Montgomery County Taking Proactive Approach In Support Of Food Trucks
Montgomery County officials think they can avoid the controversies that have threatened food trucks in other places, even as its food truck community grows into a more organized and more prominent alternative to the corner sandwich shop.
Dan Hoffman, Montgomery’s first ever chief innovation officer, is working on a program that would pinpoint locations where food trucks could be successful without interfering with the business of traditional brick-and-mortar restaurants.
Hoffman said the county hopes to identify and input “food truck-friendly” locations into a data set that would be accessible at the county’s Data Montgomery website, with the hope the info would lead to the creation of apps with which food truck operators could reserve space ahead of time or let customers know where they’ll be on a particular day.
“We want to be proactive. We want to create some consistency and some reliability for food trucks,” Hoffman said. “These are small businesses we want to embrace.”
Just not necessarily in areas already populated with restaurants.
Montgomery County Food Trucks Start Website
A group of Montgomery County food trucks have started a website, another measure of how the county’s food truck operators are organizing to help promote each other.
It’s also another sign of how truck owners are coming together in case they face the type of backlash trucks in D.C. and Arlington have.
The website, MocoFoodTrucks.com, includes schedules for 16 of the county’s most popular trucks, including many that make frequent stops in Bethesda.
It also includes a blog and contact info for catering requests.
Brick-and-mortar restaurant owners have traditionally seen food truck owners as competitors who don’t have to spend as much in operating costs. In Bethesda, food truck operators who do set up shop in downtown areas say it’s not uncommon to be harassed by meter attendants. Many prefer to set up in the corporate office parks near Rockledge Drive, where parking is easier and a steady flow of customers is guaranteed.
In September, a group of about 12 vendors discussed how to better communicate marketing strategies and routes and how to fight regulations such as the county’s “9 a.m. to dusk” rule.
The county does not permit trucks to operate past sundown, which effectively limits vendors to lunchtime hours during the winter months.
Later this week, the D.C. Committee on Business, Consumer and Regulatory Affairs will review a proposal that would restrict food trucks to certain areas of the city.
Whitman’s Festival Of The Arts Hits 50 Tonight
Today will mark the 50th time Walt Whitman High School celebrates its annual Festival of the Arts, the event that showcases all types of works and performances from the school’s students.
This evening’s program will also feature a selection of local food trucks and caterers.
It’s the 50th year of the school (7100 Whittier Blvd.), which has produced an interesting group of alumni that includes movie director Spike Jonze,’87, U.S. Senators Gordon Smith, ’70, and Mark Pryor, ’81, the billionaire Rales brothers (Steven, ’69, and Mitchell, ’74), celebrity news personality Giuliana Rancic, ’92, and football star Anthony Dilweg, ’84.
Tonight’s festival will have student paintings, sculptures, drawings, photography, graphic designs, ceramics and other works. The chorus, orchestra and jazz band will all perform and theater students will put on one-act plays.
The school’s arts department sponsors the event, which this year will include food from the GoFish food truck, Carmen’s Carts, BGR The Burger Joint, Armand’s Pizza, Ben & Jerry’s and the Stix food truck.
The event runs from 6 p.m. to 9 p.m. today and tomorrow in the school’s gym.
Pepe Food Truck Bringing Free Sandwiches To Bethesda Row
The food truck from D.C. restaurateur Jose Andres will be giving away sandwiches when it stops in Bethesda Row next week.
A Facebook announcement this afternoon from the Pepe Food Truck said the first 100 sandwiches will be free when the truck stops near the Equinox gym (4905 Elm St.) on Tuesday, Feb. 26 from 11:30 a.m. to 2 p.m. Equinox is partnering in the promotion.
Sandwiches include shredded beef, eggplant, fried chicken, Spanish pulled pork and the Futbol Club Barcelona, or club sandwich. The menu also includes chicken noodle soup, spinach and garbanzo bean salad, chips and patatas bravas.
One of Andres’ Jaleo tapas restaurants is on Bethesda Row (7271 Woodmont Ave.) and the chef credited with popularizing tapas in the U.S. lives in Bethesda.
Flickr photo by justgrimes
Burger and Breakfast Food Stand Moving
Less than two months after opening up shop on Rugby Avenue, a food stand serving up breakfast and burgers is on the move.
