May 25, 2013

Kim Rivers

McShane’s in East Syracuse closing, planning to open food truck: What’s in Store

East Syracuse (WSYR-TV) – The doors are closing at McShane’s on Kinne Street in East Syracuse.

According to the restaurant’s Facebook page, the last day for business at the brick-and-mortar pub is Friday, but a food truck will soon take its place.

No word yet on when the “Chicken Bandit” might be ready or where it will be located.

McShane’s was recently featured on the Food Network show “Restaurant Impossible.”

If you’d like to know What’s in Store in your neighborhood, give us a call at 446-9900, or you can e-mail yourstories@9wsyr.com.

Top 10 street-food cities

That’s why online travel
adviser Cheapflights.com (www.cheapflights.com) has put together
its Top 10 street-food cities. Reuters has not endorsed this list:

1.
Hong Kong, China

With a bustling international food scene, Hong Kong
offers up everything from sweet tofu soup to dumplings all from street-side
stalls. Long under British rule but now part of China, the city is famous for
everything from snake soup to egg tarts, and serves up an interesting mix of
Cantonese delicacies and Western favourites. Markets like those on Temple Street
in Yau Ma Tei, the Ladies Market on Tung Choi Street and Kowloon City are
popular places to peruse Hong Kong’s street food scene and taste test items like
hot pots, curried fish balls and skewers of stinky tofu (your nose will guide
you to that one). The city’s dai pai dongs – open-air street food vendors – have
been dwindling since the 1980s when regulations tightened, but places like
noodle shops and markets still thrive. Some of Hong Kong’s food stalls like dim
sum canteen Tim Ho Wan on Sham Shui Po even made the most recent Michelin Guide
- a significant honour from a guide that’s notoriously stingy with its stars,
reserving them mainly for high-end brick-and-mortar restaurants.

2. Rio
de Janeiro, Brazil

Food stands are a staple in Rio de Janeiro. Vendors
offer everything from cod fritters to feijoada (rice, beans and pork) and
salgadinhos (salty aperitifs). The scene has stretched to the city’s waterfront
and its suburbs. Beverages are popular street-side buys here, especially drinks
like fruit smoothies and suco de acai (acai juice). Sweet treats like tapiocas
(crepes) and churros filled with chocolate or caramel are also popular. Stroll
the boardwalk of Copacabana and Ipanema beaches to find 24-hour food stands.
Street meat called churrasquinhos, hot dogs known as cachorro quente and cheese
bread (pao de queijo) are all common street food fare in Old Rio.

3.
Paris, France

Paris may be famous for decadent sit-down mid-day meals,
but its street food offerings are extensive. After all, who can resist that wall
of Nutella jars practically calling your name from every Parisian crêperie? The
city’s iconic street food specialty is the heavenly crêpe. The thin pancakes are
typically made to order and filled with your choice of ingredients, which could
be anything from a savory combination like ham and cheese, or a sweet specialty
like that heavenly chocolate-hazelnut spread paired with slices of banana. But
the French city’s street food scene goes beyond its network of street-corner
crêperies. Sandwiches from bakeries, falafel in the Marais district and Indian
specialties like samosas are all served street side. A surprising amount of food
trucks – many of them dishing out traditional American favourites like burgers –
are also popping up around Paris. Just be a little discerning with your
selections in popular tourist locales, such as the areas around the Eiffel Tower
and Montmartre.

4. Boston, Mass., United States

Humble hot dog carts,
step aside. Gourmet mobile meals are all the rage in several US cities,
including Boston where more than 50 food trucks (up from 15 in 2011) roam the
city, planting themselves – on any given day – in one of 30 locations. The
trucks also converge on various neighbourhood markets in the spring, summer and
fall. Each truck has cornered its piece of the foodie market, and cuisine ranges
from local specialties like lobster rolls (from the Lobsta Love truck) to
Vietnamese favourites (from the Bon Me truck). The buzz around the
treat-dispensing trucks is also a reflection of a growing food scene in this New
England city. Truck chefs host food festivals and cooking contests, and, on
occasion, even end up launching wheel-less meals from restaurants inspired by
their food trucks. On the flip side, some brick-and-mortar restaurants are now
sending their meals on the road.

5. Istanbul, Turkey

Food stalls
and street-side snack shops are ubiquitous in this Turkish city. Specialties
include kebap (little pieces of broiled or roasted cow, sheep or chicken meat),
döner (meat roasted on a vertical spit), lahmacun (Turkish pizza), sokak simit
(a large, crispy bagel-like bread roll with sesame seeds) and an array of flaky
pastries. Neighbourhoods like Karakoy, Ortakoy and Taksim feature plenty of
street food vendors, and the city’s Grand Bazaar is another hot spot for street
food. Down at the waterfront, vendors stand aboard boats and offer up fish
sandwiches that will only set you back about three Turkish lire. Seasonal
favourites like corn on the cob in the summer and roasted chestnuts in the
winter are also popular in Istanbul.

