INSIDE DISH: 'Edibles' team returns with moveable feast


by Mason King, IBJ Inside Dish, July 29, 2011


Copyright 2011 IBJ.com






Welcome back to IBJ’s video feature “Inside Dish: The Business of Running Restaurants.”


Our subject this week is Duos, a mobile concept in the new tradition of food trucks with a pedigree going back to the 1990s downtown vegetarian hotspot Essential Edibles. After said eatery met its demise in 1997, husband-and-wife founders David and Becky Hostetter went into a long period of mourning, with no desire to start another business. But the restaurant bug returned a couple of years ago when Becky began considering going mobile, which had significantly lower entry costs and afforded more control over the eatery’s fate.

“We’re able to make whatever we want, when we want, and go out when we want,” said Becky, 56, the culinary mind behind both Essential Edibles and Duos.




“It’s such a great idea to have food that people want and to sell it directly to them, instead of having a restaurant,” said 60-year-old David, who also has worked for St. Elmo Steak House, primarily as a server, for more than two decades. “The costs are less. Just the romanticism of selling food and having people come up to you on the street and buy it is really cool.”


The duo behind Duos applied lessons learned from the implosion of Essential Edibles, which grew more quickly than its capital reserves could support. “We weren’t very good business people,” David said. “When we knew we wanted to do this [Duos], the first thing we did was hire an attorney. The second thing we did was hire an accountant.”


Duos got off the ground without the weight of significant debt, as the Hostetters used their savings to buy a $30,000 custom-made trailer outfitted with a full operating kitchen. They also socked away $30,000 for start-up expenses.


“I wanted to have at least three months of operating expenses in the bank,” David said. “And we didn’t know for sure what our operating expenses were going to be.”


One obvious expense would be renting kitchen space. Marion County health regulations require mobile food vendors to perform the majority of their food preparation in an approved and licensed stationary kitchen. (The truck or trailer also must meet health code requirements.) The Hostetters enlisted the shared-use facility Indy’s Kitchen at 2442 Central Ave. Its kitchen-use rates range from $14 to $24 per hour, depending on total time per month and peak or off-peak usage.


The Hostetters settled on offering a lunch-time menu that changed every week, with both meat and vegetarian options. The emphasis would be on seasonally appropriate grub, with ingredients from local farms and other vendors, when possible.


“Food cost is a particular issue for us,” Becky said. “You have to keep a particular price point, but I’m also trying to use as much local product as possible, and sometimes those two don’t speak together well. Local organic produce is expensive.”


The Hostetters invited local chef and former Essential Edibles employee John Garnier to become a third owner, with a sweat-equity contribution. They first hit the streets in December, which provided a rude introduction to outdoor vending.


“We went out maybe once a week in December, just getting the feel of it,” David said. “It snowed a lot. Our first big gig in early January was a First Friday event. It was 8 degrees out. The water froze. It was horrible. But we had lines of people coming to our food, so we knew the demand was there.


“It just took us to May before the weather cooperated with us, for us to go out and be successful. We’ve seen really steady progress through this year and think we will until the end of the year.”


The Duos trailer has developed a regular rotation of lunch-time sites during the week, including the Wishard Hospital Farmer’s Market on Tuesdays, the intersection of Vermont and Alabama streets on Wednesdays, and White River State Park on Thursdays.


The owners hope to hem to a strategy of controlled growth. Gross sales have increased from $3,262 in January to $14,724 in June, with $10,000 per month currently being the break-even point.


“We’re making a little bit of money now,” David said, noting that new expenses await, including about $20,000 for a used truck to pull the trailer. (It currently is being towed by Garnier’s overtaxed 1995 Chevrolet Suburban.)


Duos also employs a third chef, as well as a part-time kitchen staffer for food prep. David Hostetter said he hoped to bring on four more employees by year’s end, which would allow the trailer to add a second daily shift. “We’d like to be out twice a day by next year, and Becky and John can’t be everywhere all the time,” he said.


In the video at top, the Hostetters describe their entry back into the restaurant game, developing the Duos concept and trailer, lessons learned from Essential Edibles, and their plans for slow and steady growth.

Duos – Slow Food Fast

Craftedspoon, Posted by JD on Tuesday, July 12, 2011

Copyright © 2011, Craftedspoon.com 

  

The trailer and the food might move fast but the conversations will help you slow down during lunch at Duos. Keep an eye out in the Indianapolis community for the Duos food trailer.

Food vendors in Indy just keep on truckin’
Indianapolis Star. July 7/2011 Crystal Carreon
Copyright 2011 - Indianapolis Star - All Rights Reserved


Pots rattle with boiling rice. Onion, sliced like confetti, pops in the wok, as the chef drizzles rosewater into a large bowl of flour and eggs. Then, cardamom pods are crushed to prepare for a week’s worth of South Indian cuisine.
Is this a peek at the newest ethnic restaurant in town? Not quite . . . at least, not in the brick-and-mortar sense. The menu under way is for one in a fleet of new food options -- fresh from a truck.