Green Eggs and Burgers will reopen tomorrow at 7725 Old Georgetown Rd., a closer-to-downtown location the family-owned business hopes means more visibility.
The new location, at the corner of Fairmont Avenue and Old Georgetown Road, is at the recently shuttered BP gas station.
Property owner Jay Hellman said creating space for a group of food trucks on the property is one possibility.
In the past, food trucks have expressed reservations about coming into downtown Bethesda because of difficulty finding street parking and concern from the brick-and-mortar restaurant community.
Family Opens Organic Burger, Breakfast Food Stand On Rugby Avenue
Two sets of brothers saw a need for all-day breakfast food and organic hamburgers in Bethesda.
So with the blessing of a local property owner, they started the Green Eggs and Burgers food stand (a play on the title of the best-selling Dr. Seuss book) in an underused parking lot on Rugby Avenue, across the street from the Palisades apartment complex.
Two days into what co-owner “Richie Rich” Lal described as the operation’s soft-opening, the stand has garnered a number of customers from nearby office buildings on the north end of Woodmont Triangle. Lal and his crew, which includes his brother Raj and his cousins Issa Noorestani and Edrees Noorestani, ran out of a few items during the lunch rush on Wednesday.
“We’ve had a great response so far,” Lal said. “We canvassed all the buildings and people were like, ‘Oh, you guys are saviors. Promise me you’re gonna stay here.’”
For the immediate future, the operation won’t be going anywhere. Lal, a Fairfax, Va., resident, said the group couldn’t get Montgomery County permits for a portable food truck, so they settled on the stand which is permitted for the Rugby Avenue location only.
Lal said Issa Noorestani was a partner with a kabob food truck in Washington, D.C., before heading off to college at Penn State. When he got back to the area, the group got together to form their own business and Bethesda was immediately appealing.
“Bethesda is the next growing market,” Lal said. “Obviously, this is a booming area. The clientele is good. We just figured D.C. is full. D.C. is literally saturated with food trucks. We figured let’s do something different.”
The stand serves a variety of burgers using organic beef and produce and breakfast favorites, like french toast. Lal hopes the stand can lead into a food truck or even a brick-and-mortar establishment. The group is on the short list for a food truck license in D.C.
And Lal is well aware of the simmering conflict between Bethesda brick-and-mortars and food trucks, part of the reason why a group of Montgomery County’s most prominent truck owners got together for a first-ever informal meeting last month.
The Jaffe Group, which owns the lot and the nearby office building, connected with Lal to use the lot until it’s sold and redeveloped, potentially into a Class A medical or office building.
Lal is trying to get the word out through the usual social media means, but don’t be surprised to see a walking cow mascot handing out cards in Bethesda in the next few weeks. A smiling cow holding a hamburger is part of Green Eggs and Burgers’ logo, displayed on the bright yellow food stand.
“Yellow makes people hungry,” Lal said. “We had to go with yellow.”
Morning Notes
B-CC Students Deal With Loss of ‘Color Day’ — There were no reported problems at Bethesda-Chevy Chase High School last Friday, the day the school dropped “color day” and replaced it with “Blue and Gold Day” after a number of alcohol-related and hazing incidents last year. One group of students did hang a banner that read “RIP COLOR DAY.” [The Gazette]
Pepe the Food Truck Comes to Bethesda — The popular D.C. food truck made its first trek into Bethesda yesterday, stopping in front of chef Jose Andres’ Bethesda Row Jaleo location. [Jaleo Bethesda via Facebook]
County Looks to Redistribute Unused Food — Modeled on a program at the University of Maryland, Montgomery County Councilwoman Valerie Ervin (D-Silver Spring) yesterday announced plans for a food recovery process from restaurants, hospitals, supermarkets and schools to go to local food banks and shelters. [Washington Post]
Free Flu Shots at Montgomery Mall — WTOP, Adventist HealthCare, Washington Adventist Hospital, Shady Grove Adventist Hospital and M&T Bank are sponsoring free flu shots tomorrow (Thursday) morning at Westfield Montgomery Mall (7101 Democracy Blvd.). The first 103 people at the event, in the second level food court, will get free flu shots. The next 100 shots will be $25 each. The flu shot clinic will be 7 a.m. to 9:30 a.m. [WTOP]
Flickr photo by Michael Adler2
Morning Notes
Celebrated D.C. Food Truck Coming North — Chef Jose Andres’ Pepe food truck will make stops at NIH, Bethesda Row and Friendship Heights, the company announced yesterday. [Huffington Post DC]
Rock Creek Park Runners Report Owl Attacks — A number of runners in Rock Creek Park have recently reported owl “attacks” during their jogs. A Bethesda man said his running group was attacked along Glen Cove Parkway. [WTOP]
$499 Million Contract Awarded to Renovate National Intelligence University — A Baltimore company was awarded the contract to renovate Bethesda’s Intelligence Community Campus along Sangamore Road. The campus, which was vacated by the National Geospatial Intelligence Agency as part of BRAC, will include the National Intelligence University and employees from a number of other agencies, totaling 3,000 employees by 2017. [The Gazette]
Flickr photo by gastwa
Montgomery County Food Trucks Getting Organized
For now, food truck operators in Montgomery County don’t face the level of animosity from brick-and-mortar restaurants their counterparts in Arlington County or Washington, D.C. do.
