I tried my first Mighty Cone, like many other people, from the food court on the grounds of Austin City Limits music festival. I don’t remember the exact year, but it has become a tradition that I eat at least one Mighty Cone while at the festival ever since. They canceled the fest last year, but I decided to keep my cone-eating tradition alive. So I wandered to down to their food truck, located just a stone’s throw from Zilker and the festival grounds, and ordered The Monster.

The Monster isn’t necessarily the massive amount of food the name conveys, it was actually created for people who have trouble making decisions and can’t eliminate one of the three choices of fried chicken, shrimp, or avocado from their cone. People like me. “I just want all three,” I tell them.

Mighty Cone came to be in 2002 when the folks at ACL reached out to Lake Travis’ favorite Hudson’s on the Bend, and invited them to add to the culinary options available at the festival. One of the chefs (most likely high) had the genius idea of putting their crunchy trout batter onto chicken, wrapping a tortilla into a snow cone cup, and then tossing the aforementioned chicken into the cone with slaw and ancho chili sauce. The result is a self-contained meal that festival goers can hold in one hand whilst walking the festival grounds, freeing up the other hand to do all of the things one does at festivals.

Genius.

Website: www.mightycone.com

Location:
The Picnic
1720 Barton Springs Road
Austin, TX 78704

Hours:
Fri–Sun 11 a.m.–8 p.m.