Street Cart Chic

A New York food cart. Photo: jasonlam/Flickr

Call it the Summer of the Street Vendor: Food trucks and carts are, it seems, this season's version of artisanal pickles or pastured meats. Whether you live in Los Angeles, Portland or New York, each day seems to spawn a new vendor -- and they're not selling your granddad's dirty-water dogs.

Words like "organic," "natural" and "handmade" are being slapped on everything from burritos to burgers, giving street meat an almost saintly aura and the occupation of street vendor a previously unheard of cachet. Street cart fever has spawned all sorts of coverage, from city-specific blogs to nationwide podcasts like VendrTV.

As with other low-profile aspects of the food industry that have suddenly found themselves ready for their close-ups, the sudden glamour of the street vendor trade obscures the everyday challenges -- some small, some overwhelming -- that come with selling food (no matter how pedigreed) from a big metal box on wheels.

Interviews with two vendors and a call to Slashfoodies to help us find great American street vendors after the jump.
It can be a dusk till dawn undertaking, replete with traffic woes, thousands of dollars in parking tickets, harassment from police and other vendors, and exposure to all sorts of weather.

In New York, Samira Mahboubian and her husband recently opened Street Sweets, a colorful truck selling everything from ginger shortbread cookies to Nutella-filled croissants. Despite the innately cheerful nature of their wares, Mahboubian reports that "the biggest challenge has been adversity from other vendors or restaurant owners with al fresco dining" who feel threatened by her presence. She's still looking for a more permanent location to park the truck, which she launched after spending a decade as a marketing director for Ralph Lauren's Polo line.

Two blocks away from Mahboubian's truck, two workers at El Rey del Sabor, a tiny Mexican cart selling exemplary tacos, tortas and huaraches, said that traffic was the biggest challenge to their work. Their reluctance to give their names, however, suggested that perhaps they had other problems to contend with.

It's these types of problems that led in part to the recent publication of Vendor Power!, a fold-out pamphlet put out by New York's Center for Urban Pedagogy and The Street Vendor Project. The pamphlet, which is printed in four languages, is designed to help New York's approximately 12,000 street vendors understand their rights, as well as the rules and regulations that apply to their trade. In addition to providing some historical context (both Macy's and Bloomingdale's started as street carts), it lists statistics that are both interesting (2 percent of street vendors speak Tibetan) and sobering (the average New York street vendor makes $14,000 a year). It's a fascinating glimpse of the tip of the vending iceberg, and provides thought-provoking context for all of those $2 tacos and $5 lamb pita sandwiches.

Over the next two months, Slashfood will interview different street food vendors around the country, asking them about the challenges of their job and the work that goes into the food they sell. If you have a favorite vendor, comment here, and we'll try to track a few of them down!