San Jose Gets a Guatemalan Food Truck

Food trucks tend to focus on meals that can be enjoyed on the go, so when I came across Shaddai, a new Guatemalan food truck in San Jose, I was shocked to see cooks walking steaming-hot bowls of pepián de gallina and caldo de res over to eager diners. More than that, the menu is huge — literally a banner as tall as the truck — and features hard-to-find specialties like chow mein tostadas and Guatemalan enchiladas.

Located in a bustling food truck park on the outskirts of downtown, Shaddai is the creation of Betxaida Lopez. Lopez and her family moved from the Guatemalan city of Tiquisate, Escuintla to San Jose when she was seven years old. As an adult, she started a housecleaning business with her mother, Irma Lopez. They often talked about opening a restaurant together but never expected the opportunity would come straight to their door.

“My brother is a contractor,” Lopez explains. “A guy who hired him couldn’t pay cash, so he offered him the truck.”

Although Lopez’s professional kitchen experience up until that point was limited to a few months at a local pizzeria, she jumped at the opportunity. In the months before the truck launched, she and her mother cooked side by side until Lopez felt she had mastered her mother’s repertoire of traditional recipes and techniques.

Her hard work has paid off. The churrasco chapin at Shaddai feels like a plate you might be offered at a Lopez family barbecue. While it resembles the kind of carne asada plate you might find at other Latin American restaurants, the flavors and textures are distinctly Guatemalan. The grilled steak is loaded with chirmol, a charred tomato salsa; the black beans have been blended to a thick, pudding-like consistency; and the rice is speckled with peas and carrots. If you want the full family party experience, visit Shaddai on the weekends and sit under the gazebo adorned with string lights while brave diners sing Spanish oldies at the outdoor karaoke station and children play in the bounce house.

I heard one customer exclaim, “¡A la gran puchica voz!” (essentially, “damn!”) just from reading a sticker on Shaddai’s window — a reflection, perhaps, of how excited locals are to have a Guatemalan food option close to home.

“Most of our customers are Guatemalan,” says Lopez. “There’s no food truck or restaurant that’s Guatemalan in San Jose. People tell us they would travel to San Francisco, but now it’s here.” (While there are a small handful of Guatemalan-owned food businesses in the area, none of them serve a full-fledged, exclusively Guatemalan menu like Shaddai’s.)

Since Shaddai is located in a parking lot packed with a variety of other food trucks, it also attracts a fair number of wandering customers unfamiliar with the cuisine. After all, it’s hard to walk past a menu promoting tostadas topped with chow mein and dry, salted cheese without doing a double-take. While that particular dish sounds like a strange, modern fusion, chow mein tostadas actually have roots in Guatemala’s Chinese immigrant community going back to the early 1900s. They remain a popular street food item to this day. Another notable variation on tostadas is Shaddai’s garnachas: fresh tortilla chips topped with shredded beef along with the same salsa and curtido that accompany pupusas.

When Lopez mentioned that her favorite dish is enchiladas, I nodded along in agreement, thinking of the saucy fried tortillas my family enjoys each week. Then Lopez clarified, “It’s way different from Mexican enchiladas.” As it turns out, the Guatemalan version is made by tossing ground meat in tomato sauce and loading it onto a tostada with mayo, lettuce, pickled beets and slices of hard-boiled egg. Every bite is fresh, bright and savory.

Some items like pepián de gallina, a chicken stew made with pumpkin seeds and sesame seeds, are only available on weekends when the truck is fully staffed. “Pepián is our signature dish in Guatemala,” says Lopez. “It’s like the mole for Mexico. We would love to have it every day, but it’s delicate.”

There’s also always a surprise or two on the menu each weekend. In past weeks, Lopez has made frijol colorado con costillas, chiles rellenos, and an incredibly crisp version of fried chicken. I’ve tried almost everything. Among the weekend specials, one of my favorites is the rellenitos — plump, fried, sugar-coated ovals made from plantains and stuffed with sweet beans or manjar (a milk-based filling).

Each plate of food at Shaddai comes staked with a toothpick that proudly waves a Guatemalan flag. It’s a reflection of Lopez’s pride for her home country and excitement to share the cuisine with the South Bay. These days, she and her mother cook together on the truck six days a week — a fulfillment of the elder Lopez’s lifelong dream.

“At a young age, my mom taught me to shoot for the stars,” Lopez says. “Little by little we’re getting there. It feels nice to say I’m a business owner.”

Shaddai Guatemalan Cuisine (1302 South 1st St., San Jose) is open Tuesday–Friday 11 a.m to 8 p.m., Saturday and Sunday 11 a.m.–10 p.m. Cash only.