starting a food booth

[matthews131]

hey i have been cooking ribs and they are ready after 4 hours and then i leave them wrapped in foil untill people buy them . some times another 4 hours. they seem to get to tender and fall off the bone. well i was just talking to a buddy that went to rib fest and he said all the big wigs just pull them out of a cooler cooked and put them on a bbq under open flames for 3 min and serve??? is that something i shoud try??? do they have them cooked the day before??

 

[chef jimmyj]

ya so i have done 2 events now and the first to were awesome and we made money its just hard because i put in 3 times the hours and money into food cost then the guy buying a 3 dollar bag of potatoes and selling pouting for 6 bucks a piece. we sell pork on a bun 6 bucks brisket on a bun 7 bucks and half rack 8 bucks. are our prices OK???   and another thing we dint have a food truck so we have to lug everything around and try to rub the meat in our 10 x 20 tent and it just doesn't look good. but then again we sold 300 lbs of meat in 1 day and had nothing but good reviews!!!! 2Nd event and we made the news paper!!!! woo hoo . everyone thinks it is so easy to do what we are doing but im telling you its a lot of work. we are up at 3 am putting food on for noon hour then having to stay up to keep the fire going and work till midnight and do it all over again for a 3 day event. and i work a full time job durring the week. its crazy but i have a Passion for this and am not going to give up. i see so much potential to make money doing what i love to do.   

If your Selling Price is at least 3 Times what the plate cost to make...You are doing well. The Plate cost must include, meat, sauce, sides, plates, forks, napkins, condiments and fuel plus anything else you spend money on to put it together. Leave any of these off and it comes out of profit. Can't say for Canada but at events in the States there are always more guys selling French Fries, Pizza and Beer Battered something or other, than BBQ, Burgers/Sausage or Seafood stands. A 6-7 Dollar large cup of Fries costs around a $1 to make. Plenty of Profit!...JJ

 

[eman]

Like others have said ,Pre smoke at least one days sales. freeze it and thaw the night before. have the smoker going for the next days meat.

 Even if you have all the meat you need pre cooked ,have the smoker going just for the smoke and the smell.

 

[flyboys]

Just curious to see how you made out through the rest of the summer...

 

[matthews131]

ya we did pretty good we both work full time and do this on the side. we made all our money back to pay for everything we bought and the bbq and still had 2000 bucks left over to buy more equipment for the next year. we also have people asking us to do weddings and buck and does so i think we are getting a name. we did the santa parade in your village and people seemed to like that. we have big pland but we are taking it slow we dont want to have tyo barrow any money from the bank to do this so it will take a few years to get were we want

 

[flyboys]

Sounds like your approaching it very wisely. I'm glad to hear you made out well and aren't getting in over your head. Thanks for answering my question and I wish you guys the best of luck. I'll be watching if you decide to keep this post updated.

 

[amigo4182]

hello im Hoping you take the time to read this, me and my friends are wanting to try our hand at having a food booth this year at our local town festival we have been getting our things together but have run into a few snags, if its not to much trouble im hope that someone can educate me about my problem
we were thinking of using 2 roaster ovens as food warmers and an electric fryer for some fries, as well as a real small fridge to keep things cool,
 so my question is this when going to the local events and paying my fees to have electric and booth space will most places provide enuff power to run everything i have or are most places set up to give out some little extension cord that will barley power my roaster ovens, next questions what is a good way to heat up my water so i follow food safety regulations,i hope you can give me some insight on our issues 

 

[matthews131]

hey amigo we bought a steam table this year and its 208 volt so you might have to rent a generator or sometimes they offer 240 volt plug. if they do you can rig up a breaker panel that has 4 or 5 110 v recepticals on it then a 100 ft eqtencion cord that you can plug in to your 240 plug that you rented. we tried keeping everything cool with coolers and ice but its to expencive so now we bought a few coke coolers that we keep in our 16 ft enclosed trailer. just fyi we have done everything as cheap as we can and it was a pain in the ass and probaly cost us more in the long run.  you just need to get some decent equipment. and as for hot water we bought a 2 gallon water heater that just plugs into 110 v plug and it works well. i hope this helped!!!  oh and if you want to see more pics and how we are doing check us out on facebook  search for mike and cory's up in smoke bbq  

 

[matthews131]

ohh flyboys an update we started to also get into a bit of catering! we just did a rib dinner for the lyons group. we cooked for 170 people it went awesome. thats were the money is. you know how much to cook and how much money your going to make so its great for making doe!

