Food trucks offer hot food for Moore County NC residents in midst of outages

Rachel Jurgens always knew that food trucks would eventually save the day.

Jurgens, who owns a food truck park in Moore County, believes that their mobility and self-supporting nature make them the perfect vehicle to provide what people really want in an emergency: food, coffee and beer.

When she strategized how her food truck park, Red’s Corner, would help her community in an emergency, she pictured a snowstorm or a hurricane, not a malicious attack on her city’s power source. Still, when she caught wind that her town would have to live without power for several days, she assembled a squad of trucks to give the people what they wanted.

In the midst of dark traffic lights and cold houses, Red’s Corner was one of the few places in Southern Pines that seemed normal, several customers said.

Over the hum of the generators, a musician played his electric guitar, powered by the Cookies & Moore truck. Kids played soccer in a grassy pit behind the trucks. Hoards of people and their pets huddled around outdoor heaters and fire pits.

“It was so communal, even all the dogs were getting along,” said Ouida Newell, the owner of the Wildfire Pizza truck.

When the trucks on shift run out of food (they don’t yet have refrigerators to store extra supplies), Jurgens said she has a “laundry list” of food truck owners who have volunteered to drive from other parts of the state to fill in.

Some people, like Mark Keller, weren’t even there for the hot food — they just wanted a warm place to relax.

“It’s almost like an anniversary party or a birthday party even though we don’t know each other,” said Carol Haney, mayor of Southern Pines who happened to be eating there. “I guess we’re all celebrating the fact that we’re safe and it’s warm.”

The food trucks started a GoFundMe to help cover the cost of meals for locals who can’t afford it. Jurgens said anyone who needs a free meal can call for her directly to have it discretely served.

The Meat and Greek truck will also use those funds to continue delivering meals to the local police department and people who can’t leave their houses.

Locky and Lynne Brown, who live down the street from Red’s Corner, had been without power since Saturday night and had exclusively been eating leftover cheese and peanut butter from their pantry. After two days, they finally decided to venture out for their first hot meal since the outage began: a meatball sub.

“The food trucks really saved the day,” Lynne Brown said as she bit into the sandwich.

The community showed their appreciation for the trucks with ample tips and good business. Newell said she sold nearly three times the number of pizzas she would on a typical weekday. She only stopped selling when she ran out of cheese.

“I made more money in tips yesterday than I have in my entire life,” she said.

Southern Pines has embraced food trucks as a solution for the town’s crisis. Haney said the town loosened restrictions on street parking and generator use, which would not ordinarily be allowed because of noise ordinances.

“We just need to get food to people,” she said.

This story was originally published December 7, 2022 at 6:30 AM.

Teddy Rosenbluth

The News & Observer

919-829-4569

Teddy Rosenbluth covers science for The News & Observer in a position funded by Duke Health and the Burroughs Wellcome Fund. She has covered science and health care for Los Angeles Magazine, the Santa Monica Daily Press, and the Concord Monitor. Her investigative reporting has brought her everywhere from the streets of Los Angeles to the hospitals of New Delhi. She graduated from UCLA with a bachelor’s degree in psychobiology.