This is an update to the story we ran on Sam’s hot dog cart last week. Sam sent us the following email:
******************************
Here are some additional pics from our first day at the Johnson City (TN.) Farmers Market and in particular a pic of the speed rail that we modified to hold squeeze bottles. My years of bar tending paid off
with this little mod of a stainless steel speed rail. Two screws and a cut off tool were all we needed to mount this on the side of the cart for easy access to squeeze bottles. Inexpensive and good looking in stainless or painted to match cart. Here is a link.
Hope this is helpful,
Sam Oerly
Street Eats
P.S. I included some updated pics of our E-Z Built cart with the logo and graphics. Really brought everything together the way we envisioned it.
************************
Brilliant, Sam – I’m going to put one of these on my own E-Z Built asap, except I might go with this Stainless Steel 32″ Double Speed Rail.
Keep the tips coming folks. If we publish yours we’ll put your name on a sticky note just like the one at the top of this article. It’s a fun new thing we’re doing to recognize our awesome contributors.
-Steve
Hope this tip was helpful to some folks. Being able to easily take it on and off sure makes clean up a breeze. Thanks Steve!
Love the speed rail….now find a place for the paper bags….
Hello Street eats, nice touch wiht the side rail, not a bad idea. keep the slinging dogs selling and good luck
Tony
GREAT looking Cart , I am still thinking about a cart but I still am Pianting for a living , I have been doing other ventures on the side but I still have to work , GREAT LOOKING CART AGAIN , Have a GREAT DAY , Marcus Brown
Very nice, looks great too. I have a question about serving hot dogs. Do most vendors prepare the hot dog with the condiments themselves or do they let the customers add the toppings?
My health inspector did not like everyone using the same three utensils for the onions, jalapenos and relish.
Be Lucky!
..and at less public events a place to put your beverage 😉
Not only are we fellow Tennessean’s, but I see you use Square as well… GREAT product
Kewl!
Love the side rail idea…. Thanks for the continuing inspiration!!!!
Hello Fellow Doggers!
I like the speed rail idea! I going to look at it as an option for my cart.
I am looking for a spicy sauce recipe for my dogs. I am adding a flat griddle and doing bacon wrapped dogs with grilled onions. Need a killer sauce you can’t refuse!
Marcus- You have to stop thinking and go for it. Find a spot clost to home, like a busy gas station or other mom and pop and try it on the weekends to get your feet wet. Soon you will looking at every corner as a potential cart location. Talk with you health department and get them on your side. Go to the office and pick up your application packet and see if you talk with the person who will approve your cart and your plan. Find out what they are picky about. Mine is the hand washing station, condiment trays being iced, and garbage cans. For me, it was a better option to use the single serve packets for relish and mayo and a couple others. It made the inspector happy, which makes life easier on everyone.
Luck Dawg,
What I learned the hard way about condiments….Portion control is profit. I was using paper boats for my dogs but found that people were loading the boats with condiments and I was going through a ton of items a day. I went to foil wrappers and my usage was cut in half, thus more profit per dog. Any of the expensive toppers you need to put on to control cost. Cheese, chili, grilled onions or what ever. Just my 2 cents.
Thanks guys. @ Capt’n Mike: We realized we had room at the end of the rail for the bags so that’s where they are now. @ Lucky Dawg We tried topping our specialty dogs and letting customers top their own “plain” dogs and quickly realized it wasn’t worth it. People are too messy! Now we top them all.
Arizona here, we have insulated stainless steel condiment speed rack that stands on its own. We are able to have some ice inside of which our condiment squeeze bottles sit on top of, and we can move it to where we want. Never let customers apply their own toppings. They don’t know how much to use and never clean up. Also DOGGERS… the size of the tip of your squeeze bottle will also control costs and speed of application. Welding shops are able to make stainless steel condiment carriers. health DEpt. loves stainless steel.
joe
@ Sam love the Sandwich Board Too! No sense throwing the scrap wood in the woodstove! d’-‘
Yep, put the condi’s on yourself if at all possible and make it entertaining! Don’t forget the plain sauce for the kids. Lastly, the Leobs crunchy onions are a hit on my cart
Mr. Tiki.
Hi Steve,
I have been working on my ez build hot dog cart. Instead of building it out of wood, I am using metal tubing. Thanks to your news letter I am going to use a cutting board top. My cart is about 1/3 done. Im a little bit behind schedule, but still moving forward. Do you think the rail system in your ez build video will work ok for this type of suface. Will the heat from the steam pans melt the cutting board material. Any suggestion?
Thanks again for what you do. I have read your book from top to bottom. I am also looking forward to putting the secret to use that you talked about in you book. Very happy with your book.
Thanks again
Lawrence,
I would frame the steam table opening with square tubing and attach your rails to that. Make sure the steam table framing is higher than the rest of the work surface framing by the thickness of your cutting board material (or even a little higher). Then just butt the cutting board material against the steam table framing. You can trim it in with thin aluminum angle if there are any gaps.
I hope this helps, and send me pics when you finish it!!!
Steve
I’m not in the biz yet but I’m planning on it! Love the speed rail….one question – aren’t some condiments supposed to be kept on ice? Mayo comes to mind and maybe none of the ones in the speed rail pic require refridgeration but that came to mind….
@Tik….I love the crunchy onions idea and see how that can help with the clumpy onion problem I’ve read on another page – one question – do you still offer fresh cut onions or do you just use the crunchy onions? And if anyone else is using crunchy onions I would ask the same thing….