6. Mexico City,
Mexico

Affordable and authentic are two frequently used adjectives for
street food in Mexico City. Thousands of food stalls and taquerias line city
streets dishing up Mexican favourites like tostados, carnitas, tamales and
quesadillas. But the key street dish in this city is tacos al pastor – thinly
sliced pork that has been spit-roasted and bathed in chilli sauce, paired with
chopped onion and coriander, then rolled into a small tortilla. Try the carts in
the city’s main square, Centro Historico’s Zocalo, or the Colonia Roma
neighbourhood. For a treat, head to the cart on the corner of Delicias and
Aranda streets, which offers blue-corn tlacoyos – grilled corn patties with
beans, cheese, cactus, cilantro and salsa.

7. Ottawa, Ontario,
Canada

Often overshadowed by Vancouver and Toronto in the street food
arena, Ottawa boasts a growing mobile meal scene, with 44 food trucks and carts
already hawking their yummy goods and about 20 inventive newcomers ready to hit
the streets in May. New trucks include the Urban Cowboy, which will dish out
self-proclaimed “innovative Texan street food” and the Ottawa “Streat” Gourmet
set to feature local, seasonal eats. New specialty carts will serve everything
from frozen yogurt to churros and baked potatoes with toppings. These additions
will join the city’s perennial street food favourites like hot dog and sausage
carts, BeaverTails (fried pastries with your choice of sweet or savory toppings)
and poutine (french fries topped with gravy and cheese curds).

8.
Marrakech, Morocco

The heart of Marrakech’s street food culture is Djemaa
el-Fna, which daylights as the city’s main square, but moonlights as an
impressive spread of about 100 open-air food stalls. Adventurous foodies can
sample the traditional sheep’s head, while those with more reserved tastes can
bite into offerings like fried eggplant or couscous-based dishes. If the food
isn’t enough of a draw, the market also features performers, snake charmers and
tarot card readers. Overflowing bowls of olives and barrels of spices are
mainstays in the city’s souks, or markets. Rue El Kassabin is another key spot
to savour street food in this city. Known for its slow-roasted lamb called
mechoui, the area serves up a variety of other street food fare including bean
soup, escargot, sausage sandwiches and Moroccan-style macarons.

9.
Berlin, Germany

There are plenty of international favourites served
street side in Berlin, but two dishes are the main players: currywurst and the
döner kebab. Currywurst is essentially a deep-fried pork sausage covered in
ketchup and dusted with curry powder. Curry 36 in the Kreuzberg district is the
go-to local food stand for many lovers of this dish. You can order it with or
without the skin. Devout currywurst fans typically pair the sausage with fries
topped with ketchup and mayonnaise. Stands selling döner kebabs – gyro-like
Turkish sandwiches – also pepper the city. Berlin’s markets serve up a mix of
international street food, including items like pickled herring on bread,
falafel sandwiches and Turkish pastries. The city also just launched “Street
Food Thursdays” at the Markthalle in Kreuzberg. The weekly event will feature a
line-up of street food favourites for several hours every Thursday.

10.
Fukuoka, Japan

Other Japanese cities may be more famous, but Fukuoka is
famous for its street food. Located on the northern shore of Kyushu, the city
boasts more than 150 transportable food stalls known as yatai that open around
dusk, then pack up and vanish at the end of each night. The stands dot the city,
but large groups of them are located near Tenjin Station and on the southern end
of Nakasu Island. Specialties include tonkotsu ramen (a noodle dish featuring
broth made using pork bones and fat), mentaiko (spicy pollack roe), hakata gyoza
(pan-fried dumplings filled with cabbage and pork), iwashi mentaiko (Japanese
sardines stuffed with mentaiko) and tempura (seafood and vegetables fried in a
light tempura batter). The perfect pairing for many of these dishes? A glass of
sake.

Food trucks are the answer in Alexandria, not food carts

To the editor:

Of course the food cart program in Market Square failed (“Wheels come off food cart program,” May 16). The few carts that ever showed up had no menu or prices and were staffed by workers who were usually busy on their smartphones. Also, the food carts were put out by brick-and-mortar restaurants that never had a major investment in them and would have preferred customers go to their regular locations.

A food cart is not a food truck. The food is not cooked or prepared on the cart but rather prepared somewhere else and left to sit in the hopes that someone would come and buy it.

