meat cooking on a gril
We take barbecuing seriously.
"It would effectively be the end of this type of cooking, without these smokers working on the side, a food truck can't do this food." Dylan Boerboom told me this a few weeks ago while standing inside his Boomin' Barbecue truck parked in the Ombibulous liquor store parking lot. He'd been given a warning from the city of Minneapolis that the smoker, which sits behind the store and next to the trailer, was not in compliance with their food truck permit. "Basically," he told me, "they said that all food sold needed to be produced within the footprint of the actual truck/trailer. And not only that, but they took us to task for the picnic tables out front. Like, really? We are all still just trying to get by and they want to take away the tables which are sitting on private property?"
Boomin' wasn't the only one in the cross-hairs, Jon Wipfli's Animales BBQ and Fare Game were also being targeted by the city. I had heard from Wipfli that they were all working together to try to figure it out with the city before going public, but that track ended this weekend. Despite having the support of city council members Elliott Payne and Michael Rainville, the health department seemed unwilling to even have a conversation about it.
On Friday, the trucks were told they would have to shut down their offset smokers by October 1st. On Saturday morning, Wipfli went public with the situation on an Instagram post that has garnered thousands of likes and shares.
Boomin' posted as well.
As did Fare Game.
It created such a fervor in the food space, and there was such a dressing down of Minneapolis government across social media, that the noise was indeed effective. By the middle of the day, there was an update to the Animales post that mayor Jacob Frey had reached out, "Thank you for all the support!! We just spoke with @jacobfrey1 and they are working quickly to help resolve this issue and come to solutions with us. Would not of been possible without the out pouring of support. Thank you all and thank you @jacobfrey1 for taking time to problem solve with us." It's clear that none of the food trucks wanted this to devolve into political bashing, that they were all trying simply to get their situation as small businesses noticed.
The statement from Frey was "These awesome local joints are putting Minneapolis on the bbq map and we will find a way to keep them smoking. We are going to find a legal way to make this work."
But, will they?
The food truck laws on the books are outdated for sure, enacted when food trucks were lining up along the downtown city streets and the whole food trucking world was new. It should be noted that ALL of the targeted trucks are parked on private property. Boerboom told me that when he appealed to the health department official who came to his truck he was told that the laws are what they are, and that there's really been "no appetite" to change them.
Of course, everything has changed since then. And during the pandemic, quite a few concessions were made to industry statutes, shutting down city streets to make patios, enabling restaurants to sell liquor to go, etc. I don't know how you argue that there has been "no appetite" to make it easier to do business as a small food operator. All those smokers had been given pass and inspected by the health department before, none of them are new this year. So why now?
Well, despite all of the industry support that is evident in the comments sections of those three posts, and the fact that these small operators are working together in this, it seems clear to all of them that someone complained. The inspector that showed up at Boomin' actually called out the Texas Monthly article which celebrated Animales and Boomin' as local heroes of Texas BBQ. Did that piss off someone who wasn't named? When Boerboom asked why the inspector would go after the picnic tables in front of his truck as illegal, he was told that it wasn't fair to restaurants who have buildings and pay taxes. That if he wanted things to be different he should go rent space and build a restaurant. Nice, way to call it all the way back to 2008 when restaurants thought food trucks would be the end of them (spoiler: no, that would be something else entirely). Never mind the fact that so many restaurants have now launched their own food trucks, it kind of makes that argument moot, no?
So is that the role of the health department? Competition hit squad? If they had passed inspection on these smokers already, isn't it their own culpability if it's in violation of an ordinance? Since they are clearly not endangering the public, this isn't about a health violation, wouldn't this be something that could be addressed in the off season with these businesses, giving them notice that with the calendar year of 2023 all ordinances will be strictly enforced? That at least would give them time to plan and respond. Instead there is fast work to shut them down before the end of a season that has been rough for everyone, with meat prices making it harder to create affordable barbecue and still make money.
It's widely talked about that whether you pass a health inspection or get fined for things depends on who shows up to do your inspection. Some inspectors are lax and others are pedantic, meaning a restaurant has to hold their breath and see how the dice lands. Look, I understand that the department has a huge job covering all the businesses, and not necessarily a wealth of employees, but that seems even more reason to act judiciously and not give someone six days to shut their smoker down because they were getting too much attention.
The real question is, what can be done, and will we have BBQ in October. A few people I talked to off the record who are close to city politics are hopeful, but not convinced. Once a process starts rolling, the mayor can't just bigfoot it because he likes ribs. There's talk of allowing these businesses a special variance for the rest of the season, or perhaps applying for a different kind of event permit that might keep them up and running for these last eight-ish weeks of good weather. Okay, let's start there.
And then what? I don't like to talk about losing city innovators to the suburbs, because I think the subs deserve good food too. But you can't deny that the city needs more reasons for people to come to it, not less. Can we have a discussion about how small food businesses are vital to Minneapolis? Again? To change an ordinance it will likely have to go to public hearings, which is where the support of these smoke spots will be needed. Judging by the thousands of people who got the mayor to respond within hours on a Saturday, I'd say there was "an appetite" for it.
