Friends

Street Food Market

The taco truck alone would have sold me on this one.

Brick Rated Score

4.3/5

Set 41701 · 2022

Pieces593

Minifigs3

Year2022

Set number41701

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The verdict

This is the most fun I have had with a Friends food set since the old Heartlake City Restaurant, and the taco truck is the reason.

It opens right up for play, it is packed with tiny printed details, and the four little sub-builds mean there is always another corner to fuss over. It leans young and the sushi stand is a touch thin, but as a colorful, playable market it delivers. Best for kids who love pretend-food play and adult Friends fans who collect the food builds.

Best for: kids who live for pretend-food play and adult Friends fans who collect the food builds

The full review

What it is

Some sets just look like a good afternoon, and the Street Food Market is one of them. It is a little international food row: a taco truck, a juice bar, a sushi and ramen stand, and a dining table with a bench, all splashed in the warm colors LEGO Friends does so well. The taco truck is what got me. It is a solid, satisfying build that opens along one side with a hinged door, so you can actually reach in and play out a scene instead of just parking it on a shelf. Tucked inside are the kind of details that make me grin, hot sauce, a little pot of guacamole, printed food dotted across the counters. It celebrates street food and the diversity of cuisines you find at a real market, and it pulls that off with a lot of charm.

The catch

I will be straight with you about where it wobbles. The taco truck is so good that the smaller stalls have to live in its shadow, and the sushi and ramen stand in particular feels a bit slight, a fiddlier build that ends up smaller than you expect. This is a set built for play first, so if you came hoping for clever engineering or a meaty parts challenge, it is going to feel light in your hands. And at the 49.99 dollar RRP the value is fine rather than generous for the piece count, though now that it has retired you are shopping the aftermarket anyway, so watch the price before you commit.

Who it's for

Get this if you have a kid who loves pretend-food play, because the opening truck and the pile of little accessories will keep them busy long after the last brick is placed. It also earns a spot for adult Friends fans who collect the food and cafe builds, since it sits comfortably next to the restaurants and diners in that lineup. Skip it if you want a display-first showpiece or a build that tests you, this one is happiest being handled, rearranged, and played with rather than admired from across the room.

The parts story

What the build is actually like, and the pieces worth knowing about.

Building it is a breezy, sociable experience rather than a marathon. Five numbered bags and four instruction booklets mean you can hand a booklet each to a couple of helpers and build the stalls at the same time, which is a lovely touch for a family afternoon. The taco truck is the meatiest and most rewarding section, coming together into something sturdy that opens cleanly for play, while the sushi stand is the trickier little cousin that asks for more patience than its size suggests.

The real joy here is in the small stuff. This set is generous with printed and molded food elements, the tiny printed sushi tiles, little eggs, cutlery, flowers, and pretend-food bits scattered across every counter, and they do a lot of the heavy lifting on charm. The minidolls are a highlight too: you get Sebastian, Nandi, and Emma, and every one of them comes with two heads so you can swap their expressions. Nandi is the standout, one of the first Friends minidolls with a reddish-brown skin tone, wearing a one-shouldered patterned top and gladiator sandals. For a set this size the color palette is bright and varied enough that the parts pile feels like a treat.

Fun facts

01Every one of the three minidolls, Sebastian, Nandi, and Emma, comes with two printed heads so you can swap their expressions, which was still uncommon for Friends minidolls at the time.
02Nandi is noted as one of the first LEGO Friends minidolls to feature a reddish-brown skin tone.
03The set shipped with four separate instruction booklets so several people could build the different stalls at the same time.
04On LEGO.com the set landed a 4.91 out of 5 owner rating with 96 percent of reviewers recommending it, one of the warmer receptions a Friends food set has had.