On Saturday, more than 100 food and drink vendors set up shop in San Francisco’s Mission neighborhood for the fourth annual San Francisco Street Food Festival, hosted by La Cocina, whose mission is to help low-income food entrepreneurs start their own businesses. Food trucks rolled in, tents popped up, carts lined up, and thousands of people came. (Story continues below.)
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Those in one of the longest lines waited to buy eight-dollar fried garlic bread topped with melting burrata from State Bird Provisions, which Bon Appétit recently rated one of The Hot Ten Best New Restaurants. Others waited to pay four dollars for three slices of maple-glazed bacon from Pinx, which won the festival’s Vote for Your Vendor contest in 2011. (The four winners this year are Banh Mi Love You Long Time, Rice Paper Scissors, Little Red Dot Kitchen and Mozzeria. They all were awarded free entry to the festival.)
Festival Food in the Peninsula
But if you missed this year’s festival, never fear. You can still enjoy some of the featured street food at locations closer to home.
The Hapa SF Filipino food truck heads to the Urban Market in San Mateo on some Mondays, Off the Grid in Redwood City on Fridays, and the Google campus whenever it is invited to cater an event. Curry Up Now, which serves Indian cuisine, joins Off the Grid as well, and it parks at The Willows Market in Menlo Park some Mondays. TaÃno’s Puerto Rican food truck parks in Pacifica, and Kasa Indian Eatery travels down to San Mateo for the Moveable Feast on Wednesdays. You can follow all the individual truck schedules on Twitter and Facebook.
Curry Up Now and another featured truck, El Tonayense which serves Mexican food, join 12 other trucks at Santa Clara University from March through October, selling concessions to fans at San Jose Earthquakes games.
Blue Bottle Coffee, one of the better-known vendors at the festival, has some kiosks in San Francisco and also sells its coffee at Philz Coffee in San Jose and Palo Alto and at many other locations throughout the Peninsula.
Some of the SF Street Food Festival vendors, like Kung Fu Tacos, come south when their businesses are invited to park outside events. The Southern Sandwich Co. is one of many trucks working on getting San Mateo County health permits, so look out for them in the future.
Food Trucks Gather
Urban Market, Off the Grid, Moveable Feast and Mobile Gourmet are all Bay Area food truck congregations where hungry crowds can experience the street food festival atmosphere.
Urban Market takes place at the San Mateo Caltrain Station at 385 1st Ave. from 4:30–8:30 p.m. on Mondays. Redwood City hosts the Off the Grid food truck event every Friday from 10:30 a.m.–1:30 p.m. at 555 Broadway. Mobile Gourmet occurs Wednesdays from 11 a.m.–2 p.m. at the Hiller Aviation Museum in San Carlos. Moveable Feast serves San Mateo, San Jose and Palo Alto at multiple locations throughout the week.
