Beast of the Street Food Truck
If there’s one food trend that doesn’t seem to be abating, it’s the blitzkrieg of the food truck (hooray!). Last year, Haddonfield chef Mark Rooks decided to add his mini-restaurant-on-wheels to the fray. He tapped into the local-food trend, supporting neighboring farms (hooray again!), and Beast of the Street was born.
Today, Rooks zips around south Jersey in his glossy black truck, serving street food like grass-fed beef sliders, crab-meat-and- cream-cheese spring rolls with habanero-honey dipping sauce (made with Busy Bees NJ honey from Cape May Court House); the Gobbler egg roll, with fresh roast turkey, stuffing, and fresh local-cranberry relish; and curried local-pumpkin soup. A catering specialist for nearly 20 years, Rooks sums up his cooking philosophy in three words: fresh, seasonal and edgy.
“I love what I do from day to day,” he says, of catering. “But I was having the itch to do something else. I have really tried to focus on basic food-truck comfort foods, but put an edgy spin on them,” Rooks explains.
One example? Rook’s take on crab fries. His version starts with waffle-cut fries that are topped with luxurious jumbo lump crabmeat and a housemade white American cheese sauce.
Visit the website to see where the Beast is rolling next, or call to arrange a personal pit stop for fall parties. —Marisa Procopio
