ottawa foodies

If we don't have enough nice food trucks already the city has issued permits for four more food trucks to open this year! Here is the article from the Citizen: ottawacitizen.com I will now have to make a trip to Woodroffe and Maitland to visit my beloved Mayflower truck... I loved the resto on Elgin and would love it if the truck were within walking distance. I'm sure it will be worth the bus ride though.

Woodward, not Woodroffe.

So is this the big comeback of the Mayflower that the owner hinted at a few months ago? A food truck in a fairly inaccessible location (to who were his patrons on Elgin)? If so, brutal.

Sounds like a great location to me...that area has a ton of office and industrial buildings. As far as I know, most food trucks get the majority of their business from the workday lunch crowds and most trucks are not even open in the evenings or weekends. Not everyone in this city works downtown, and I appreciate the trucks that take that into consideration!

The owner billed it as a comeback. It's a different concept in a completely new location. Most of the regulars were neighbours. Good for him for trying to re-establish his business, but I suspect his Elgin patrons will not see this as a comeback at all, since it's completely different and inaccessible to his loyal walk-up crowd.

Clyde/Woodward/Laperriere does have a lot of truck traffic that may or may not take to the Mayflower truck - depends a lot on the menu and prices. My brother used to have a chip truck there on Laperriere near Clyde back in the 70's/80's maybe into the 90's and made a living parked from about 11 to 3 or so. He even sold my mom's macaroni and cheese and her chili there. I have another bro still working those hours year round out on Old Innes Road with his own truck. Again, a lot of truckers and industrial and office workers out there who will support a decent food truck, even if the owner is a bit crusty!

My understanding is that the old manager of the Mayflower restaurant is the owner of the food truck. He was never the owner of the restaurant. Who is the "crusty" one?

European Deli, Nicastros, and Dutch Imports also have a lot of office workers visiting at lunch (although further south than Clyde & Woodward area). I sympathize with those who work in the more suburban area since work nearly took me to the Qualicum building in the Baseline and Greenbank area last year. But the Mayflower had a loyal following downtown and his regulars may feel slighted by opening a truck that far away. Hopefully the city will continue to grant more permits each year and more trucks will open to serve the west and east ends.

I believe that this sounds like the same location as the old Leroy's/Detroit Soul Food truck. It didn't last too long there as I always thought that it was a poor match because people will want to try it out at least once, but might not want to keep going back there over and over and over again which is what you need if the truck is going to last in the long term. It's industrial but you have a limited audience. It's not downtown and you'd need a lot of repeat and continual business to survive. Perhaps the Mayflower is a better bet than the Soul Food truck.

Yes, I meant manager instead of owner. Seems like the manager would have even more of an idea about what his customers want....

@Tree Pug the crusty one is my bro, chip truck owner on Old Innes.

It would be nice if the City of Ottawa would recognize the mobility of these restaurants with wheels and allow them to rotate through the different spots.

But then how would poor defenseless restaurants like farm team survive?

I'm thrilled that the smoke truck will be in Hintonburg. I missed the Trailer Pork Boys last summer.

Angry Dragonz is now open for the season! They actually opened on Wednesday and I finally made it out to their food truck today. I ordered the usual (well "my" usual;) involving a Dragonz Bowl and an egg roll. The food is just as delicious as ever...

Caribbean Cruiser opened for the season last week. Same location as last year (Merivale at Capilano).

Stella Luna now has a gelato cart set up on Bank right in front of 240 Sparks. There goes my girlish figure-;)

Mine, too.

le sigh

Yeah and right across the street from Stella, the cart that sells Asian tacos now has Suzie Q doughnuts.

uhmm... I need to take my dad for blood tests every two weeks at Montreal Rd and vanier.. so might be a chance to give the Peruvian truck a try when they come up..

Sula's awesome tacos, Suzie Q donuts, and Stella gelato. At a single intersection.

I'm dead.

Question from the person sitting next to me: Are there any food trucks that serve salad?

I don't mean what they put next to the food, or anything in a purely ornamental place. I believe we're talking about an actual salad-as-a-meal kind of thing. Crazy.

'Wiche's Cauldron in Stittsville serves a salad as a lunch.

I think Streat has salads in their rotation from time to time. They serve a different menu every day so you'd have to check Twitter / Facebook regularly though.

OK prepare to slag me, but on our recent annual back to the prairies road trip we discovered McDonalds salads. They are pretty decent, and of the two I tried (greek/garden) I preferred the garden, with grilled chicken. Not a food truck, but fast and decent.

Streats' salad days are stupid good. Last week i had glorious curried quinoa, tasty shrimp salad, and this spinach/potato/bacon salad thing that verged on a religious experience.

Harvey's has a very good "side salad" and it is under $3 and weights 300 grams.
I buy them most of the winter instead of crappy independent at Billings.

The Harvey's salad has lettuce,tomato,cucumber slices, purple cabbage, shredded carrot and you get 2 salad dressings (I forget the brand).

There is also a coupon online for $4.99 burger combo and you can get a salad instead of fries.
I like the veggie burger,so now a great deal- veggie burger and salad and drink for $4.99