bike East Bay’s free bicycle valet tent.
So much for a private dining experience: As soon as I was seated with my pastries unpacked and highly conspicuous camera in hand, the table next to me on one side, then the other, and then suddenly all of them, and mine, filled up with chatty diners. Which would have been great were I not steadily coating myself, the table, my clothing, the inside of my backpack, and the ground with endless flakes of the pastry surrounding soft turmeric’d potato.
Aside from a messy eating experience, the hand pie offered delightful buttery flavor and feel in both the crust and filling, with an immediate olfactory hit of masala upon biting through the mess. A slightly higher flake-to-filling ratio than I’d have liked, but great flavor and a comforting eat for sure.
The cookie, flavored with gochujang, a Korean chili paste that has hit mainstream palates and menus in the last few years, and topped with black and white sesame seeds, was a perfect monster of crackly sugary crust, craggly and immensely chewy. A sugar cookie at heart, it tore with beautiful resistance and made for a great sharing item— serves one to three people, appetite for sugar depending. Excellent texture aside, the sweet offered a light lingering hint of heat in the aftertaste, with more smokiness and mild chili flavor at the front, and the sesame seeds brought a nice bit of toasty balance to the sugars. I could have used a whole lot more of both of those flavors, but as offered it is a widely appealing approach to potentially divisive pairings.
My main dish, washed down by an Almanac Kolsch, was a bed of cubes of hot fresh fried tofu mounded with crunchy bean sprouts, shredded carrot and cucumber, and a thick peanut sauce, the scent of which led the aforementioned onlookers to seek out their own bowls. The small paper bowl and flimsy fork were hardly equipped to handle all that thickness, but I was up for the challenge, diligently digging up chunks until I’d made a messy and delicious medley. The peanut sauce was just north of sweetened and I would have lived a kick of heat or acid along with the fresh crunch of the veggies to offset the heavier fried and sweet overtones. An unusually good deal for a vegetarian dish as well, with a generous portion of tofu I could not finish without discomfort, I only wished for a closed box to tote it home in.
The final night market of the season is Oct. 3rd, 4 – 8 p.m. See you then!