Because of an antiquated law, Alexandria is missing out on the food truck revolution, and the quick fix with food carts was never going to be able to compete. So the food cart program is dead, officially, several months after most thought it had been buried.

I will not belabor the idea that food trucks are not just for construction sites and back-alley dice games. People can do all that research and find websites, Twitter feeds, Food Network shows and Cooking Channel shows. The Alexandria City Council needs to move with the times and let food trucks in. It should do something for those who actually live here, rather than just hike taxes, spend money on rental bikes and triple density on the waterfront for boutique hotels.

- Michael Ford
Alexandria

Food trucks are the answer in Alexandria, not food carts

To the editor:

Of course the food cart program in Market Square failed (“Wheels come off food cart program,” May 16). The few carts that ever showed up had no menu or prices and were staffed by workers who were usually busy on their smartphones. Also, the food carts were put out by brick-and-mortar restaurants that never had a major investment in them and would have preferred customers go to their regular locations.

A food cart is not a food truck. The food is not cooked or prepared on the cart but rather prepared somewhere else and left to sit in the hopes that someone would come and buy it.

Because of an antiquated law, Alexandria is missing out on the food truck revolution, and the quick fix with food carts was never going to be able to compete. So the food cart program is dead, officially, several months after most thought it had been buried.

I will not belabor the idea that food trucks are not just for construction sites and back-alley dice games. People can do all that research and find websites, Twitter feeds, Food Network shows and Cooking Channel shows. The Alexandria City Council needs to move with the times and let food trucks in. It should do something for those who actually live here, rather than just hike taxes, spend money on rental bikes and triple density on the waterfront for boutique hotels.

- Michael Ford
Alexandria

Atlantic City’s Mustache Mobile competes for the title of best food truck in …

Known for making his pizzeria menu into fun grub, Michael Hauke owner of Tony Boloney’s, will compete on national television for “LIVE’s Truckin’ Amazing Cook-Off” hosted by ‘LIVE with Kelly and Michael.’ On Friday, May 24, tune in to watch Tony Boloney’s Mustache Mobile compete against nine other food trucks from across the country to win the grand prize.

Hauke is no stranger to winning, one of his other claims to fame is winning the Guy Fieri Cheesesteak Battle at the Atlantic City Food and Wine Festival with his popular “Cheesesteak Ole.” This award-winning concoction consists of 10 spices sirloin steak, fried onions, jack cheese, chipotle-house-sauce, lettuce and tomatoes – just the names of the dishes alone should be enough to keep you intrigued. A few unique favorites are: The S#ITFACED Chicken,Bouffant Breeze, Casino Carnivore, and Boardwalk Vampire.

If you happen to be in Atlantic City, check out the Tony Boloney’s brick and mortar location, located in Atlantic City’s inlet nearest to the Revel Resort!

Columbus Food Truck Pilot Program Sitting in Neutral

COLUMBUS, OH - Because of complaints from food-truck owners about Columbus’ plan to regulate the popular mobile restaurants, public-safety officials are delaying the start of the program and considering more changes.

Truck owners say the 18 to 20 metered parking spots the city planned to make available on a first-come, first-served basis are not enough and would create a hostile environment among owners scrambling for the spots.

The city is trying to balance allowing the trucks in already cramped areas such as the Short North, Arena District and Downtown while maintaining public safety and not hurting surrounding businesses.

A pilot program was to have been in place by June 1, but the latest back and forth with owners has led to at least a two-week delay to develop new ideas.

The popularity of the culinary cruisers has exploded in the past few years, with an estimated 150 or more of the trucks in the city.

City officials say regulating the trucks is necessary because of complaints from residents and business owners who said some trucks were leaving behind trash, creating noise and parking outside brick-and-mortar restaurants. At the same time, food-truck owners have complained that the city’s commercial sales-license policy is too difficult to understand.

Councilwoman Michelle Mills is leading the charge for regulation that appeases food-truck owners but, she said, “My No. 1 priority is public safety and protecting our residents.”

“There has to be some things that we have to say no to,” she said. “We absolutely want to support the food-truck industry, and it is a huge part of our tour-ism industry here, so we have to strike a balance.”

The city’s pilot program includes the following provisions to operate on city-owned property:

• Trucks have to obey time limits at the meters.

• Public spaces must be vacated by 3 a.m. every day.

• Trucks cannot be longer than 25 feet.

• Owners must obtain a temporary sales permit.

Find the entire article by Lucas Sullivan at The Columbus Dispatch here

Food truck industry, mobile businesses celebrated at festival in Houston …

Prateep Phanyajaroen, owner of Big Z Thai Corner Food Truck, at Houston Food Truck Fest on May 18 at Stereo Live.

