I'm a relatively new food vendor looking for a little feedback on my Fall menu...

I'm a relatively new food vendor looking for a little feedback on my Fall menu. Almost all of the other vendors in my area basically do the same thing- hotdogs, chili dogs, walking tacos. I will begin serving this menu next week.

Option #1 $6.50
>Locally made, natural cased German style grilled bratwurst.
>house seasoned onions and sweet peppers (sautéed on my cart throughout service)
>stone ground brown mustard
>locally made and very high end caraway sauerkraut
>served on a grilled locally made organic roll

Option #2 $6.50
>Locally made, natural cased hardwood smoked grilled kielbasa
>house seasoned onions and sweet peppers (sautéed on my cart throughout service)
>smokey 3 pepper mustard
>locally made and very high end spicy purple cabbage
>served on a grilled locally made organic roll

Side option $3.50
>Loaded Redskin Potato Bake (basically a delicious cheese, sour cream, bacon, and potato casserole)

I keep a couple other items like yellow mustard, ketchup, shredded dill pickles, raw onions, and hot jardiniere on hand as well.

Thoughts, questions, or comments?

>organic roll

>$6.50
That better be the biggest fucking braut I've ever seen

sounds pretty good. I'd probably order 2 and 3. what's your setup for selling all of this? is it legal to prep food in your home where you live?

thinking about getting into some farmer's markets. totally different product though, ice cream sandwiches.

Stupid phrasing, my fault. Firstly, the ingredients are all organic, but they do not even market themselves that way. Second, it's the exact same dough as their hotdog bun, but I them create a slightly different size and shape to fit the sausage better. It's really really good tasting bread.

>locally made [...] spicy purple cabbage
>locally made organic roll

I get what you mean, but at the same time I don't.

Fair enough. It's a standard 1/4 sausage. Most people understand that putting together that many high-quality and locally produced items is going to cost more. I wouldn't fault anyone not willing to pay, but I definitely would not apologize for the price either. I guarantee the $3 guys are making better margins than me.

So you're aiming for the high end. I wish you luck and hope your market area can support it

Thanks. As far as prep goes, doing it at home is strictly forbidden. I have a commissary for storage, prepping, and dish washing.

Add french fries or chips. Sell bottles of soda and water. Make them organic if you must.

He's either stupid or just trying to market by using the word "locally" as much as possible

With those prices, those sorta fancy labels like “locally“, “high end“, “organic“, smoked things that don't need to be smoked, it' pretty clear you have no idea of the concept of a great bratwurst.
T. German

Regarding the krauts and cabbages- there is a relatively new family run company in my area that produces very high end flavored sauerkrauts. Retail the stuff costs about $1 an ounce. I have been partnered with them since the beginning of summer, primarily pairing their products with hotdogs and a house made sauce.

Thank you. I am aiming for high end, but honestly even a fast food meal is getting close to $10 anymore.

In germany where you take good food for granted, maybe

In Americaland, you have to point out when food is real food.

>10 dollars

When I buy it sure but i'm a fatty fat who gets like 2 burgers and some fries.

I don't have a fryer and chips do not sell nearly as well as you'd think. I do offer them at most services. I also sell canned soda and water.

Organic is important to me or very many of my customers. High quality and great flavor is my primary motivation.

Apples and oranges, but thanks for the feedback.

I doubt it's exclusive to my area, but people here love knowing that they are helping to support local small businesses. Not only do they love it, but they are willing to pay for it.

It's probably worth mentioning (on not, since nobody really cares)- I would charge $6.50/$3.50 if I'm at an event that I have paid to be at. Free locations and lunch would typically be $6/$3.

>locally made
>natural cased
>house seasoned
>locally made
>locally made
>locally made
>locally loaded

Your key phrase for fall should have been 'rustic' you shitter.

>locally loaded
Kek
>thinking that the menu board on my hotdog cart is actually written the way I have described it to you guys
Kek (which is kek spelled backwards)

>natural cased German styled grilled bratwurst locally loaded in locally baked organic roll with stone ground brown mustard and a side of hand-reared onions

Nao can really take that beef.

Just in case you can't get past the description I posted above, the actual menu reads:

German-style Bratwurst
-Grilled Onions & Sweet Peppers
-Spicy Brown Mustard
-Caraway Sauerkraut
-on a toasty bun

>german style
turn it into Dutch style instead, makes it seem more exotic and grand when read out to an american.
>locally made
locally sourced.

>not making your own sausages
cmon man, this is how you get clients

/Pol/and, is it?

Is this some kind of shemale tranny meme?

We are all a sort of shemale, tranny meme in our hearts, user kun

>$6.50
Those better be big damn sausages, OP. Like fuck am I paying that much for a standard brat.
Also,
>high end saurkraut/purple cabbage
Cabbage is cheap as fuck, that's the appeal. Just make your own sauerkraut.

