The Monterrey Mexican food truck parks around town.
Monterrey Restaurant now has a food truck
Since June, Monterrey Mexican Restaurant has been operating a food truck that serves Chapel Hill from the Chapel Hill Tire parking lot on West Franklin Street.
Along with this food truck, Monterrey also operates two restaurants — in Chapel Hill and one in Carrboro.
Monterrey Owner Jose Linares said the food truck stays open to 3 a.m. on weekends and is an inexpensive and fast option for students and residents.
“We have a cheap menu because everything is on plastic things,” Linares said.
Linares said the Town of Chapel Hill enforces rules on food trucks, such as forbidding them to operate within 100 feet of a restaurant’s front door.
“The Chapel Hill permit is more expensive than it is in Carrboro, but mainly, there just aren’t a lot of places to park in Chapel Hill,” Linares said.
Luckily for Monterrey, they have an agreement with Chapel Hill Tire about use of their parking lot, Linares said.
Linares said the Monterrey food truck offers the same menu items as the restaurant.
Tonya's Cookies
Tonya’s Cookies opened on West Rosemary Street in Chapel Hill Sept. 24.
Tonya Council, Tonya’s Cookies owner, said the cookies are homemade with locally sourced ingredients
She said it’s important to her that people support local businesses.
“Our cookies are made from scratch everyday,” she said. “We do as much as possible when it comes to using ingredients that come from North Carolina.”
Homemade at Tonya’s Cookies can be taken both ways in that cookies are made from scratch, and most ingredients come from Carrboro home state, North Carolina.
In addition to cookies, Tonya’s Cookies also serves locally made ice cream.
The ice cream comes from a creamery located in Julian, N.C.
Some of the popular cookie flavors are pecan crisp cookies and chocolate chip. The pecans are grown by local North Carolina farmers.
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Next Thursday at 5 p.m., the first 15 people in line get a free small bag of cookies.
Midway Community Kitchen
Midway Community Kitchen opened in January 2016.
The kitchen can be rented by ocal restaurant owners and hosts cooking classes, private events and pop-up restaurants, owner Kathy Ellis Gunn said.
“I call myself a social entrepreneur since a big part of my mission is to contribute positively to my community members in a tangible way,” Gunn said.
The classes are community driven. Gunn is working to create classes that the community wants to take part in.
“Some things that we think will be a big hit don’t do very well and others that we think are just so-so end up selling out,” Gunn said. “It’s interesting to see what takes off.”
Every six months, Midway Community Kitchen offers free cooking classes to the Northside neighborhood. The kitchen is planning to start offering classes that teach job skills for high school students and other youth who aren’t planning to go to college.
The kitchen is planning to celebrate Oktoberfest with a beer, wine and sausage dinner. They are partnering with Al’s Burgers for the dinner.