Click through the slideshow to see more images.

From escargot (L’es-Car-Go) to all-natural popsicles (The Goodie Box), chicken and waffles (The Waffle Bus) to Pad Thai (Pho-Jita Fusion), food truck fans had plenty to choose from at the Houston Food Truck Fest over the weekend at Stereo Live.

Lynn Rutherford of Cypress, who scored tickets to the fest for Mother’s Day, lunched at Big Z Thai Cuisine.

“We ate some, did a loop and came back,” Rutherford said. “We ordered the papaya salad, pick-me-up beef and [crazy] taco, and they were all great.”

Click through the slideshow at right to see pictures of food, food trucks and fun at Houston Food Truck Fest.

For those who arrived at the May 18 fest — which included more than 18 mobile businesses — with full stomachs, supporting local businesses was still possible. The Picasso Bus — “Art on Wheels” — offered face-painting and more. The Shoe Box, a mobile shoe and sunglasses boutique, was also at the festival.

“I quit my job almost two years ago, and I knew I wanted to open my own boutique, and I knew I had to do it in a different way,” said Coryne Rich, owner of the Shoe Box, which is just a couple months old.

In addition to lower monthly overhead compared to a traditional brick-and-mortar location, Rich, who was influenced by successful mobile boutiques in Los Angeles, loves the flexibility of being a business on wheels.

“Houston can be very guilty of (considering a certain shopping center) hot and then (the excitement is) over,” Rich said, “and so I like the idea of not being locked in to that … and we can move and go wherever the scene is.”

Lauded Boston Food Truck to Open Restaurant in Magoun Square

Pennypacker’s, a small food truck company known for its porchetta sandwich, is planning to open its first brick-and-mortar location in Somerville’s Magoun Square.

A Facebook post from Pennypacker’s said the Somerville Zoning Board of Appeals approved plans for the restaurant on May 15 and that the Magoun square eatery could open this summer.

A staff report written by Somerville’s planning department says the restaurant will move into 514C Medford Street, a building that’s also home to K2 Market, Caprese Pizzeria and soon-to-open King of Wings.

Primarily a takeout restaurant, Pennypacker’s will have seating for 10 and will be open from 11 a.m. to 7 p.m., the staff report says.

Ward 5 Alderman Courtney O’Keefe, posting on Davis Square LiveJournal, said King of Wings is also slated to open this summer.

Pennypacker’s currently has two food trucks, one that’s regularly stationed in South Boston and another that hangs out near Boston University in Brookline.

Eater Boston says the food truck recently won “best in festival” at the Food Truck Throwdown.

Its addition to the neighborhood is helping Magoun Square become somewhat of a local food destination, with Daddy Jones, which opened in 2012, Olde Magoun’s Saloon and a number of local Brazilian-food haunts.

An attorney’s view: Food truck freedom good for Duluth

Spring has sprung, and we Minnesotans finally can escape the confines of our homes and enjoy the great outdoors. In recent years, Twin Cities residents have enjoyed the innovative culinary delights coming from Minneapolis’ and St. Paul’s food trucks.

Now, Duluth has a chance to benefit from this exciting new trend — provided that Mayor Don Ness vetoes the City Council’s adoption of regulations that would put the entire scene into a deep freeze.

The food-truck craze that’s sweeping the nation took a while to get to Duluth. Last year, the first mobile vendor started operating in Duluth, and there are only a few trucks right now. But these few trucks are serving delicious gourmet sandwiches and fresh tacos made with local ingredients to Duluth residents. They are making the city a more vibrant and exciting place to visit. And they are giving people with big ambitions but little capital a shot at the American Dream by going into business for themselves.

So with all these benefits, why on Monday did the Duluth City Council pass an ordinance that would crush food-truck freedom and cripple this exciting new industry?

The regulations the City Council passed, among other things, make it illegal for food trucks to operate within 200 feet of brick-and-mortar restaurants. This proximity restriction — which is almost half a city block by some estimates — would not just hurt the food trucks and their employees, but would force the trucks to stay away from where their customers want them the most: nearly all of Superior Street and most of downtown Duluth.

The sole purpose of the 200-foot restriction is to protect restaurants from competition. But competition is the American way, and there’s no reason for governments to choose winners and losers in the marketplace; that’s the job of consumers. No one, after all, would think it reasonable or right to prevent a Burger King from opening up within a certain distance of a McDonald’s. But that’s exactly what the proposed 200-foot restriction would do.