>Organic is important to me or very many of my customers.

then I'd ditch the brat and kielbasa and stick to locally produced high end organic tofu based products.

seriously, if your clientele needs to hear "locally, high end, organic", you can sell them cardboard popups as long as the price is high enough and you have a man bun, rainbow colored hair, and lots of tasteful piercings.

Nah, plenty of organic-wholefood-all-natural freaks are still eating meat. And it's usually not great meat because fuck the meat industry.

OP could probably benefit from a vegetarian and a vegan option on the menu though.

he means he bought them at the local walmart

I actually just mistyped that. It was supposed to say "organic is NOT important to me". Local, on the other hand, is very important to myself and a good portion of my customer base.

If quality and flavor were actually your main motivations, you would know that organic isa pointless label that costs more with zero benefit. If you were just on the bandwagon to swindle your hipster customers, that's fine, but kill yourself if you actually believe in this snake oil.

Yes, that was a typo. "Organic" is not important to me at all. Like I stated earlier, the bread is not marketed at all (by myself or the baker) as "organic", even though it is.

>you can sell them cardboard popups as long as the price is high enough and you have a man bun, rainbow colored hair, and lots of tasteful piercings.

Ironically, I fit zero of those stereotypes and neither do 99% of my customers. They're typically just normal mid to upper-middle class working moms and dads who appreciate great taste and quality.

>the ingredients are all organic, but they do not even market themselves that way
Are you sure they're actually organic, as defined by local law and/or independent authority, or do you just say this because the vegetables grew in some dirt and that looked natural to you?

I pay 5 bucks for a decent sausage at a cart around here. I'd have no problem jumping up to 6 for really good shit

A combination of things. I'm at the bakery once or twice a week so I see all of the flours they use. The bakery is part of an old school "organic" farm that has been producing various goods and services for a long time. The egg and dairy producing animals are right there on sight.

I've never specifically had this conversation with the owner, but my guess is that they are just not interested in paying for the "organic" certification. They're very down to earth old school folks that know they have an outstanding product without that label.

Thank you. When you see my sausages next to a $6 Wendy's burger or a $10 food truck burger, $6 doesn't seem so outrageous.

Regarding option #1: I have never seen or heard of a Bratwurst served with peppers, neither sweet nor otherwise. Plus, the onions typically go into the Sauerkraut, they are not served separetely. The caraway is nice and very German indeed. You could also offer "sweet" Sauerkraut as an alternative. It contains diced apple and it's usually rinsed a little bit before cooking to get rid of excess sourness. It is cooked not only in stock but with at least a dash of apple juice and/or white wine. It is seasoned not with caraway but with bay leaves and dried juniper berries.

t. southern Bavarian

great taste and quality is for gays and losers

>house seasoned

what the FUCK does this even mean
go easy on the buzzwords

Yeah I'd buy it. Look for bachelors with a blank stare in their late 20s early 30s. I would buy this shit in a heartbeat. I have more money than I can give a shit about and nobody to spend it on. I also am a sucker for vague things like "local" and "organic". Would probably be a daily customer. Would get #1 mostly. Sounds good man.

Like I've stated elsewhere in this thread, I do not actually use those type of descriptions in my menu (at all). Those embellishments were simply for your enjoyment, and to point out that there is an extra level of time, money, and care between myself and the average hotdog cart in my city.

I'm just a normal dude who rolls his eyes as much as you guys when I read a buzzword laden menu as well.

Well the problem is that you can get more meat from Wendy's for the same price. I think a 3/4 lb burger from Wendy's is about $7, and that'd be triple the meat of what you're offering. I'd still be hungry after one of your sausage sandwiches, though I'm sure it'd taste good.

Might be a better idea to skip on the high end sauerkraut, most people won't be able to tell the difference between an ordinary raw sauerkraut and a high end one. Or like says make your own sauerkraut, it's pretty easy, just takes time to let it ferment. This way you can bring the price down a little bit. If you could get the price down to around $5 I'd be more likely to buy them.

I like you. You're the kind of guy I would always have a few Cokes on hand for if you told me you preferred it over Pepsi.

Heh thanks man. I'd always go for the bottled water which is another thing 99% of people on this board wouldn't pay for.

Valid feedback. I will never beat a fast food burger in the dollars per ounce race to the bottom. I'm totally fine with that.

I actually have zero desire to lower my prices at all. I vended an event on Saturday next to a BBQ trailer selling $3 brats and Polish sausage. I can guarantee you that I sold 4X as many $6 sausages as that guy. I routinely vend next to another dessert trailer that sells $2 hotdogs, and my $4-5 hotdogs sell circles around him and he hates me for it

As far as the sauerkrauts are concerned- until 3 months ago I had never tasted a product like what these guys are producing. My guess is, neither have you. Even their "traditional" caraway kraut is 100 times better than anything I'd ever tasted before. I'm not really here to change anyone's online opinion on a product they never have tasted. It costs (a lot) more for a reason.

