Truck stop boom

There is a truck for every gourmande in Lower Manhattan these days (15 at last count), from the iconic joe vendors at the Mud Truck on Astor Place to the newly opened Van Leeuwen ice cream truck, which started dishing fancy scoops at Prince and Greene streets this week. Then there is The Dessert Truck, which exploded on to the eater scene last spring with a barrage of media attention.

But the ice-cream truck model has been around for decades, so why the boom now? These are not fresh-off-the-boat operations, people. These are legit businesses with a slew of MBA number crunching. (Pepto truck anyone? I put money on 48th and Park for that one.)

As I licked my tasty, if pricey, Slow Food scoop the other day, I pondered the boom. The Internet has revitalized the old park-and-sell model. Some web sites and blogs - such as Yum Tacos, Los Tacos Trucks and Taco Hunt - are dedicated to tracking and mapping the mobile kitchens (and their turf wars), freeing them from geographic confines.

Another reason, overhead is low. The young and hungry can start a business with elbow grease and truck rental.

And lastly, a food truck offers entreprenurial freedom and lifestyle that brings business back to basic. It is literally where the rubber hits the road. Except instead of schilling lemonade, it's lunch. For the record, the ice cream from Van Leeuwen is very good - much better than Grom - because it remains light, fresh and creamy without going overboard on sweetness and milkfat. I didn't have the scoop 'coma' that so often follows a heart-clogging lick. I recommend splurging the $3.75 on a scoop.

Dallas Jones Bar-B-Q

For those that understand bacon makes everything taste better: this is your mothership. And for you others, it's still a worthy satellite. This button-sized BBQ joint, which can seat 10 people max, is a taste of southern heaven on the south side of the West Village. It is the opposite of Dinosaur's bigger-than-life operation uptown (my other fave BBQ joint), but the taste is eyes-rolling-in-back-of-head delicious. I got an order of the St.Louis-style pork ribs (recommended by the super-nice waiter) with a side of collard greens and beans. It was accompanied by a corn muffin, which sadly I had no room for. There was pork grease running down my chin and the bacon bits in the chopped collard greens were so salty and tender that I ordered a second side of the vegetable dish. The beans were soaked in tomato sauce (maybe some ketchup?) but they brought the sweet to the bacon's salt. My pork-free BF went for the beef ribs and a quarter chicken, also drenched in their spicy sauce. Tasty! I was amazed/impressed that this little hole-in-the-wall kitchen produced such a mighty and authentic BBQ meal. When you've already well passed the 1,000-calorie meal mark, it's best to just pile it on. So we did. A pecan tart a la mode sealed the deal. Washed down with some lemonade, the whole mess came to $63 for both of us. Bottom line: good place to stuff your belly, but be prepared to spend the next few hours in a sticky food coma.

Where: 178 West Houston Street, 212-741-7390