ABSTRACT
Walking through Midtown Manhattan at lunchtime, Union Square in the early evening, or the West Village late at night, it is difficult not to notice a subtle yet stirring culinary uprising in the streets of New York City. There is a collective clamor, online and offline, about a new street food trend with an elevated artisanal design—the microblogging mobile food truck. The fact that it’s not always there when you want it, unless you know exactly how to get it, is what makes this phenomenon stand out. Occupying the intersection of food and technology, this latest public event has adopted online social networking, and in doing so, creates an innovative and shifting trend in street food culture. In 2008 and 2009, New York City saw a major influx in these modern and distinctive specialty mobile food trucks. At the heart of each start up is an elevated culinary style not typical of street food, combined with the popular internet marketing platform, Twitter. Compared to the traditional New York street food carts or trucks, this operation is one of the most animated events to happen to street food since the 1950s when the Mister Softee ice cream truck emerged with its classic musical draw. 1 Though ice cream, taco, and catering trucks are not new to the city, this novel wave in mobile food trucks stands out as separate for many reasons.
