Sitka restaurant culture hits the road in food trucks

Cruise ship visitors are on the rise in Sitka, and with that,this season’s bumper crop of food trucks. But they’re more than just a foodie trend — food trucks and carts have a long history in urban areas. People can break into the restaurant industry with less capital, and on wheels, have the freedom  to follow crowds. Sitka is a perfect place to see how these portable restaurants can change the foodscape of a town.

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To truly understand Sitka’s portable restaurant trend, I called the woman some consider its godmother. Carole Knuth and her husband, Peter,  owned the longest-running food cart in Sitka — Reindeer Red Hots. Knuth just sold the cart after fourteen seasons serving reindeer hot dogs and all the trimmings on a downtown street corner.

I took a walk with Knuth one bright day to see the trucks that have popped up during her time serving food. We also explored why having a portable restaurant is not always as easy as it seems.

On Lincoln Street, in a gravel lot in front of the movie theater, are the first two food trucks — shiny white with gleaming metal accents.

“Ooh, there’s a crowd up there,” I say. There are about twenty people, standing next to Ashmo’s, a truck that specializes in fish tacos and black cod tips. Knuth says, “Wow. See, people want to- Visitors want to have something fast.” I duck inside the truck to talk to Ashley McNamee, who runs it. They’ve been operating for four years now.

McNamee says, “Food trucks are so fun because you can specialize in something. It’s a lot less initial investment than obviously a brick and mortar is. And you can kind of do things how you want to do them, when you want to do them.” McNamee hands a couple tacos to a man waiting at the window.

Next, we walk right next door.

“Oh, it’s the smoothie truck,” Knuth says. “How bout a smoothie?” She orders a pacific pineapple with soy?

Behind the counter, Sarah Jaglin tells me about her experience working in the truck. “Food on wheels,” she says, “there’s nothing better than that. I think it adds a different vibrancy and energy to the idea of eating out.”

I ask her about the challenges of working in the food cart. “Um, keeping non sticky surfaces i’d say,” Jaglin says. “It’s a lot of fruit so it’s quite sticky.” She pauses, then adds, “In a fun way though,” and smiles.

Knuth gets handed her smoothie and she takes a slow sip. “Ooh, that’s pretty darn good,” she says.  

There’s also a bright-blue truck in the Sitka scene that sells ice cream–Four Pinks and a Blue–but they aren’t out on the street today. As we continue our walk, Knuth tells me about some of the challenges of her days in the food cart business.

“Just the darn expense,” Knuth says. “Just to run a hot dog cart, it takes six sinks.” Regulations require separate sinks for preparing food, washing hands, and washing dishes. The trucks also have to figure out where to park.

“So finding space to have a mobile cart is a tough one in town because there’s all kinds of regulations,” Knuth says. “Like you can’t just set up here cause this is city property and people need to walk on the sidewalk. But then there’s creative places like Captain Jujus…”

Around the corner from Ashmo’s and the Smoothie Truck is Captain Juju’s It’s parked right off the circle surrounding Saint Michael’s Cathedral, on the former site of Sitka’s long-defunct pay phone gazebo.

Julianna Stromer greets us from behind the trucks window and introduces herself. She and her husband Matt own the truck. Julianna Stromer mostly runs the truck. Matt Stromer is a troller and his fish will be served in the cart. Matt Stromer says, “As we’re fishing, dressing the fish, taking care of them, i always think about where this fish might wind up, you know.

I talk to one of the customers and ask her what she got. “A salmon, salmon taco,” she says. She crunches down on it, looks up and says, “I love it.”

As we walked back to Knuth’s car, I ask her what she thinks about the future of food trucks.

“Gosh,” she says. “I think that the future depends on what the city allows for more people to be able to have space.” And enough satisfied customers to keep Sitka’s new portable restaurants on the road.