Once largely a bicoastal trend, tricked-out food trucks are rolling into Indy, steering stepped-up street food and gourmet-fusion fare onto our plates. And unlike the greasy grub of yesterday, today’s mobile meals lean toward locally grown, slow-cooked and organic fare.

“I have a lot of faith in our Midwest palates,” said Becky Hostetter, the chef behind the Duos food truck, while prepping her South Indian menu recently. “Our new customers are growing.”

Customers also are lining up at Mabel on the Move, the creation of local mom Kate McKibben to serve healthy comfort food; and Tom Rockwell’s Hoosier Fat Daddy BusCafe, featuring slow-cooked American favorites.
Many food truck chefs prepare their meals in commercial kitchens. Food is either stored overnight for next-day service or loaded onto vehicles that day. Lunchtime locations can vary daily -- from parking lots to sidewalks -- and are advertised on Twitter, Facebook and the food trucks’ websites.

The fact that high-quality food trucks have arrived in Indianapolis doesn’t surprise Tim Zagat, co-founder of the Zagat Survey, the iconic guide that has driven restaurant trends around the world based on consumer reviews.
“I think food trucks are a very important phenomenon all over the country,” said Zagat, days after organizing a sold-out food truck festival in Manhattan. “They are increasingly able to produce fine food.”

But what’s driving this phenomenon?

Zagat cited growing diversity and the economy. Lower operating costs for mobile restaurants, coupled with rising expectations about our food, make it good business.

And with more trucks trolling sidewalks, local food and wine experts are taking note.

Meredith Easley of Easley Winery welcomes the food truck boom and said she is making plans to court the roving restaurants for “Taste of Downtown,” the annual August festival at her family’s winery on North College Avenue.
“The idea is not familiar in the Midwest . . . good, quality food, from food trucks,” she said during a recent event with the Hoosier Fat Daddy BusCafe at the winery. “It’s changing the culture.”

Unlike the cutthroat food truck wars in California, or the crowded festivals in New York, many of the food truck chefs here say they want to create a sense of community around healthier food. They want to know their customers and make quality food accessible and affordable. Most items range from $3 to $7.

Duos’ Hostetter, who ran a vegetarian restaurant more than a decade ago, said the response to her menu, often an eclectic mix of hormone-free beef or vegetarian dishes, has been inspiring.

“I just feel like there is openness and a willingness to try something different,” she said. “I want to bring food that engages people, our community, our neighborhoods.”

Recently at Indy’s Kitchen, the commercial space Duos rents to prepare food, Hostetter, her business partner, John Garnier, and cook, Anthony Perry, synchronized their movements to their tasks: Garnier chopped onions, Perry peeled potatoes, and Hostetter looked over the recipe for rosewater cardamom cake.

The next day, T.J. Osborne dodged light rain to grab a Duos lunch at Wishard Hospital’s farmers market, a weekly event promoting healthy choices.

“We could walk across the street and eat at any of the (fast-food) chains, but with this,” she said, cradling her hyderbadi chicken,” I don’t feel guilty. I love it.”

Several blocks away, Mabel on the Move catered to a business crowd on North Meridian Street.
In front of his co-workers, 28-year-old Tim Carter pumped his shoulders up and down in anticipation of Mabel’s homemade mac and cheese topped with panko.

“I’m trying to eat healthy,” he said. “I don’t like ingredients that you can’t pronounce.”
And that, says McKibben, is the point.

“My whole mission is to bring healthy food to the people. This is something I can do: I can bring them a good, quality meal, a little taste of Mom’s cooking.”

McKibben, 53, whose youngest child left home last year, said she couldn’t sit idle in an empty nest. An Airstream enthusiast and avid cook, she was flipping through a magazine looking for her next adventure when she spotted a 1962 Airstream Globetrotter Travel Trailer. She had an idea.

In March, McKibben rolled out her “twist on comfort food” -- no high-fructose corn syrup, humanely treated beef and mostly organic ingredients.

Working the lunch crowd in a red apron with white polka-dots, McKibben popped out of the trailer with samples of tomato caprese soup.

“It’s super healthy for you, all those vitamins and minerals.”

For Hoosier Fat Daddy’s Tom Rockwell, the idea to go mobile arrived like his food, slowly cooked until the timing’s just right. And the time came last summer.

Couch-bound while recovering from shoulder surgery, he watched plenty of Food Network and mentally replayed conversations with his nephews in Los Angeles, raving about food trucks out there. Then West Coast Tacos rolled into town, the first L.A.-styled “hipster” truck to give Hoosiers a taste of a changing food culture.

