By Hunter Hine
The Department of Resident Life hosted a food truck festival in the Mowatt parking lot on Wednesday, Oct. 27 as part of University of Maryland’s Homecoming week.
Three food trucks attended the festival — Trini Vybez, the Federalist Pig and Reba’s Funnel Cake.
This was the first year of the food truck festival and the first event Resident Life has hosted as part of Homecoming, said Resident Life Coordinator for Recruitment & Outreach Programs Dan Hairfield.
“A lot of it is just helping people get together, giving them a chance to learn about a couple of the small businesses here in the local area, getting them excited as part of Homecoming week,” Hairfield said.
Trini Vybez, a Trinidadian food truck, has worked once before with the university through the Robert H. Smith School of Business, said owner Natalia Kalloo. One of the truck’s fan favorites are doubles, a dish with two fried barra dough pieces, a type of flatbread, stuffed with channa, which is curried chickpeas, tamarind sauce, cucumber chutney and pepper sauce, Kalloo said.
“I just want to expose individuals to good authentic Trinidadian or Caribbean food,” Kalloo said. “I hope that they can partake in our culture and enjoy what we have to offer to the community.”
The Federalist Pig, a brick and mortar barbeque restaurant with two locations and a third being finished in Hyattsville, has a unique food truck. A pick-up truck carries supplies, but staff prepare food on tables set up outside the truck. Pitmaster Rob Sonderman said the restaurant had not worked with the university before, but they hope to start a relationship.
Reba’s Funnel Cake specializes in funnel cakes, but also serves a plethora of flavored lemonades, other fried desserts and even fried fruit, said Hayes Greene, Reba’s general manager. Greene has been with the truck since it first started in 2012.
“Sometimes food has the ability to change your whole mood, just your whole feeling for the day,” Greene said. “We want to come to the campus and make everybody’s [day] great, through deliciousness.”
Resident Life Graduate Coordinator Miriam Fraga investigated food options around D.C. and reached out to a variety of food trucks to invite to the festival, Hairfield said.
A Resident Life tent beside the Mowatt lot offered a free raffle, which included prizes like Maryland scarves, Maryland socks and testudo keychains, Hairfield said.
Students who attended were excited by the variety and the chance to take a break from normal campus food. The festival drew both those familiar with food trucks and those who had never tried them before.
Senior biology major Sejal Parepally stood with her roommate Anna Lee, a senior public health science major, as they waited for food. Parepally is vegetarian, Lee doesn’t like barbeque and neither wanted funnel cake, so they chose Trini Vybez.
“It’s different food from what’s normally on campus, so it’s just something new to try,” Lee said.
Jonathan Molnar, who graduated from the University of Maryland in 2020 and works with the office of undergraduate studies, sat in the grass between the Prince Frederick dorm and Mowatt lot with colleague Tierra Merritt, a master’s student in urban education. The two got food from the Federalist Pig. Molnar had pulled pork, and Merritt ate brisket.
Merritt said she is from Chicago where food trucks are common, so she and Molnar made the trek across campus after hearing about the festival from their boss.
“Restaurants come into the campus and kind of show other college students, maybe undergrads, what’s out there in D.C.,” Merritt said. “There’s music playing and folks are just happy, and I feel like anytime there’s food involved people are happy. I know I am.”
Shubham Prakash ate a funnel cake from Reba’s since he is a vegetarian and hadn’t tried funnel cake before. Prakash is an international student from India and a master’s student in information systems.
“All of these things are kind of new for us, I’ve never seen a food truck before, so obviously … that’s something that attracts me,” Prakash said.
Hairfield said Resident Life was interested in hosting the festival again.
“We’re hopeful that this ends up being a huge success and will try to bring it back in the future,” Hairfield said.
Featured image: University of Maryland community members line up to order food from Reba’s Funnel Cake food truck. The truck was located in Mowatt parking lot on Oct. 27 as part of the Homecoming week food truck festival. Photo by Hunter Hine.