Street Food

Food Trucks: Lessons From a Year Eating Out

Five Things I Learned Eating at Food Trucks Every Week in 2012

Our weekly bite explores the city's food trucks, one at a time, highlighting our favorite mobile dishes and snacks. Kicking off a new year of food truckin' merits a quick look back at what eating at more than twenty mobile vendors has taught me. My exploration of the food truck scene has yielded mo ... More >>

Food Truck Bite of the Week: Hot to Tot at Little Green Cyclo

Our weekly bite explores the city's food trucks, one at a time, highlighting our favorite mobile dishes and snacks. The Truck: Little Green Cyclo The Cuisine: Sustainable/Organic Vietnamese Street Food Specialty Items: Garlic noodles, bahn mi, rice & rice noodle plates Worth the Wait in Line? At pe ... More >>

Our Street Food Scene Might Be Too Twee For Its Own Good

In an interview with Food Republic, Petey Dammit, the bassist for San Francisco garage rockers Thee Oh Sees hits the nail on the head when it comes to the downside of having such an ethnically diverse and inventive street food scene here in town: It can leave the plain old meat and potatoes eaters w ... More >>

Food Events to Make Your Crazy Weekend More Delicious

So maybe you've heard: there's a lot going on in San Francisco this weekend. And it will likely result in transitpocalypse. But that doesn't mean you can't eat delicious things while you're having a ton of fun. Check out these food events on the fringes of the insanity that is America's Cup exhibiti ... More >>

Food Truck Bite of the Week: Getting Good Juju at Voodoo Van

Our weekly bite explores the city's food trucks, one at a time, highlighting our favorite mobile dishes and snacks. The Truck: Voodoo Van The Cuisine: Rock and roll cuisine Specialty Items: Alcohol neutralizing sandwiches and fried goodies Worth the Wait in Line? Possibly the only truck where waiti ... More >>

The Great Food Truck Race Features Lame Truck Design, Tyler Florence's Neck Beard

Each week, we take a quick, cautious look at what's going on with food TV. This week, The Great Food Truck Race, a one-hour show that once saw a food truck drive past it, Sundays at 9 p.m. on the Food Network. Part of the fun of eating at a food truck is hanging around the trucks themselves, with t ... More >>

Food Truck Bite of the Week: Bao to the Chairman

Our weekly bite explores the city's food trucks, one at a time, highlighting our favorite mobile dishes and snacks. The Truck: The Chairman The Cuisine: Asian Street Style Snacks Specialty Items: Steamed rice flour and baked wheat bun sandwiches Worth the Wait in Line? Mostly, but the lines can get ... More >>

SOMA StrEat Food Park: The Ultimate Restaurant Mash-Up

Our weekly bite explores the city's food trucks, one at a time, highlighting our favorite mobile dishes and snacks. The Truck: The Chairman The Cuisine: Asian Street Style Snacks Specialty Items: Steamed rice flour and baked wheat bun sandwiches Worth the Wait in Line? Mostly, but the lines can get ... More >>

Sunrise Deli Hits the Road

The Sunrise Deli food truck hit the road yesterday, serving up what has often been lauded as the best falafel in the Bay Area to eager diners on San Francisco State University campus. Serving Middle Eastern food to San Franciscans since 1984, the Sunrise Deli has expanded from its four brick an ... More >>

Bill Banning Food Trucks from Parking Near Schools Is Withdrawn

The Sunrise Deli food truck hit the road yesterday, serving up what has often been lauded as the best falafel in the Bay Area to eager diners on San Francisco State University campus. Serving Middle Eastern food to San Franciscans since 1984, the Sunrise Deli has expanded from its four brick an ... More >>

California Bill Banning Food Trucks From Parking Near Schools Is Quashed

​Assemblymember Bill Monning (D.-Monterey), who recently introduced a bill requiring food trucks to park no closer than 1,500 feet from any school during school hours, has just withdrawn the bill from the state legislature. AB-1678 raised an outcry around the state because of its potential ec ... More >>

Lawmaker Decides Not to Treat Food Trucks Like Child Molesters

​A  few weeks ago foodies across the city, including Supervisor Scott Wiener, were shaking in their boots that food trucks would be banished from existence. A new bill was circulating the assembly, which would have barred any food truck from parking within 1,500 feet of schools. And in San Fr ... More >>

