Mission Street Food — Drama!
A bit of drama tonight before the opening — “James the Hater” from Vanguard Properties (the stone building on the corner) came out all agro, getting in the MSF team’s face, yelling that their permit was bogus, they were dirty, they had no right to be there, etc. (MSF does have a permit, they hose down the sidewalk after closing, pick up after themselves and are nice people.)
Anyway, the guy was a douchebag. I don’t think he likes sandwiches. Or people. Was he attacked by a taco truck as a child? Maybe he had just come down from Medjool and was disoriented. So if you see him, tell him to hug it out and buy him a Mission Melt. Karen gets big points for unflappability, especially since The Hater came in with no intent of listening to anyone but himself.
To keep things positive, I’ve created a “What’s your favorite sandwich” poll.
Obligatory pictures of Mr. Benton’s bacon. Dear god is that amazing. I almost considered putting it on my brownie.
I learned how they make the bread so fluffy. The flatten down a ball of dough, roll it up into a cylinder, roll THAT into a spiral, and then flatten it again. Apparently they fight over who gets to press and roll the bread since it’s a great ab workout.
Met Allan and Katie from Mission Mission. Hooray! Allan had a life-sized Death and Taxes t-shirt on.
Oh, and there IS panorama software for the iPhone!
I took this with Panolab — it’s free. You line up ghost images of photos (live or from your library) around a hemisphere. Pretty interesting, but it doesn’t adjust light levels (though I kind of like it that way). Click to enlarge:
And there’s Panorama – $10, but it stitches and adjusts lighting quite nicely. Good support — they’re out of New Zealand and got back to me right away. Click to widen:
Burrito Justice 
Oh dear god this is such a better explanation of the night that mine. I wish I had written it.
Is there a clear semantic difference between asshattery and assbaggery?
i beleive “james the Hatter” is a vegetarian, maybe that had something to do with his not too cool tirad
Fair enough, but no meat in either the Mission Melt or the King Trumpet. And the PB&J is cute.
The Antonjitos truck was not exactly a meat free zone in its standard configuration.
I don’t blame him for going mad! He has cleaned up the block. Take a walk from 24th to 20th streets and you can see how clean the 21st Street block is compared to the others. These vendors who do not pay taxes nor have a permit leave a mess for merchants who pay taxes to clean. If you log onto the sfgove website you will see that only the Mango stand has a permit to sell fruit and snowcones. The “antojitos san miguel” truck has a permit for 16th Mission Bart Plaza. The owner of the truck rents it to Anthony Myint on Thursday nights. Anthony was given the permit to display but if he did his homework he would know that it is a permit to sell Mangos and not hot food!! I am sure if they had a valid permit this would not be a problem!!
I live on 21st and Mission and i see how hard Vanguard Properties tries to keep the street clean. Every morning they have a guy out there sweeping and hosing down the street. I also see a truck that power washes a few times a month i think. The whole block has improved since they moved in a few years ago. The Mango stand, hot vendors and yes the “great taco truck” of Mission Street foods is a big contributor to the mess that i see every morning. Not everyone throws the garbage on the floor but enough do. I do not believe they have a permit because i have seen the police cite them on various occasions If you like them so much invite them to set up in front of your house and you clean after them .
frankly, no one seems to understand that “james” was trying to protect the neighborhood. He started board of the Mission Miracle mile. A community group who’s goal is to improve the mission and help thriving businesses that pay taxes to keep the block clean and safe by paying for extra cleaning and police attendance. He was doing what he felt was right for the locals. perhaps not the best approach was used but…..all with good intention.
Matthew…a member of the neighborhood
I would welcome Mission Street Food in front of my house any day, any time. Do I need a liquor license for a keg in my garage?
There’s no doubt that Vanguard keeps that corner clean, and I congratulate them for making Mission Street better. I wish more businesses did the same.
But that just doesn’t excuse James’ behavior. MSF was leaving the corner cleaner than they found it, sweeping, washing it down and picking up their trash. And last Thursday the cops told them that all was cool with the permits they were using. (I found Antijitos permits on 21st as well as 16th on SFgov, by the way.)
I would have expected Vanguard to welcome a neighborhood event like MSF, but I guess it wasn’t meant to be. I hope MSF finds a more deserving street corner whenever they open back up the truck. All I know is I’m sad I don’t get sandwiches tonight.
nunemacher seems to have a habit of telling his neighbors to piss off when it suits him. he tried to develop a building at illinois & 18th that raised the ire of the dogpatch folks and even the carpenters union next door to him. the result has been daily pickets, which his contractor tried to deal with by throwing feces all over the street. and he’s trying to build market-rate SROs on 6th street, exploiting a loophole in the planning code to build a bunch of tiny cubes at an insane price per square foot. sheesh.
My company used to do alot of business with Vanguard and James in particular. He may have done alot of good for the neighborhood but I’ve never met a bigger self-entitled, raging ass-hat in my life.
I have to say that for the past couple of hours i have been hooked by the impressive articles on this site. Keep up the wonderful work.