Typical Kitchen Equipment on the Food Truck

When you are just starting with your food truck business, don’t get overwhelmed with the enormity of the things that you need to do. Learn about the appropriate equipment to use in your truck kitchen. It is imperative to ensure that your food truck kitchen has all the equipment needed, but still with plenty of leg room for your staff to make them feel more convenient. Food trucks come in various shapes and sizes: they can be the size of a small car, a bus, or a delivery-type truck (the most common type). Food trucks should have a complete and functioning kitchen with all the necessary equipment. These are some of the most basic equipment that a typical truck kitchen should have:

• Three-part compartment sink, including a hand wash sink to wash ingredients
• A freezer or refrigerator to keep supplies fresh
• A cooler for the refreshments that you serve
• A dispenser for serving iced tea, lemonade, and sodas
• A flat griddle or char-broiler

  Typical food trucks serve hotdogs, burgers, fries and ice. These are some of the basic equipment you need should you decide to offer them:

• Hotdog roller
• Griddle
• Fryer
• Soft-serve ice cream machine

  When purchasing equipment for your food truck, take into consideration what your menu is going to include. Here are some popular food truck types today:

• Chinese cuisine – The basic needs will be a bamboo steamer, a versatile wok and rice cooker.
• Italian cuisine – You will need a pasta roller, meat slicer, pots, cookers, oven, pizza prep table and oven, and sandwich grill.
• Mexican Food – To serve tacos, tortillas and salsas efficiently, you must have a chip warmer, a salamander broiler, a cheese melter, and other tools needed to serve Hispanic dishes.
• Middle Eastern and Greek cuisine – You will need griddles, woks, and ovens, among others.

 

Basic items that you should have in your food truck kitchen:

Food Prep Needs

• Cutting boards
• Can openers
• Food blenders/processors
• Knives and knife sharpeners
• Mandolins
• Vegetable cutters and slicers
• Mixers
• Thermometers
• Scales
• Timers

 

Cooking Essentials

• Frying pans
• Sauce pans
• Pots
• Infrared cooktops
• Hot plates and griddle tops
• Sandwich and panini grills
• Broilers
• Char-broilers
• Flash bake ovens
• Microwave ovens
• Commercial ovens
• Toasters
• Pasta cookers
• Rotisseries
• Rice cookers
• Steamers
• Ladles, spatulas, whisks, and other utensils
• Handle holders
• Gloves

 

Frying Essentials

• Fryer station
• Fry baskets
• Oil filtration and disposal units

 

Warmers/Holders

• Holding cabinet
• Hold oven
• Countertop food warmer

 

Refrigeration

• Freezer
• Walk-in refrigerator
• Ice machine

  It is also important for your kitchen to have ample and secure storage for all the supplies and equipment needed. Having a well-designed food truck kitchen ensures that you have a profitable food truck business by providing efficient service and increased productivity. There are basic rules in the configuration style of your kitchen. It all depends on what works well for your staff. These are the two basic methods of grouping kitchen equipment:

• Assembly-line – This design works well for a food truck, which produces large quantities of the same food, like sandwiches or pizzas. With this type of configuration, the design should allow your staff to stay organized. The tools are arranged based on the order of use.

• Zone-style – For this type of design, the kitchen is divided into blocks, one block per function. There is one for food preparation, another for cook, then another one for refrigeration, and another for cleaning. This works well in food trucks that serve many types of food in their menu. This layout, allows your staff to prepare on one area of the kitchen, as the newly prepared ones are being cooked.

There are many more considerations, and contractors may be capable of providing you with additional tips. Prime Design help you with all these decisions when we are designing your truck and asking questions based on your needs.  

Typical Kitchen Equipment on the Food Truck was first published on Prime Design Trucks