Food Cart Fest is Vancouver’s biggest celebration of street food and they are returning for a fourth year with more food carts and expanded entertainment programming that includes a live-music patio.
It goes on every Sunday during the summer from June 28th to September 6th, 2015 during the hours of 12pm -5pm.
The Food Cart Fest is located between the Cambie Bridge and Olympic Village. It’s easily accessible by transit.
Admission is $2.50, but there are ways to get in for free:
- Free for Vancity Members
- Free with a non-perishable donation to the Greater Vancouver Food Bank Society
- Free for children 13 and under
- Free for seniors 65 and over
Travelling on a bike and not sure where to keep it secure? There’s free bike valet so you don’t need to worry about your bike being stolen.
Food Trucks and Food Vendors
Every week the food truck vendors do switch up, so keep an eye out for which ones will be there.
The list includes:
- Aussie Pie Guys
- Beljam’s Waffles
- Blue Smoke BBQ
- Brown Paper Packages Ice Cream
- ChouChou Crepes
- Cloud Nine Cotton Candy
- Community Pizzeria
- Culver City Salads
- Disco Cheetah Korean Tacos
- Dougie Dog
- Eat Chicken Wraps
- French Made Baking
- Eli’s Serious Sausage
- Feastro the Rolling Bistro
- Fliptop Filipino Fusion
- Guanaco Salvadoran
- Johnny’s Pops
- Juice Truck
- The Kaboom Box
- Le Tigre
- Lemon Heaven
- Mangal Kill Mid East BBQ
- Melt City Grilled Cheese
- Mogu Japanese Street Eats
- Mom’s Grilled Cheese
- Pie Hole
- Reel Mac n Cheese
- The Roaming Dragon
- Rocky Point Ice Cream
- Super Thai
- Slavic Rolls
- Soho Road Naan Kebab
- Tacofino
- Reef Runner
- Varinicey Pakoras
- Via Tevere
- Vij’s Railway Express
- Yolks Breakfast
There’s probably others that aren’t on this list.
Be ready for lineups! The most popular food carts like Mom’s Grilled Cheese and Tacofino will constantly have long lines. Especially during the hot summer weather, make sure you have sun screen on or a really big hat.
The Food
Lets be real, food is really the main attraction and everyone needs a bite of the Vancouver Food Cart Scene. I love food carts and summer is a great time to see them out and about at special events.
Mogu Japanese Street Eats serves up Japanese inspired burgers and their famous chicken karaage. You can also find them at the Richmond Night Market as well as their usual location in Downtown during the weekday.
Ebi Katsu has a breaded deep-fried prawn patty, house made Japanese tartar sauce, and lettuce. That patty is loaded with shrimp! Definitely try it out.
Sweet and Spicy Chicken Karaage has marinated deep-fried chicken topped with their house made sweet chili sauce. A crowd favourite!
Dougie Dog serves up all-natural gourmet hot dogs. You may have heard of them because they made an unsuccessful pitch on Dragons Den.
La Mexicana Hot Dog has guacamole, salsa, bacon, jalapeño peppers, and topped with cheddar cheese. It was pretty spicy because of the hot dog and the jalapeño peppers, but the guacamole balances it out a bit more to cool off the initial spicy taste.
Johnny’s Pops is always a popular option for awesome popsicles! Make sure to grab some quickly because they sold out before 3pm on opening day. I waited too long and wanted it to be the last thing I ate here, but I was too late.
Don’t forget to take a photo of it first! Photo first! Eat second!
Don’t forget to stay hydrated. They have their odd booth called “World of Drinks”. Drinks range from $2 – $4.50.
Summer Patio
New this year is the summer patio with live music and alcoholic drinks. It is 19+, so make sure you have ID. They try to showcase the best craft beer and wine the province has to offer.
There are lots of tables and seats available in the area.
You just need to buy drink tickets to be able to sample the drinks. They are around $5.
While I was here, there was Maui Brewing Co, Laurelwood Public House & Brewery and Redhook Ale Brewery. Also Summerhill Pyramid Winery, River Stone Estate Winery and Bombay Sapphire.
I’m sure there will be a rotating selection of craft beers, wine and liqueurs.
Activities
Of course there is more to the food cart fest than just eating. They have included a few fun activities to keep you occupied like life-sized connect 4!
Super-sized checkers game.
They have big jenga too! These 3 games are all located inside the huge shady tent.
Ping Pong
An imitation beach with a live DJ.
The East Side Flea
They were here for the opening weekend. There are a variety of vendors selling some pretty neat stuff.
I’m not 100% if they will be back again, but you can check out their future locations on their Facebook page.
https://www.facebook.com/eastsideflea
The food cart fest is a zero waste event and they try to divert as much waste away from landfills as possible. With the amount of garbage generated, it’s not great for the environment if we just chuck it all away. Last year the festival was able to run for 11 weeks, diverting 93% of the waste generated onsite. Thats pretty damn awesome.
I was actually quite confused how to separate my waste, but there’s usually someone around to guide you.
Overall, it is a fun Summer event in Vancouver. It’s a great way to hit a bunch of food carts at once all in one place. I did find on the opening day that the line up to enter the food cart festival was long and also certain line ups to the popular food trucks were also long. Paying an entrance fee and then paying for food seems a bit off since food trucks are all over the city on the weekday. Luckily, there are options for free entry.
This event isn’t for everyone. If you hate the sunny weather and hate lines, this isn’t the event for you.
Foodology Disclaimer: I was invited by the Food Cart Fest organizers for a media preview to sample some food and also I am an employee of Vancity. I ensure you that all thoughts are my own.
Address:
215 W 1st Ave (between the Cambie Bridge and Olympic Village).
Website:
http://www.foodcartfest.com/
3 Comments
Nice article.