Found Treasure: Evil Wings Food Truck

April 19, 2024 – Reasonable eaters can agree hunger is the best sauce. 

A staff that’s having a blast, though, is a great sort of seasoning. 

Both come into play with the Evil Wings food truck team, with whom the fun manifests in various ways—and when the hunger really strikes, late on a Friday or Saturday night downtown.

Yes, the fun comes from the mobile kitchen itself. On a rainy winter night the first time I tried Evil Wings, co-creator girlfriend-boyfriend duo Irene Lopez and Gerardo Rojo formed a tornado of cheerful food prep, sizzling up a cheeseburger with caramelized onions and the legit-craziest crazy fries in Santa Cruz County—with smiles as big as the marshmallow-fruit-crepe that provided a thunderclap of a nightcap.

On a different visit, the fun comes from Irma Tapia’s phone screen. Tapia is Lopez’s mom and BFF, and point-person for the Evil Wings day shift at Cabrillo Liquors in Soquel. (Complete hours, BTW, are 9am-8pm Monday-Saturday and 9pm-4am Friday and Saturday near the Catalyst at 1003 Pacific Ave. in downtown Santa Cruz. *Yes, 4am, a rare non-fast-food late-night spot in Santa Cruz.) 

Tapia shows me a video after I request a toothpick’s slathering of the thick housemade spicy sauce that goes on the signature Diablo Wings, which (gulp) require a waiver. 

Eat four wings covered in that sauce—which felt like it left a line on my tongue where I placed the toothpick—in under 2 minutes, and you win more than a face full of fire. 

You also get six free wings of any sauce, of which there are nine, including garlic Parmesan, mango habanero, Buffalo, Asian chili and more.

On her phone, the video reveals a brave 15-year-old as he slips and slops sauce everywhere while he checks with Tapia on time. Call it hot stuff in headlining fashion, as the wings helped inspire the name and launched the original endeavor. 

Fun now also comes from elsewhere on the menu, which throws down all sorts of guilt-defying indulgence—drippy burgers (Impossible included), Philly cheesesteaks, quesabirria, onion rings, hard shell tacos and additional classic Mexican like tortas and tostadas. 

Irma’s faves, for the record, are the fries, mango habanero wings, fried chicken sandwich, queso birria and street tacos. (Irene goes for much of the same, adding Rojo doesn’t play favorites, because, “he likes everything he makes.”)

A fun menu (with everything ranging $8-$16, with exception of the $18 sampler) doesn’t mean much without execution. For many restaurants, this sort of range would be tricky. And while plenty of food trucks, beloved workplace “roach coaches” among them, can do a lot of different things, it doesn’t happen with the same flavor intuition it does here. 

Homemade salsas, authored by Rojo, play a starring role. 

“It’s a lot of work,” Lopez says, “But if we buy the salsas, we can’t really give our touch to them, and [Rojo] is really good. He has all these recipes in his mind.”

The approachable vibe is underlined by handwritten specials on the napkin dispenser, drawings of a caped French bulldog that are leftover from a previous owner, and a kind energy overall. 

But as full-bodied as the fun is, there is one other key to the truck is work ethic. 

Lopez is a nurse and Rojo, after a decade and a half as a restaurant and catering chef, has shifted to construction. Seeing them cook—and take it deep into the AM on weekends—suggests they could slap a bumper sticker on the mobile kitchen that reads, “I’d rather be food truckin’.”

“We love it, and we just love to serve,” Lopez says. “It’s a family business, that’s why we’re more in love with it.” 

Spicy food can trigger the human body to release endorphins. Fortunately for my intestinal tract, that clear love and the food that comes with it provide endorphins on their own.

More, including Diablo challenge video, at Evil Wings’ Instagram page.