“It pushes you along,” he said after seeing West Coast Tacos. “You just get to a point where you want to do something a little bit more uplifting, a little bit more fun.”

Rockwell soon tracked down an old school bus in Chicago and spent months customizing, rewiring and retrofitting its interior. He managed to fit a 250-pound grill onboard, with fryers and warmers, four sinks and a full-size refrigerator.

His brother, Steven Rockwell, painted the now locally famous pinup, Amelia Love (“A meal ya’ll Love”) on the bus. And Hoosier Fat Daddy BusCafe -- slow-cooked pulled pork, corndogs tucked in empanadas and the “knuckle sandwich” of pulled roast beef -- launched in February.

“Most people can’t afford to go out and spend $100 on food,” said Rockwell, whose menu runs up to $5.99. “It (the bus cafe) might not be five-star, but it will be really good.”

More mobile food trucks hitting Indy streets this spring

Several new food trucks in Indianpolis now offer just about anything you could find in a restaurant.

By Kent Erdahl  Fox59 News

11:25 p.m. EDT, April 13, 2011

Indianapolis—

A trend sweeping the country is now really beginning to hit Indianapolis this spring. There is an influx of new mobile food trucks that are offering food that could compete with some of the best restaurants.

A new food option rolled into the Fountain Square neighborhood just in time for lunch on Wednesday.

"We just happened to drive by and see this was out here and wanted to try it out," said Melissa Oesch who bought a sandwich from a Duo's Slow Fast Food truck.

Becky Hostetter got out of the restaurant business years ago, but decided to launch Duo's Slow Food Fast in December."We try to keep it seasonal," Hostetter said. "As much local product as possible."

This spring the food truck is showing up more and more, offering a rotating menu that always includes some eye-catching options like a vegetarian cornet sandwich.

"Shaved fennel and carrot, avocado, chive, marinated onions," Hostetter said, describing the sandwich.

Duo's isn't the only new food truck catching people's eyes, so has a big blue bus featuring a painting of a woman known as Amelia Love. She is the spokeswoman for Hoosier Fat Daddy Bus Cafe.

"If we had five bucks for every picture that's been taken of Amelia," said Tom Rockwell, owner and operator of the food truck.

Rockwell has plenty of picture worthy eats too, such as a pork tenderloin sandwich and chicken salad gyro..

"I'd been a nurse for 20 years and wanted to try something different," Rockwell said.

He got the confidence to move forward with his idea, in part, after seeing the success of West Coast Tacos, a food truck that brought a Los Angeles tradition to Indy last year.

"They've drawn a lot of attention and I think it's really great," Rockwell said.

"West Coast Tacos sent us a note and welcomed us to the neighborhood... to the streets," Hostetter said.

The new food trucks have found success through self promotion on social networking sites like facebook and twitter. Now a search of those sites reveals at least six different new mobile food options in Indy. They include:www.hoosierfatdaddybuscafe.com, www.duosindy.com, www.mableonthemove.com,www.byrnespizza.com, mylunchboxindy.com, www.tacoswithoutborders.com andwww.thebestdamntacos.com.

One of the reasons why we haven't seen more food trucks on the road in Indy is that they have to prepare their food in commercial kitchens, which can be tough to afford. However, that's beginning to change thanks to a community kitchen in Indianapolis simply called Indy's Kitchen.

"It would have been hard for this many trucks, I think, to hit the streets this quickly without Indy's Kitchen being there," said Linda Gilkerson, one of the owners of the kitchen. "Just because there wasn't space just dedicated to rental."

Becky and her partner say Indy's Kitchen is one of the secret ingredient behind Duo's success. They're not the only ones.

"We have four trucks working out of here," Gilkerson said. "And there's a lot of interest."

The food truck owners say there's also a lot of interest in the new options from customers.

"Indiana has been pretty much a meat and potatoes place for as long as I've known," Rockwell said. "The idea of trying things that are just a little bit different is just fun."

Customers agree.

"I think maybe people will be able to try things we don't have as much of in Indianapolis," said Laura Henderson who enjoyed a picnic lunch from Duo's on Wednesday.

"I had the chicken curry sandwich," Melissa Oesch said. "It's awesome. I think it's fantastic."

Owners say another reason for the surge in food trucks is because they know there will be a lot of demand for more food options during the upcoming Super Bowl in 2012.

Up & coming: mobile fare

Jolene Ketzenberger. Indianapolis Star. Indianapolis, Ind.: Jan 7, 2011. pg. D.4

Copyright 2011 - Indianapolis Star - All Rights Reserved

So what trends do local foodies expect to see in Indianapolis in the coming year?