Those in favor of the new regulations argue food trucks have an unfair advantage over restaurants because of their mobility and supposedly lower overhead. But whatever cost savings food trucks enjoy come at a steep cost. Fixed restaurants have a host of advantages over food trucks: tables and chairs, bigger kitchens (meaning bigger menus), larger storage for inventory and the possibility of selling alcohol. Perhaps most importantly, brick-and-mortar restaurants are protected from the frigid Minnesota weather, a tremendous advantage in the North where the freezing temperatures mean food trucks cannot operate for much of the year. Restaurants shouldn’t be allowed to add to their many advantages the ability to have the government quash the competition.

Using government power to pick winners and losers in the marketplace is not just wrong, it is unconstitutional. That is why the Institute for Justice, a national civil liberties firm, launched its National Street Vending Initiative, which works to vindicate the economic liberty of vendors nationwide. As part of that initiative, the Institute for Justice sued Chicago last November because of a 200-foot proximity restriction that is identical to the one Duluth just passed.

Food-truck freedom is good for Duluth’s entrepreneurs, it is good for hungry Minnesotans looking for new food options this summer and it is good for the city. Mayor Ness, don’t give food trucks the cold shoulder. Veto the 200-foot proximity restriction, give the City Council the chance to rethink food-truck regulations, and embrace this hot new culinary trend.

Katelynn McBride is an attorney for the Minneapolis-based Institute for Justice (ij.org/streets-of-dreams-2). She wrote this exclusively for the News Tribune.

Tags:
city of duluth, opinion, editorials, business, downtown

More from around the web

Wheels come off Market Square food cart program

By Derrick Perkins

City Hall’s plan for transforming Market Square into a bustling food court hit a snag this year — lack of interest.

Officials rolled out the food cart program in spring 2011, hoping to enliven the usually quiet plaza with an array of eating options as well as tables and seats for hungry office workers, tourists and residents. Three years later, just the tables, adorned by bright yellow umbrellas, remain.

The concept, then touted by former City Councilor Rob Krupicka as Alexandria’s answer to the food truck craze, got off to an inauspicious start. Officials planned for eight carts, all deployed by brick-and-mortar Old Town restaurants, serving customers on a daily basis.

But at its peak, the program saw just five takers. By the end of the first year, two carts still vied for hungry pedestrians. And only one expressed interest in continuing last year.

Not a single restaurateur applied for the program this year.

Val Hawkins, president and CEO of the Alexandria Economic Development Partnership, points to the hassle of getting the city-approved carts to and from Market Square as one obstacle. The other is financial.

“It wasn’t really a profitable venture for these folks, for the vendors that did it,” Hawkins said. “When people ran their numbers … they could see that there was a very tight margin on that cart. When they got into it, [their concerns] were confirmed, basically.”

While Bread and Chocolate as well as Fontaine Caffe and Creperie — the two that survived the program’s inaugural year — did not return media inquiries, restaurateur Mike Anderson imagines profits didn’t meet expectations for the businesses involved.

“My guess is if everybody is making money then they would go through whatever aggravation there is to stay open,” Anderson said. “My guess is the volume of sales just wasn’t there to make it worth the effort to set up every single day.”

When Anderson stopped by Market Square, the carts seemed busy. But that doesn’t mean they were economically viable.

“What you see and what those guys actually ring up is sometimes two different things,” Anderson said.

Former Vice Mayor Kerry Donley backed the proposal when it went before city council and recalls plenty of interest from the local business community. But at the end of the day, he said, restaurateurs had to put up several thousand dollars — from $2,899 to nearly $6,000 — for the carts and then operate them along with their brick-and-mortar shops.

“I think it’s hard for existing restaurants to say, ‘Here, I’m going to invest $5,000 or whatever it costs to buy one of these carts,’ when they’re trying to run a restaurant at the same time,” Donley said. “I think there was a lot of interest in it, but I think when push came to shove … a lot of people shied away from it.”

Before retiring as deputy planning director in recent months, Barbara Ross spearheaded the initiative. Even as interested vendors dwindled, she stood by the program’s success.

The idea behind the proposal, she told the Times in fall 2011, was invigorating Market Square. And the addition of tables and chairs did just that, she said.

Officials are contacting restaurants previously interested in the program, hoping to find vendors for the summer months. If that doesn’t work, then the city needs alternative ideas for further enlivening the plaza, Donley said.

“I do think Market Square is a wonderful place, and we ought to look for better ways to utilize this attractive, peaceful open space in an urban environment,” he said. “If it’s not going to be food carts, we ought to look for other ways to make Market Square an attractive and nice place for people to congregate.”

McShane’s in East Syracuse closing, planning to open food truck: What’s in Store

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