This is a guest post written by Sharon Shi, an Innovations Associate at SMGxwho also enjoys and loves trying new foods.
You may have just asked yourself, what’s a bustaurant? Well, it’s exactly what it sounds like: a restaurant on a bus. Bustaurants are usually double-decker busses where the lower portion of the bus houses the kitchen and the top portion of the bus is where customers are seated and served. They differ from our usual food truck. At a food truck, customers order at the counter and walk away skipping with their new delicious meals. On bustaurants, customers run to the top of the bus, grab their seats, and enjoy their meal with a view of wherever they may be.
From what I’ve read, the first bustaurant in the US, World Fare, was born in March 2009 in Los Angeles, CA. Looking at their menu the food looks delicious with entrees such as Short Rib Bunny (Worcestershire braised short rib, Horseradish Crème Fraiche) and Shrimp Lettuce Cups (buttermilk dredged rock shrimp, Boston bib lettuce cups, houses made remoulade). Certainly quite the fine dining and food you’d expect in a restaurant and not necessarily on a food truck, or bus for that matter.
The bustaurant trend continued in California with one more popping up in San Francisco the same year called Diamond Lil. The Diamond Lil also served amazing sounding food including the Cuban “pig box,” veggie paella, and herring but seems to have taken customers on trips to places such as Napa. Imagine eating dinner on a bus in the Napa wineries. Sounds romantinc…anyway, so do these 2 busses still exist? The World Fare website and twitter account haven’t been updated in over a year and I couldn’t find any updated news on the Diamond Lil. Were their existances short lived and are there any other bustaurants out there doing well? Will the bustaurants be the next food truck?
Well it may be awhile before they make it to Chicago as we continue to wait to hear if food trucks will be allowed to cook on board. Just wait until they do and you start smelling their scent from miles away. I can smell the grilling now. But if bustaurants were allowed in Chicago, who would you like to see be the first?
Connect with Sharon on Twitter @Shartron or to hear more about her adventures and read her blog at www.shartron.blogspot.com.
