"Whatever you call it, I've got it" is the message implicit in this vendor's handwritten sign. As you might gather from the decal at lower right, he's from Colombia, where "raspado" is one common name for his icy confection. Raised among Puerto Ricans, he also knows it well as a "piragua"; when catering to the local Dominican community, he readily identifies his stock in trade as "frio frio".
All of his confections are built on the same granular bed of shaved ice; variations are minor. For example, the "diablito" — note the devil-horns D — is laced with a chile-spiked sauce. My "minuta" could also have taken the enchilado treatment, but the default (shown below) is simple: ice, tamarind, lemon.
Shaved-ice cart
Van Buren St. near the southeast corner with Ferry St., Newark, New Jersey
