Circle City Spuds Truck Review

Thank goodness for a sunny day and fairly open parking on 4/13, when I went downtown to the One America Building and visited Circle City Spuds, Indy's premier baked potato haven for lunch or dinner.  This day, Heather was luck enough to have a helper on board.  As I showed up and told her helper at the order window who I was, I heard Heather say in the back of the truck, "I didn't think you were gonna make it," as she served me up the last two potatoes of the day.  I'm so glad I made it just in time.


Circle City Spuds was more or less built on a whim.  When Heather started watching The Great Food Truck Race a year ago, she had a stroke of pure genius.  Why not start and decorate her own truck?  Before she could even get her truck decorated or up and running, she had financial backers and soon enough Circle City Spuds was born. Their first appearance on the streets was during the Superbowl earlier this year, and since has been a staple of the downtown food truck craze.  Heather, a former student of  IU's School of Art, was also the catering manager of the Four-Star Holiday Inn in Bloomington, and a bartender for 9 years, but mostly found herself as the queen of her own kitchen.  After years of involving herself with food and drinks, Heather's homemade creations and the fusion of a mobile business just seemed to make sense.  The originality and presentation of her meals make a definite impact or impression on visitors to her truck, but I think the biggest key to Heather's current success is the cuisine.  My opinion: comfort food with a hearty twist.

Heather says her inspiration for her spuds comes from a small bar back in her hometown of Van Buren, IN, called The Other Place.  This bar and grill served up potatoes with a very similar flair, and were the main focus of her business; she wanted to serve something from home to the people of Indianapolis.  The other treats she makes, such as her slow cooked pulled pork and her famous mac & cheese create flavorful masterpieces like "The Brickyard BBQ Spud" or the "Mac & Cheese Spud" (pictured above), all a part of her process in making something memorable that no one else in Indy is serving.  I've been lucky enough to eat (or try) each one of these spuds from her truck, and let me tell you, it's nothing short of awesome.  If putting pulled pork or mac & cheese on a potato seems a bit off, please, stop reading.  I promise, once you try it and the potato/bbq/mac & cheese sort of just melts in your mouth, you can see why her cuisine is so successful.  My favorite part about the dish I had were the bacon slices, crisped brown to perfection, pulling the whole meal together and adding a little bit of crunch and flair to the meal.  You can try many of Heather's delicious mouth-watering morsels for between $5-$8.

Though cuisine is the main focus, Heather's work regiment is something to be desired, too, as many trucks may have a staff of a couple people.  With Heather's venture, she has a helper every so often (like the day I visited), but most of the time it's just her on the truck cooking and serving up each and every dish.  It's a lot of work, but she seems up to the challenge.  According to Heather, her daily routine goes a little something like this, "I get up at 7am, start prepping bacon and mac n' cheese.  By 10 o'clock my potatoes are in the oven and I'm at my location.  I shut down by 2, clean up, run to the grocery store, buy groceries, get back to the kitchen and prep for another hour, go back to the house and refill fuel, back on the dinner rush by 6.  Close down by 9, go home clean-up, and then start all over again."  As a courtesy to herself, she does close down most Sundays, Mondays, and Tuesdays to give herself a little bit of time off.  While talking about work ethic and daily routines, I also got the chance to ask Heather what she thought about the recent food truck "explosion" Indy has experienced in the last year and a half.  She said, "I think that Indy has about hit it's max in what it can handle on food trucks.  I don't think that (Indy) can handle 100 trucks in this city, it just doesn't have the clientele for it.  I expect it to stay around 30, and I expect the bad ones to fall by the wayside, and the people who run this like a restaurant will stay in business and thrive."

Today (May 4th, 2012) at 5pm is the #FFFTF Event downtown at the Old National Center sponsored by MOKB, features Circle City Spuds and many of the city's other beloved trucks, gathering to serve up Indianapolis food truck style.  Admission to today's event is $5, and tickets can be purchased through clicking the #FFFTF link here.

Thanks again to Heather from Circle City Spuds for taking the time to speak with us.

Stay Hungry & Eat On,

--J


Photo Credit to James Thornburgh.