It is more common now than ever. Food trucks driving around Tampa. The hit TV Cooking Channel show ‘Eat Street” has a variety of great delicious food items just a footstep away. You don’t have to drive to your favorite food destination. It drives to you. Wow and now Tampa has experienced the light of eating out of a truck! Not just the ice cream sandwiches from the neighborhood circus music good humored drivers of yesteryear. These brightly painted billboard trucks are equipped with fully positioned hi-tech kitchen appliances with staffs of 3-5.
This first ever Food Truck Rally event was held at the Hyde Park Presbyterian Church and had well over 3000 hungry foodies attending this epic event. The 10 brightly decorated trucks, painted food trailers and tents tackled the task of feeding the well tamed but starved crowd. Diner trucks with names Fire Monkey, Wicked Wiches, Killer Samich, Fat Tortilla and our good friend, retired from the behind the counter cafe, Michele Faedo’s famous Ybor City ‘deviled crabs.’ Social networking majorly helped make awareness of this new found food epidemia. People were coming from all areas of Tampa Bay and around the state to experience the food truck eats. Many of the vendors ran out of food. Pretty early in fact! Amazing!!! A slow start but by 11:30 am the side streets and parking lots in Hyde Park Village were clogged up with trance smelling beings heading in a similar smokey direction. ‘Go to the Food Trucks!’ The lines swirled around without any ropes or direction. Included in the maze of people attending was Tampa Mayor Bob Buckhorn. I too, like the other thousands attending enjoyed the change in the autumn climate for great tasting food items and outside experiences that led me to Hyde Park on Saturday.
This was definitely a great staged, Facebook marketed and planned event. But don’t fret if you didn’t make this spectacular nuance. Another Food Truck Rally is set October 22nd at Christ Fellowship Church on Sligh Ave. There are hopes that the number of trucks at this next event will double. I’ll be there!