LEGO Icons 40681 Retro Food Truck Review

Lately, every time LEGO releases a new Modular Building, they have also been releasing a vehicle to go with it. This month, Jan of 2024, we get a unique gift with purchase. Here is my article of the LEGO Retro Food Truck Review.

A LEGO Gift with purchase is a free set you can get for a limited time when you spend a certain amount of money at the LEGO store, or on LEGO.com. This set is “free” when you spend $190 during the first 2 weeks of January 2024. Be advised that sometimes LEGO doesn’t make enough of the GWP sets and they can (and do) run out. Read more about the LEGO January GWP.

This is a very cool set, and for the price/threshold I think it is 100% appropriate. You are getting a retro food truck, 2 minifigures, and a lot of play-a-bility!

The LEGO Retro Food Truck

When is the LEGO Retro Food Truck Released

This set is available as a gift with purchase from the LEGO stores and LEGO.com from Jan 1 2024 – Jan 16, 2024, or until supplies run out. After that you may be able to find it on second hand reseller sites like Bricklink.com or maybe Amazon.

I typically order my sets from LEGO.com because I don’t live close to a LEGO store. the closest one for me is over 2 hours away. However, I have heard stories where some LEGO stores sell out of the set before others, so it can be possible to still get it at a different store if yours is sold out.

This is a very limited edition set that came out in conjunction with the Modular Natural History museum set. When it is gone, it is gone.

What’s in the 40681 Retro Food Truck Box

Inside the box, you’ll find four smaller bags, each numbered with different different colored pieces.

You also have an instruction book and a small sheet of stickers with hotdog, snacks other food, truck related prints.

Instructions for the Retro Food Truck

The instructions come with the set in a little paper booklet. you can also Access an electronic version of the instructions to build the retro food truck on the LEGO website.

Overall there are 75 steps needed to complete everything.

What I find interesting is that this set is not part of the LEGO builder App that I have on my iPhone.

I also don’t see much about the build together iniatiave that LEGO promotes. that is where you either build parts of the set simultaneously with a friend, as quality time, or in this case, I think it would be awesome if someone started to build the Modular Museum while someone else worked on this Retro food truck.

Building the 40681 Retro Food Truck

Start to finish, this took me 45 minutes to build. That included taking photos, and notes of the set for this review. Regular readers know that I am a very experienced builder. Although the set is an 18+ Icons set, I don’t think you need to be that old to build it and have a good time, Sure there are quite a few small, even tiny pieces, but there aren’t any difficult techniques. I think my 11 year old could do it easily.

Bag 1

The first bag went together, fairly quickly. As what usually happens, is you build a mini figure and then start the actual build and in this case it was no different. The minifigure is the hotdog vendor who has a sweaty one-sided head a white shirt with red stripes and standard blue pants. He’s holding a hotdog and a bun.

Then, We start to build a chassis of the food truck. This is a six wide brick built chassis and was interesting to me as how the base was assembled in 3 sections. It was a bit shorter than I expected. I don’t know what I was thinking, but I expected the truck to be a little bit longer than it is that’s not bad it’s just more retro.

Nothing really interesting on the first bag except you do get a peek at what I think of some of the inside of the food truck with some red yellow and brown shaped cones. These are the beginning of the extra food accessories.

Bag 2

The second bag begins to fill out some of the details inside and outside the van.

You build a driver seat, and a very rudimentary dashboard. Some condiment stations on the sides. And a grill in the back for cooking the hot dog. The food prep area is small but efficient, and includes a cooktop and soda machine.

One very unique build technique is the use of some gold claws to resemble french fries. I will be using this in the future!

The front and rear bumpers are constructed in the now standard Lego car way of a SNOT build. You have a three or four wide by six long area that you build lights, bumpers, and other features into for the bump for the back. In the front use approximately the same space for the headlights grill and front bumper.

Bag 3

Of all the bags in the set bag three is the smallest and the easiest to build you start at the midline of the van with a red stripe that goes around the perimeter at the windshield, the side walls, and an outline for the roof.

In the back there are some cool red and white canopy type pieces as well as red and white rearview window markers.

Bag 4

This is where it all comes together and the final details are installed.

You start by assembling the second minifigure, a lady who is buying a hot dog. She has a 5-coin, and a printed earpiece on her head.

Next you get to build one of the most iconic parts of the blue food truck – the red and white fold down canopy. It uses a combination of 2 and 3 long rounded plates and studs in a clever way. I won’t give away any spoilers, but it is a fun building technique.

Another fold down condiment tray is installed in the back. It has a ketchup and mustard bottles on it.

At the very end you get to build a little red folding sandwich board that has 2 stickers. One sticker shows that you can get a “deal” where you trade a ticket to get one of the green drinks that are inside the Truck. While it doesn’t say exactly what kind of ticket, I have to assume that if you went to the Museum, and could prove it, you would get the free drink.

Review of the Retro Food truck

To learn how I came up with the different categories and how I assign star ratings, please read my article about how I review LEGO sets.

• Is it Worth it?
• “Build fun-ness”
• Minifigs
• Hidden Surprises
• Build time
• Is it Worth it?

Star Rating

Build fun-ness

★★★★

I had a great time building the food truck set. First of all, it was free. Sure, I had to spend $190 to get it, but I do that anyway, especially at the beginning of the year when all the 2024 LEGO sets are announced.

Lego has a few different ways to build cars and vehicles. In younger sets (the 4+ range) often you will get a single large chasis on which to build the details of the car. Howver in the LEGO icons range, the process is a bit more advanced, and I learned a few cool new details as I put together this creative project.

Minifigs

★★★★

This set comes with two minifigures – the Food truck owner, and a female patron.

The owner has a red stripped white shirt. He has a great expression on his minifigure head of sweat. I don’t know if he is hot working next to the grill inside, or if he is nervous that the customer will like his food, or if it is some other reason, but it is a very cool detail.

The lady has short black hair, and a printed earbud piece in her ear. she has a 5 unit coin. It doesn’t say if it is dollars or Euros, but I like to think it is LEGO VIP points – lol.

Hidden Surprises

★★

This tidy little build doesn’t have any significant hidden easter eggs or surprises. A cool feature of the build is the fold down table in the back and the striped awning. I also like the color scheme and the front curves on the truck (although some famous LEGO YouTubers are not fond of the style).

Build time

★★★

Overall this build took me about 45 minutes, including taking notes and photos for this blog post. It is rated as an 18+ set, but as I mentioned above, I know my 11 year old son could easily put this one together. There are no alternate builds that I know of, but it would be fun to recolor this set using the same instructions for a different kind of truck. I’d love to see a row of 3 or 4 together in different colors.

Is it Worth it?

★★★★★

Free sets are always worth it to me. Like I previously mentioned I will be spending the money anyway on LEGOs, so why not get something free with it at the same time. I really like this GPW as it will fit nicely in my LEGO city.

Fina Thoughts

this is a delightful little build, that includes vendor and customer minifigures. The truck has cool details and a neat little menu board, and fits perfectly with the natural history museum or in a LEGO cityscape.

If you have the ability, I highly recommend collecting this set before it is gone.