Short Leash Hot Dogs fans like Meghan Storms will soon be able to enjoy the food truck’s favorite dishes on a more regular basis at a permanent location downtown.
“They’re my favorite food truck,” said Storms, a Tempe-based developmental specialist and long-time Short Leash customer. “(The hot dogs) are consistently delicious, flavorful combustions.”
Owner Brad Moore said he and his wife, Kat, are planning to open Short Leash’s first permanent location at 110 E. Roosevelt St. in early to mid June. They said they hope to correspond the new location’s opening with the truck’s third anniversary, June 5.
Moore said Short Leash’s brick-and-mortar location will be a sit-down restaurant that will serve their normal menu items plus some of the specials that have been featured on their Sit…Stay menus.
Some of these dishes will become staple menu items, like the Crispy Dog — a jalapeño and cheese wiener fried in a mini corn tortilla and served with an avocado cream sauce, Moore said.
“Like a lot of food trucks, we’ve struggled with not having a physical kitchen … for things like chopping ingredients and storage,” Moore said.
Short Leash will also be adding salads and more sausage entrees similar to the bratwurst sliders in pretzel buns that are the truck’s Featured Dog from time to time, Moore said.
He mentioned that the restaurant will serve local beers and wines, possibly including ales from Tempe-based brewery Four Peaks, once the restaurant acquires a liquor license.
The central, downtown location that Short Leash has already started moving into, right next door to downtown Jazz club the Nash, seemed like it was meant to be theirs, Moore said.
“It chose us,” he said.
Moore said that the space became available and the owners reached out to Short Leash, knowing the truck owners had been interested in the location in the past.
“We built our business (downtown),” he said, so it was important to the couple that their brick-and-mortar location be downtown as well.
He said that, eventually, Short Leash may offer a brunch option to parallel with the Nash’s Sunday jam sessions.
For Scottsdale residents and first-time Short Leash customers Victor Perez and Kaitlin Rose, coming downtown for restaurants can be a bit of an ordeal but they said they think that the hot dogs they tried at the Wednesday night Open-Air Market, were worth it.
“We already have a list of a couple restaurants that we make the trek for,” said Perez, a 37-year-old cook at Orange Sky, located at the Talking Stick Resort. “We’ll definitely add them to the list.”
Short Leash will keep most of their regular truck locations, which Moore said is the “core of our business,” but they will be scaling back so their staff is not spread too thin.
“We know how to run a food truck, but this is something totally new,” he said. “We are expecting growing pains.”
Moore also said sometime this week Short Leash will be rolling out their second truck, which they announced on their Facebook page in late February and previewed at the Devoured Phoenix Culinary Classic.
With the new location, Moore said Short Leash will be more flexible and possibly able to offer some kind of student deal or discount. He said they have been unable to do this operating out of their truck due to the team’s efforts to keep their prices as low as possible.
Moore said the new location will be open Tuesday through Saturday 11 a.m. – 2 p.m. and 5 p.m. – 10 p.m. to start.
“Honestly, we’ve kind of been crapping our pants,” Moore said, adding that the Short Leash team is nervous but excited for the changes ahead.
Contact the reporter at evie.carpenter@asu.edu