 

[nerb]

Matthews - Sounds like you are kickin ass with your first two events.  A friend and I are also starting a small food vendor venture at a local park concert series and would love some advice.  We are doing smoked ribs and chicken drumsticks.  The ribs are traditional spicy sweet dry rub with a sweet and tangy finishing sauce, smoked for ~3 hours.  The chicken drums are the same recipe and turn out great (but really we added as a belly filler because they are fabulously cheap).  

Our first event is coming up July 27 and I'm trying to figure out the logistics of having the food pre-smoked and ready to finish on the grill upon order.  I was thinking of renting a hot box  to store ribs and drums in while I get another batch going in the smoker.  I've read that ribs can be kept hot in these things for up to a few hours and actually tenderize further as a result.  We are allowed to begin setup at 8AM and the event starts at 2PM, it's mainly a dinner crowd.  I figured if I can have a batch done by Noon and a second batch coming out at 3:30, I should be good.  What do you think of this procedure?  Do you have any general start-up tips?

Much Respect for going for the BBQ glory. I hope to get there soon.

nerb

 

[matthews131]

nerb i think you got it all under control. ribs are hard to do for us as well. first thing they are expencive. second if you have them under done they are chewy and if they are over done they fall off the bone to easy and kind of go dry. i have had good luck with the steam table I bought we will cook our ribs 5 hours before the event opens up. well because if the wind picks up of something it messes with the temp of our smoker. but we hold ours at 155 to 160 for 5 hours and they are still good . maybe a bit over done but people around here are used to pulling soggy ribs from a crock pot so everyone loves them. but if i were you i would cook more chicken. when we first started we always had back ribs left over  just cause we would cook so much. so now we cool less and plan to sell out. at 6 bucks a rack it really hurts to bring 10 racks home cause you cant sell them. but i dont mind bringing home 10 lbs of pulled pork at 1.75 per lb . get what im saying? so you just kind of have to think about money a bit. chicken is cheap so make lots of that and make less ribs. sell out of ribs early and have a back up plan (chicken) to keep you going for the rest of the day.  it looks good to a customer when you sell out of something because they think wow that must of been good!!!!!!! hope this helps!!!!! good luck

 
Matthews - Sounds like you are kickin ass with your first two events.  A friend and I are also starting a small food vendor venture at a local park concert series and would love some advice.  We are doing smoked ribs and chicken drumsticks.  The ribs are traditional spicy sweet dry rub with a sweet and tangy finishing sauce, smoked for ~3 hours.  The chicken drums are the same recipe and turn out great (but really we added as a belly filler because they are fabulously cheap).

Our first event is coming up July 27 and I'm trying to figure out the logistics of having the food pre-smoked and ready to finish on the grill upon order.  I was thinking of renting a hot box  to store ribs and drums in while I get another batch going in the smoker.  I've read that ribs can be kept hot in these things for up to a few hours and actually tenderize further as a result.  We are allowed to begin setup at 8AM and the event starts at 2PM, it's mainly a dinner crowd.  I figured if I can have a batch done by Noon and a second batch coming out at 3:30, I should be good.  What do you think of this procedure?  Do you have any general start-up tips?

Much Respect for going for the BBQ glory. I hope to get there soon.

nerb

 

[flyboys]

 
ohh flyboys an update we started to also get into a bit of catering! we just did a rib dinner for the lyons group. we cooked for 170 people it went awesome. thats were the money is. you know how much to cook and how much money your going to make so its great for making doe!

Just checked you guys out on Facebook, congrats, looks like you are really doing good!  Best of luck and I hope you guys continue!  Thanks again.