Mission Bowling Club and Noe Valley Wine Merchants Near, and Food Truck News

The past 24 hours in gossip, innuendo, and cold hard facts about the San Francisco food scene. Invest in some bowling shoes, because the second restaurant-bowling alley to open in S.F. -- in less than a month -- will start setting up the pins this Monday. Inside Scoop shares some details about A ... More >>

More on Food Trucks and Schools: Shrinking SF Guidelines, Amending AB 1678

​Last week, SFoodie reported that a new bill introduced into the state assembly threatens San Francisco's growing street food scene. AB 1678, introduced by Assemblymember Bill Monning of Carmel, would prohibit food trucks from parking within 1,500 feet of any elementary or secondary school during ... More >>

New Food Truck Bill Could Kill S.F.'s Street Food Scene

​Last Tuesday, Assemblymember Bill Monning (D-Carmel) introduced AB 1678, a bill intended to prevent students from eating their lunch at food trucks instead of the school cafeteria. As it's currently written, AB 1678 would ban food trucks from parking within 1,500 feet of any school. The stat ... More >>

New Bill Treats Food Trucks Like Child Molesters

​San Francisco was put in a really difficult position when the state came up with this law barring registered sex offenders from living within 2,000 feet of schools, parks, or anywhere else children might congregate. That doesn't give that population many housing options in a 49-square-mile city. ... More >>

Supervisor Wiener Introduces Legislation to Let Food Trucks Park on Colleges

​In December 2010, the San Francisco Board of Supervisors passed new legislation revising the city's regulations for food trucks seeking to park on the street. The goal: helping San Francisco's street food scene grow and making it easier for food truck operators get up and running. In the pas ... More >>

Food Truck Frenzy Strikes Levi's Plaza

Jonathan KauffmanFoodie free for all ​What: Temporary food-truck pod Where: Levi's Plaza 1155 Battery St. When: Thursday, Feb. 2, 11:30 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. The rundown: Although most food trucks are being chased out of the Financial District, blue- and white-collar workers won't have to leave the ... More >>

Will the Bay Area's Street Food Scene Ever Rival Portland's? No.

​As I wrote several weeks ago, despite San Francisco city officials' attempts to help the city's food truck scene grow, the conflicts between brick-and-mortar restaurants downtown and food trucks applying for street-parking permits are intensifying. Trucks attempting to park in downtown Oakland ar ... More >>

SF Weekly Letters

​As I wrote several weeks ago, despite San Francisco city officials' attempts to help the city's food truck scene grow, the conflicts between brick-and-mortar restaurants downtown and food trucks applying for street-parking permits are intensifying. Trucks attempting to park in downtown Oakland ar ... More >>

Curry Up Now Owner: How Downtown Food Trucks Can Be Good Neighbors

John BirdsallCurry Up Now has been parking at Bush and Sansome for two years now.​Yesterday's food feature in the Weekly described the escalating battle between downtown restaurants and food trucks parking on FiDi streets, which began after San Francisco introduced new -- and apparently flawed -- ... More >>

Rocky Road: Food Trucks Clash with Downtown Businesses

John BirdsallCurry Up Now has been parking at Bush and Sansome for two years now.​Yesterday's food feature in the Weekly described the escalating battle between downtown restaurants and food trucks parking on FiDi streets, which began after San Francisco introduced new -- and apparently flawed -- ... More >>

As Downtown Fights Off Food Trucks, the City's New Street-Food Regulations Prove Faulty

Miguel Arias​In place of a full-length restaurant review, the food lead in this week's edition of the Weekly covers a disturbing battle that's emerging in the Financial District. Food trucks granted permits through the city's new street-food legislation have come up against organized, lawyered-up ... More >>

Oakland, Epicenter of the Taco Truck Scene, Finally Lets Food Trucks Move Downtown

Lydia Chow/FlickrMore food truck gatherings like this may be coming to downtown Oakland.​Oakland's International Boulevard has been the heart of the Bay Area's food truck scene for decades -- thanks to the benevolent (even relaxed) oversight from the city, the Fruitvale neighborhood has become the ... More >>

The Chronicle and the GGRA Go After Food Trucks

Yesterday, the San Francisco Chronicle published a flawed story about the negative impact that food trucks are having on surrounding restaurants. The Chron story, which makes the owner of Chronicle-reporter watering hole Tempest Bar its primary character, reports that the spread of food tr ... More >>

