It was a great weekend for the food truck fleet in Calgary this past week! Not only did the city celebrate the first anniversary of our beloved, wheeled culinary friends, but the Eat St. production team also happened to be in town filming segments for the fourth season of the series.
Foodies and truck fans alike all joined in on the fun throughout the weekend. Some hoping for their fifteen seconds of fame on the show, while others were just there to eat! It was great to see the different truck owners supporting each other over the three days. It doesn’t seem to matter if you’re sitting around a dining table or just standing on the sidewalk, food is always best enjoyed with others!
If you’re familiar with the show, you’ll know that they always bring in a handful of different food writers and bloggers to do interviews for each episode. I was lucky enough to be able to participate in filming three different segments in Calgary over the weekend.
If you think being on Eat St. is all fun and puppy dogs, it is, but let me fill you in on the process. Each morning, the truck’s chef or owner usually rises at the break of dawn to prep for filming. They start off in the morning, cooking in the truck, explaining ingredients used and whipping up their signature dishes. Once that’s all finished, about 3-4 hours later, the truck opens for regular business, usually to a large line of excited food truck fans. Talk about a lunch rush!
From the lines, different customers at each food truck are pulled, at random, to interview about what they’re going to eat for lunch. I saw a lot of enthusiastic people chatting to the cameras, but a cute little kid wearing a Spider-man t-shirt definitely garnered the most attention from the crowd. Damn kids stealing the spotlight!
When it’s time to interview different food bloggers and writers on-camera, we’re asked about the truck’s background, its owners and the overall food truck scene in the city. In case you didn’t know, Calgary started their food truck fleet last summer with only around ten trucks. We’ve now grown to about forty (yes, forty!) with a handful more on the way. The amount of creativity put into these trucks is absolutely amazing; you can find pretty much any kind of cuisine on the street these days. Although, I’m still waiting for my true love to start rolling in Calgary: A mac ‘n cheese truck! Sigh, maybe one day…
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Things can also get a little messy when it’s time to eat your dish on camera. In the season three premiere, you may have seen me get down and dirty with a whole truck burger from Alley Burger, but this time around, I really upped the anti: Eating an eggs benny with my hands, as well as a noodle salad and scarfing down an Indian-style taco. My mother is going to be so proud. Honestly, it’s all for fun, good television and for support of the amazing culinary scene we’ve got happening here in Calgary. So, I’m willing to get a little rowdy sometimes.
Check out the gallery below to see some shots of the Eat St. filming in action and some happy Calgarian foodies enjoying their food truck fare!
Dan Clapson is a food writer and culinary instructor based out of Calgary. He is constantly creating new recipes and striving to expand his culinary horizons. He thinks yam fries are overrated.
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Dan Clapson