They want to be ready just in case.
A group of some of the county’s most popular mobile vendors got together Monday in Rockville for a first ever informal meeting of Montgomery County food truck owners.
According to Curley Q’s BBQ owner David Cornblatt, the group of about 12 vendors discussed how to better communicate marketing strategies and routes and how to fight regulations such as the county’s “9 a.m. to dusk” rule.
The county does not permit trucks to operate past sundown, which effectively limits vendors to lunchtime hours during the winter months.
So far, though, Go Fish! food truck owner Missy Carr said she hasn’t seen police enforce many regulations, including the “ice cream truck rule” that requires a line of customers at a mobile vendor in order for it to remained parked.
“I have spoken with police officers. It’s not like they’re well-versed on food vendor licensing. I don’t think they’re worried about it. It’s not as big of an issue,” Carr said. “It’s kind of one of those things, you know it’s out there. You know it can be a problem at some point. It’s not a problem now so do you want to call attention to it?”
Some Bethesda brick-and-mortar operators have publicly expressed concern.
Jeff Heineman, owner of Grapeseed American Bistro + Wine Bar and Freddy’s Lobsters & Clams on Cordell Avenue, told Bethesda Magazine he’s worried food trucks could take away from his restaurants’ already slim profit margins if they grow in popularity.
Jon Rossler, owner of the Corned Beef King truck, said for now it makes more financial sense to serve at corporate office parks at prescheduled food truck events or farmers markets.
Parking is difficult to find in downtown Bethesda and there are no guarantees that customers will be waiting.
Rossler is working on launching a second food truck that might start serving Bethesda.
Cornblatt, who makes a weekly stop in downtown Bethesda, said he’s partnered with owners of established brick-and-mortars such as Black’s Bar & Kitchen and BlackFinn to hand out free drink coupons to their establishments to his food truck customers.
“I don’t want to be a thorn in anybody’s side. If anything, we want to do what we can to give to them,” said Cornblatt, who helped organize the meeting.
“I want to get organized so we can keep the peace with the brick-and-mortars,” Cornblatt said. “We don’t want to be chasing our tails and scurrying about.”
Morning Notes
Haven Pizzeria to Debut Pizza Trucks — Owner Tiger Mullen is starting the Tomato Flyer Pizza Co. to go along with his popular store at 7137 Wisconsin Ave. He bought three 1948 International Harvester KB-7 trucks, which he hopes to have outfitted with a brick pizza oven and all the other amenities by February or March. [Bethesda Magazine]
Local Sportscaster and Business Owner Dan Daniels Dies — The Bethesda resident and longtime radio and television voice of Redskins, Senators, University of Maryland and U.S. Naval Academy games died Monday at Suburban Hospital. Daniels and his wife opened Dan Daniels Printing in Bethesda in 1973. He was 90. [Washington Post]
Police Still Looking for Bethesda “Hugger” — Police have received no tips in their search for a man they believe inappropriately hugged three women in Bethesda and North Bethesda in three incidents on June 5, July 10 and Aug. 8. [Bethesda Patch]
Flickr photo by ehpien