Meet the Koja Kitchen Food Truck and its $5 KoJa Sandwich

Luis Chong​Some new gourmet food trucks stretch what it means to offer an affordable menu. Fortunately, new food truck KoJa Kitchen stays true to affordability. Their signature KoJa "sandwich" is just $5.  The KoJa is a clever combination, where toasted rice cake patties act as buns for your ... More >>

Long Before Taco Trucks, Tamaleros Roamed the Streets

Tamale Ladies like ours are the forerunner of the taco truck.​We food writers over the age of 30 occasionally like to put out little reminders to you youngsters that the street-food movement in America was around long before people started selling Korean spicy pork buns out of chic trucks. Remembe ... More >>

Off the Grid Moves Under SF Chronicle on Fridays

Google MapsFood trucks park Wednesday and now Friday right under the Chronicle's collective noses​Off the Grid has been so successful at putting street food once a week on Fifth and Minna Streets, in the alley that bisects the San Francisco Chronicle, that its appearances are doubling. Starti ... More >>

Top Chef Alumnus Suvir Saran Speaks About Street Food and (Apparently) Doesn't Hate Beef

​Suvir Saran Serves up Street Food (and Then Talks About It) When: Sunday, August 28, noon to 3 p.m. Where: Fort Mason Center Cost: $150 for the whole conference Two facts you may not have known about Top Chef alumnus Suvir Saran: he loves street food, and he doesn't really hate meat. "I'm f ... More >>

Jonathan Gold, Francis Lam, Robb Walsh Speak at This Year's Street Food Conference

​SFoodie has been previewing this Saturday's Street Food Festival, but public gluttony is only the splashy half of the event. On Sunday, Aug. 21, and Monday, Aug. 22, La Cocina has also organized a National Street Food Conference, which is bringing many names from the local food scene, as well as ... More >>

Street Food Festival Is S.F.'s Biggest Culinary Event

El Huarache Loco workers make breakfast​San Francisco Street Food Festival Where: Mission District (map is here) When: Saturday, Aug. 20, 11 a.m.-7 p.m. Cost: Free admission; food as it costs San Francisco is so full of food fests that we can't even begin to count them. But Saturday's 3rd an ... More >>

Food Trucks Roll Into New Permanent Truck Stop Near Transbay Terminal

Luis Chong​As you read this, three food trucks are already dishing out the first curry and cupcakes at a new location that appears to be about as permanent as food truck spots get. The spot, named Truck Stop, is an alley off Mission between First and Fremont streets. It's open to the trucks b ... More >>

The Pushback Against Food Trucks Goes National

Jeremy Brooks/FlickrThe Curry Up Now line: alarming or promising?​ On Sunday, the New York Times' Kim Severson wrote an op-ed knitting together all the cities where the food-truck backlash is flaring. New York is pushing food trucks out of Midtown, and Seattle and Raleigh, N.C., are considering n ... More >>

Fins on the Hoof Swims/Stampedes onto Food Truck Scene

Luis ChongBasque moules frites and cauliflower soup from Fins on the Hoof​Last Saturday, SFoodie went to check out Fins on the Hoof, a food truck which debuted in late May. The clever name for this Coastal Mediterranean-style menu doesn't mean chef-owner Todd Middleton is serving hybrid lab ... More >>

Naked Chorizo, Filipino Food Truck, Offers its Pork Sausage Uncased

www.nakedchorizo.com​Chef-owner Zenia Llamas was looking for a provocative name for her new Filipino food truck which debuted in April. Naked Chorizo is a literal translation of Chorizong Hubad, a seasoned uncased pork sausage. Llamas' version is marinated and then cured for 5 days, to be us ... More >>

Yoplait Encourages Eating Disorders, Are Today's Food Truck Fans Anti-Mexican?

