Recipes

I was thinking about ways to drive business to our website and came up with one that I think just might do it. It's not the world's most innovative idea, but a good one nonetheless 'cause if it works for that tool Rocco DiSpirito, then it's gotta work. Period. "Recipes": simple, tried and true how-to's that showcase Syrian food at its finest. I just added my first one: Samake Harra (for all you Westerners, it's pronounced seh-meh-keh JJarah). This is one of our favorite recipes from my mother-in-law. A true American, I get grossed out by things on the bone, with skin, with EYES.... oh the humanity! Ok, maybe I'm a little pickier than your average bear but this dish is truly succulent and you'll want to suck the meat right off those pointy little bones (at least I did).... plus, if you love spicy food like us, it's a sure to please. I thought a fish dish was appropriate because I think a lot of people eat fish over the Holidays (we always ate ham) and you might want to undertake this one. It's super simple and takes about 1 1/2 hours. Check the website for all the details and more pictures!

On a semi-related topic, we are beginning to pick up some catering accounts and it's so great. The word is officially out. So now the recipes will take up - yet another - new page on the ever-expanding website. The site gets bigger and bigger as the word gets out about the Genie. Some pictures I wanted to share of some catering gigs we did have been added to the site too.

Happy Holidays!

Craft Services

The other day the Gourmet Genie was selected from among hundreds of other food trucks to be on the set of a TV show at Paramount Studios. In my humble opinion, they had all the best trucks: Barbie's Q (and John's a super guy), Grilled Cheese and Dogtown.

The trucks served as background on the set of a "Happy Endings" which will be a mid-season replacement on ABC. I could tell you which shows on channel 7 need to go but that's a whole other blog. The plot dictated that one of the main characters dreamt of owning a food truck and won a food competition. While we took some pictures, they didn't turn out as well as I had hoped. It was a still lot of fun (and a long day of sitting around).

Being there I realized that was another angle we hadn't given much thought to: craft services. I think as food truck operators we are in a unique position to capitalize on this because we could drop off catering/craft services and still roll out for the day and do our regular route. I am beginning to get excited about this new prospect.

We've actually already had a few inquiries for commercial catering and, out of lack of experience I think, we might have come in too high. We were also approached by a craft services person working on the set of another TV show while at Paramount who inquired about pricing. He seemed to think our quote was WAY too high which was puzzling to both of us. Of course I know it's his job to do everything on a budget and maybe he was playing hardball, but it's a complete mystery to me how to set up the pricing for this kind of thing and still turn a profit. The one person we know who does craft services isn't getting back to us about her pricing. I guess she doesn't want us to steal her customers or something.

Max asserts that we are doing something different, something very high end and specialized; he feels that if they don't like our prices they can go somewhere else (he might have put in a nicer way). I would never endeavor to contest his knowledge of food cost/labor. After all he has tons of experience in that regard and I'm just along trying to make sense of budgets, creating spreadsheets and forms. The challenge is just getting our foot in the door, not the actual work. I know no one would try harder to go above and beyond than we would and I know our food is a slam dunk. So what now? Can't just sit back and wait...

After many hours of research I think I have managed to pull together a pricing schema that should satisfy both parties. Just being there that one day was great because we did manage to make a few contacts and have already had a request come in through our (NEW AND IMPROVED) website. Could this be a coincidence? Maybe. I'm keeping my fingers crossed.

In the meantime, look for our big red truck when "Happy Endings" airs in 2011 and if you know a location manager in need of craft services, now you know where to go.