The popular response to the question on social media sites can be summed up in two words.

Food trucks.

Fans of the popular West Coast Tacos and Tacos Without Borders trucks want even more of the inexpensive, mobile fare.

Local chefs Becky Hostetter and John Garnier (whom folks may remember from the popular veggie-focused Essential Edibles cafe) recently launched a mobile food business dubbed Duos that features both vegetarian and meat entrees (check out www.duosindy.com).

Fat Sammies, another soon-to- appear food truck, will offer Sicilian-style sandwiches. Yet another, Groovy Guys Fries, will sell, well, french fries.

"Food trucks, for sure," agreed local chef Thom England, culinary instructor at Ivy Tech Community College, when asked to pinpoint 2011 trends.

But he also predicted continued interest in local and artisanal food, a renewed focus among restaurateurs on charcuterie and classic desserts, even a growing emphasis on healthy omega-3s.

Chef Tony Hanslits, national dean at The Chef's Academy, also noted the continuing interest in all things local and sustainable with his top trends of local meats, seafood and produce.

England also zeroed in on recent visits by TV food celebs such as Guy Fieri ("Diners, Drive-ins and Dives") and Adam Richman ("Man vs. Food").

"Look for national figures coming to see how Indy lives," he said.

Call Star reporter Jolene Ketzenberger at (317) 444-6755.

Nuvo Newsweekly    Jan 11, 2011


Duos: Mobile kitchen doing slow food fast 


by Anne Laker

We liken it to John Travolta's return to icon status in his Pulp Fiction star turn. Believe it, foodies: Indy's own earth goddess of vegetarian vittles, Becky Hostetter, and her posse, are back in action, jamming the streets with yummies from a new mobile kitchen.



Hostetter and her carnivorous chef-partner, John Garnier, debuted their mobile kitchen, known as Duos, at Sun King Brewing Company on New Year's Eve. Then, at the January First Friday at the Harrison Center, the kitchen served up creamy tomato fennel soup and grilled fontina sandwiches with caramelized onions and greens on a crusty little baguette, for $6.54 per serving (including tax).It was flavor heaven on a hellishly cold night.


Hostetter's return to Indy's culinary ranks is cause for outright ecstasy. Why? If you lived in this city between 1990 and 1997, you probably remember Essential Edibles, co-owned by Becky and husband David. The eatery was nestled in the shabby-chic basement of an old Catholic school on Cleveland St. in Lockerbie Square. Draped with twinkling lights and always jammed with hungry folk, Essential Edibles spread the vegetarian gospel with eggplant sandwiches, soul-saving salads and luscious lemon bars whose tangy-sweet bite is memorable twenty years hence.


Dining at EE was like receiving a sacrament. Angels flew from every sandwich. The place oozed with pesto. Powdered sugar fell like dew. But tears were shed when poor accounting and a new location killed the mojo. In the years since, Becky has busied herself as a private chef. "I miss community," she says.


Enter Duos, a new vehicle for delivering food and social capital. "Slow food fast" and "let us feed you" are the Duos' mantras. Feeding people food this good from a mobile kitchen is surely a noble civic act.


Once a pattern is established, the Duos trailer will likely show up in certain locations each weekday. Keep up with Duos' menu and whereabouts on Facebook, Twitter and www.duosindy.com.


Q&A with Duos' John Garnier & Becky Hostetter


NUVO: What inspired you to try a food cart instead of a fixed location?


Hostetter: I'd been thinking about this for five years and was ready to make a move. A food trailer seems like a good way to reach a lot of people, have a lot of autonomy, and create a happening in the city. John and I care about Indianapolis and the overall health of the culinary environment.
Garnier: It's about a sense of belonging, like the feeling you get when the ice cream man is coming down the street.
Hostetter: We need to feel ownership of our neighborhoods and relish the sense of dwelling in an urban environment. It's about seeing your friends and getting your food from someone who knows your name. Having more density of creative food helps everybody.


NUVO: Why the name "Duos"?
Hostetter: We didn't want to sound corny; we wanted it short, simple and catchy. I am a vegetarian and John is not. Every menu will include two items that each of us makes: Such as a white bean soup with parsley sauce, and a meatball sandwich.
Garnier: The menu will always have something meat and something vegan, cross-referenced, with many of same ingredients. We want to grow as much as we can and source locally as much as we can.
Hostetter: We can focus on quality and challenge people's palates. I'm looking at things that should be staples for people, such as Indian cuisine. I want to do breakfast too. Like upmas [toasted farina with veggies and tomato chutney].Or rabanadas [deep fried Brazilian french toast]. Or Tunisian chickpea stew. We are exploring homemade ketchup, mustard, and pickles! I'm interested in preserved lemon, bacon jam.
Garnier: This will not be processed food.