​Today's notes on national stories, local trends, random tastes, and other bycatch dredged up from the food media. 1. Way to encourage healthy eating, Yoplait. Salon has an essay from Mary Elizabeth Williams on an effed-up Yoplait advertising campaign. In the campaign, a woman goes twitchy at the ... More >>

Fresh Eats: Midwestern Smash Burgers Shine, Food Trucks Get Pushback

​Today's notes on national stories, local trends, random tastes, and other bycatch dredged up from the food media. 1. Way to encourage healthy eating, Yoplait. Salon has an essay from Mary Elizabeth Williams on an effed-up Yoplait advertising campaign. In the campaign, a woman goes twitchy at the ... More >>

S.F. Street Food Festival Announces 2011 Date

Hannah Quevedo/SFoodie, 2009​Mark your calendar for La Cocina's Third Annual San Francisco Street Food Festival, scheduled for Sat., Aug. 20,11 a.m.-7 p.m. La Cocina is using language like "bigger, bolder, and better than ever," and "7 times the space, 6 times the food" ― claims that referen ... More >>

Objections to Doc's of the Bay Just the Start of Pushback Against Food Trucks

John BirdsallDoc's of the Bay rolled up for lunch in Emeryville Tuesday. Will it get the chance to do the same in S.F.?​Last week, Haighteration blog's Andrew Dudley opened the window onto a brewing battle mounted by some Divis neighbors to keep startup burger truck Doc's of the Bay from obtai ... More >>

Will He Stay or Will He Go? Soul Cocina's Roger Feely May Be Outta Here Soon

sjsharktank/FlickrSoul Cocina's Roger Feely (in cap) at Off the Grid.​Ask anyone who follows San Francisco's street-food scene which vendor hustles hardest, and chances are they'll name Soul Cocina's Roger Feely. The man is everywhere. Festivals, secret after-hour street-food parties, weekly ... More >>

McSweeney's to Publish Mission Street Food Cookbook

Warning: This is not the offical cover.​An article today in Publishers Weekly revealed that San Francisco-based published McSweeney's is launching a cookbook imprint. The first release will be a quarterly publication from Momofuku's David Chang, to appear as a 12-page print periodical and an iPad ... More >>

Off the Grid: 5M Launching at Minna and Fifth St.

Google MapsThe newest Off the Grid is part of the Intersection 5M project on the ground floor of the Chronicle building. Food trucks will park in the tunnel.​Organizer Matt Cohen got the green light yesterday from the city's street gods, aka the Interdepartmental Staff Committee on Traffic and ... More >>

List: How S.F. Will Regulate Taco Trucks

Google MapsThe newest Off the Grid is part of the Intersection 5M project on the ground floor of the Chronicle building. Food trucks will park in the tunnel.​Organizer Matt Cohen got the green light yesterday from the city's street gods, aka the Interdepartmental Staff Committee on Traffic and ... More >>

New Legislation Would Make It Easier to Sell Street Food in San Francisco

Thomas R./YelpThe Liba Falafel truck parks on private property in Potrero Hill.​San Francisco is poised to streamline its rules for mobile food vending, making it easier ― and cheaper ― for street food vendors to operate on both public and private property. A Planning Commission hearing to ... More >>

If You're Stopping at Los Compadres, Get the Steak

Jonathan KauffmanClockwise from top: Al pastor, lengua, carne asada, three for $5.​ Monday, October 4, 2010 There are a lot of San Franciscans out there compensating for all the times they called a taco truck a "roach coach" by hyping street food as the most brilliant amazing superdelicious food t ... More >>

Is Emeryville Poised to Kill Its Street-Food Scene?

Laurel H./YelpLiba Falafel and Seoul on Wheels in a typical lunchtime scene in Emeryville.​The East Bay city of Emeryville has been a particularly bright spot in the Bay Area's emerging street-food scene. While San Francisco is a maze of payouts and regulations across multiple agencies, Emeryv ... More >>

Fresh Eats: The State of S.F.’s Street Food

Laurel H./YelpLiba Falafel and Seoul on Wheels in a typical lunchtime scene in Emeryville.​The East Bay city of Emeryville has been a particularly bright spot in the Bay Area's emerging street-food scene. While San Francisco is a maze of payouts and regulations across multiple agencies, Emeryv ... More >>

Off the Grid Launches in Haight and Civic Center Later This Week

Chris MacArthur/SF WeeklyThe first Off the Grid launched at Fort Mason Center in late June.​Brace yourself for San Francisco street food to expand big this week. Off the Grid organizer Matt Cohen is announcing this morning that two of the three weekly street-food events slated for city parks w ... More >>

Fresh Eats: Matt Cohen says starting a food truck isn't easy

Chris MacArthur/SF WeeklyThe first Off the Grid launched at Fort Mason Center in late June.​Brace yourself for San Francisco street food to expand big this week. Off the Grid organizer Matt Cohen is announcing this morning that two of the three weekly street-food events slated for city parks w ... More >>