Might just be an image thing. People are usually kind of wary about sausages being made with unsavory parts of the animal but more expensive ones might be more appealing because they're more likely to be made with better ingredients. I've made my own sauerkraut a lot and it's way better than anything you can get in a store, and I'm not saying their product is bad, but like the other user said cabbage is cheap and most of the work is just waiting for it to ferment so a high end sauerkraut seems to kind of go against the original intention of it. Do you have the option to add a second sausage to the sandwich? If I could do that and keep the sandwich around $10 I'd probably be more likely to buy it.

By the way I'm not the average customer you should be appealing to since I'm pretty tall and exercise 6 days per week. I eat a lot and for me if I was getting food from you I'd probably eat 3 sandwiches if I was really hungry which would just be too expensive but the average customer won't be like me. Just wanted to let you know, because your food does sound tasty.

Lunch combos
>2 sausages for $10
>sausage, side, and a drink $9

Other than weekday lunch, combo pricing really depends on the event and the crowd. I'm not a typical sidewalk vendor, although I am licensed, permitted, and insured to be. I primarily vend side-by-side with food trucks. I actually own a second piece of equipment with is basically a hotdog cart on steroids with a 3 foot flat top grill and fixed roof. With a proper staff, that trailer is capable of operating at a much higher volume. We're doing an event next Sunday where we will easily do $5,000 in 8 hours.

In regards to making my own sauerkraut, I probably should have addressed this earlier instead of just ignoring it. No matter how "easy" or "inexpensive" it is to make in your basement, it is not a viable option for me. I work out of a beautiful incubator kitchen. Even that facility is not properly outfitted to satisfy my county's health department. Its a complete non-starter. For the record, I do work with another mild and unseasoned "hurr durr locally produced" sauerkraut. I am still working on the exactly how I want to execute and deliver it. I would like it to be warm or even grilled, unlike my other two options with are served near room temperature. I am totally open to suggestions.

Combo prices aren't too bad then. If the sauerkraut is raw then it's better to leave it unheated or just slightly warm it if possible by putting it on top of the sausage when it's on the grill for like 30 seconds before putting it into the roll. This way you keep the more subtle flavors and health benefits from the bacteria though the latter probably isn't a huge concern

>
I get what you're trying to do but at the same time you're trying far too hard.
$6.50 + tax for a single brat? That's horrible. You're incorporating buzzwords like fresh, homemade and ground into your menu as a thin veil to cover that a cabbage in a cabbage, mustard is fucking mustard and a brat is a brat.
For the price of $7 for a brat or 0.25 pound of Polska, to use words like that is almost redundant because for the price it's implied that it is higher quality and for a food truck, people don't want high quality as much as they want good cheap food.
Like I said you have a good idea but your own ego seems to be in the way. No one would pay those prices for those portions from a food truck lol. Stone ground mustard warrants a 100% mark up? Get out of here with your hipster bullshit.

>Stone ground mustard warrants a 100% mark up?

As a general rule, everything in the restaurant business are sold at a 200% markup.

>>mustard is fucking mustard and a brat is a brat.
Neither of those things is true. There's a massive difference between a fresh mustard made from good quality ingredients vs. a bottle of French's watered-down shit. Likewise there's a massive difference between a cheap-ass "brat" from a big commercial supplier and a small batch sausage made using quality ingredients.

>locally made
As opposed to what? Your shit being flown from across the country for a food truck? Just say home made. And use it ONCE. It sounds better and makes you come off as less of a pretentious idiot

Shit posters who contribute nothing

>op asks for suggestions on how to serve sauerkraut
>give legitimate suggestions
>"shit poster"
How?

You're certainly entitled to your own opinion about the value of quality. If you honestly believe that all things are created equally and that are no discernible differences in quality, I'm certainly not going to change your opinion. If you do not believe that, then you have to understand that higher quality ingredients almost always come at a higher price, which is then passed along to the consumer. I guarantee you my food cost is higher than the guys selling $3 chili dogs and walking tacos.

For what it's worth, all of my prices include the tax. Your personal opinion of "what people want" from a food truck may be true from your experience, but it's absolutely not reflective of the food truck culture in my city. It's not really a question of whether or not people will pay these prices, because they already do.

I don't fault you for not reading the whole thread, but I have stated a couple of times that my actual "menu" written that way. I was simply being specific and providing context for the sake of discussion.

Well appreciated the input, regardless. The current krauts I'm using are all shippped raw. The healthy probiotic benefits are really their strongest selling points. That's also the reason I do not heat them. I'm looking for a way to prepare the other (warm variety) in a way that will set it apart from the other two varieties. I'm leaning toward using one of the real nice apple ciders that are made around here.

*is not written

Which city are you in?

nigger watches me cook through my window. I have this twice a week, caraway seeds and all. Try adding a little horseradish cream to the mustard faggot and fresh dill. May e some cracked pepper too. You must miss that part through my window dick lips.