The Phoenix Street Food Coalition has given rise to a new food-truck posse that wants to encourage the public to get out and chow down south of the railroad tracks.
The Streat Fleat Regime has been an arm of the Phoenix Street Food Coalition and has been operating at the Seed and Feed since May 1, said Devin Clough, chef and owner of Q Up! Its members serve an array of specialty foods out of their food trucks from 11 a.m. to 1:30 p.m. on Tuesdays and Thursdays at a the Seed and Feed, which is a historic landmark.
The Seed and Feed is a block south of the US Airways Center on Second Street and is now known as the Downtown District Food Court, thanks to its new occupants.
Property owner and historical preservationist Michael Levine said he wants to create a launching pad for Phoenix businesses to educate people about Phoenix’s historic places.
Levine said he wants the food trucks to help the space continue to evolve. It began when the Sturges brothers built the Hay and Grain Capitol Warehouses more than 100 years ago. The building changed in 1919 with the Goldschmidt brothers and their nephew Monte Mansfield, who ran the Phoenix Seed and Feed Company.
“I supply the space and I’ve got the permits, and they pay me a percentage of their fees,” Levine said. “It’s nominal. But I’m not a not-for-profit.”
Clough said the Phoenix Street Food Coalition was organized in part to support the trucks and its owners and to improve legislation involving the mobile-food business in Phoenix.
“We’re just a group of chefs and truck owners that are trying to put cool events and places together,” Clough said. “I mean, we’re all part of the coalition and that’s our family, and all we’re trying to do is to create on top of that.”
Although the food-truck business in the Valley is growing, Clough said, food trucks barely have a reputation compared with cities like Los Angeles and Portland that value the food-truck market.
“The Streat Fleat Regime is just another way for us to kind of educate the public about gourmet food trucks,” said Clough.
Clough faces obstacles sustaining a mobile-food business every day.
The difficulty to obtain proper zoning and permits to sell food on the streets in Phoenix and the surrounding cities makes it difficult to show the public what the mobile-food industry really is like, he said.
Shinobu Diego’s Tacos y Burritos owner and chef Marc Shelton did research and sampled dishes from food trucks traveling from Denver, Los Angeles and Dallas before settling in Phoenix to start up Shinobu Diego’s in September 2011.
He said it is difficult to obtain special permits for mobile-food businesses in the Valley, especially in Tempe and Scottsdale.
“Here in Phoenix, I’m one of the new guys so, you know, it’s been difficult,” Shelton said. “The mentality here is a little different.”
Shelton said the group has had to plan around major events like basketball or baseball games because fans use the Seed & Feed parking lot.
Owner and baker Tonya Saidi of the Mamma Toldeo’s Homemade Desserts food truck handles paperwork for the Streat Fleat Regime, she said.
Saidi started selling her desserts and specialty pies out of a tent at the farmers market. In October 2011, she bought her 1968 red Chevy van in time to sell her baked goods at the Food Truck Festival.
“We’re just a group of business owners trying to come out here and be a part of this community downtown,” Saidi said.
Giancarlo D. Alarcon, chef and co-owner of Ají Mobile Foods, has been serving Latin-American dishes out of his orange food truck since November 2011.
“It’s fun as far as food trucks,” Alarcon said. “I mean, there is still a lot we have to learn. So the learning curve is there for us as far as being new. We try to go up to all the veterans.”
The Streat Fleat Regime plans to hold a double-feature dinner and a movie soon, projecting the film on the Seed and Feed’s remaining warehouse wall, Clough said.
Setting the schedule has made the dinner and movie uncertain, Shelton said, but the Regime hopes to have at least DJs and bands play.
Coach & Willie’s might also host a happy hour during movie nights, Clough said.
The plans to hold dinner and a movie twice a month are about six weeks from being set and could run through October, Clough said.
“We’re just trying to create something for everybody,” Shelton said.
Contact the reporter at cmalecka@asu.edu
