UAE’s ‘exploding’ food truck scene

Food trucks are about to be really big in the UAE.

How big? Let Debra Greenwood, director of the Dubai Food Festival, explain.

“There is about to be an explosion of food trucks in this city,” she says of the festival, which is rolling out food trucks to Dubai’s business districts Sunday-Thursday until February 26.

By the end of the month, as more and more local trucks get up and running, “there will be around 12-15 trucks” in the convoy going around neighbourhoods from Downtown to Dubai Academic city, selling their wares to hungry office workers.

It’s not just Dubai that’s getting on board what seems like a global food trend.

Abu Dhabi is running its own food festival this month, sending food truck convoys, including local brands Salt and Love Donut, out for the Street Feasts segment on weekends to Madinat Zayed and Al Ain and ending up on Abu Dhabi’s Corniche on February 19.

While Dubai’s festival has focused entirely on local brands, Abu Dhabi Food Festival has also gone to the huge effort of flying in trucks from the UK.

In Abu Dhabi, the Tourism and Culture Authority “are keen to demonstrate what street food is about and encourage the local scene to pick up a bit,” says Fabio Diu, festival manager for Real Food Festivals, a UK-based company that has been brought in by the TCA to organise Street Feasts.

Original article by Natalie Long

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UAE’s ‘exploding’ food truck scene