Kristie HangUpdate, 2 p.m., July 7: Due to popular demand, Churro Borough's Summer Pop-Up will move to Sunday, July 13, from 2-5 p.m. at Mexicali Taco & Co. in downtown L.A. Mexicali will not be serving their menu during Churro Borough's pop-up, as the taqueria is usually closed on Sundays. Due to the insane demand, this next Sunday's pop-up will be done by reservation, through an Eventbrite link. Each admission ticket gets 2 sandwiches per customer (limit 2 admission tickets). Cash only. What will happen the following Sunday, July 20, is still being determined.
10:00 a.m., July 7: Cronuts, ramen burgers — and now churro ice cream sandwiches. This year has been a year of long lines and unique food mash-ups. Last Wednesday’s debut of Churro Borough’s Summer Pop-Up Series was so successful, it left practically all of their customers empty-handed — and hungry. If you're early, you're on time; if you're on time, you're late. Let that be your motto if you try and visit the Churro Borough pop-up this summer.
The pop-up, which will run every Wednesday from 7-10 p.m. at Ramekin in Los Feliz until late August, serves Churro Borough’s signature churro ice cream sandwiches, in which the sandwiches are disks of fried churros. The lines wrapped around the block, as passers-by stopped to photograph the crowd and ask what the line was for. People were so determined to get their desserts that when staff came out to announce they were going to sell out, the line just got longer.
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The line in front of Ramekin that wrapped around the building and back.; Credit: Kristie Hang
“We usually make around 200-250 sandwiches. For this particular pop-up, we already upped it to 400, but that sold out quickly as well. We saw what happened on Wednesday and are working to refine our system by possibly using EventBrite to better control the crowds or looking at other options to see how we can better the experience,” says Paul Yoo, Churro Borough's co-owner.
For last Wednesday's night’s pop-up, Churro Borough set a three-churro limit per customer. Despite those restrictions, their 400 sandwiches were gone within an hour. Even people who got in line at 7:10 p.m. — ten minutes after the opening time — found themselves waiting for over an hour, only to be told that the sandwiches were sold out.
“We're flattered that so many people came out to support our product, but at the end of the day, it's an artisan item, it’s not pre-made and simply put together on the spot. The churro ice cream sandwich is a process; we can only do a limited amount,” Yoo says, explaining the long wait and slow moving line that customers experienced.
Sylvia Yoo, Paul Yoo's sister, is the pastry chef behind the flat beignet-like churros, fried to-order and sandwiched around ice cream that comes in flavors such as horchata, Mexican hot chocolate, blueberry, black sesame, crème fraiche, Spanish latte and vanilla custard. There are also other seasonal flavors, including panna cotta, orange creamsicle and peach cobbler. (Flavors are rotated each week to keep the menu exciting.) Yoo, who has worked at Jean-Georges and WD-50 in New York and Red Medicine here in L.A., co-owns the company with her brother.
For those interested in trying their luck at snagging a churro ice cream sandwich, the pop-up will be back at Ramekin next Wednesday. Good night and good luck.
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