NEW YORK — The Vendy Awards, the annual food festival that celebrates and ranks the city's best food trucks, released the names of nominees in four "best of" categories that will be competing against each other this September.
For gourmands who follow the wheeled set, the future winners of the Rookie of the Year, Best Market Vendor, Best Desserts and Best of New Jersey can now be checked out before the long lines begin.
Though nominees for the highly coveted categories of Vendy Cup and the People's Taste Award will be announced closer to the festival, nominees for another highly esteemed category, Rookie of the Year, were released Monday.
Among those are Mamak, an Indonesian truck based in the Financial District and Williamsburg; Mysttik Masaala, an Indian, Tibetan and Nepali food truck from Murray Hill; and Neapolitan Express, a pizza truck that's been seen in Midtown and Coney Island.
Midtown and Financial District favorites Nuchas, an empanada truck; roving Asian grill Sweet Chili; and the Lebanese food truck Toum were also nominated in the category.
Full descriptions of all the nominees can be found at the Street Vendor Project, which organizes the awards.
Nominees in the Best Market Vendor category, which rewards vendors at outdoor markets and street fairs that use locally sourced ingredients, include Bon Chovie, Brooklyn Cured, Lonestar Taco, Khao Man Gai NY and Porchetta.
Sugar fiends may want to look for the trucks of the Best Desserts nominees, which include Del’s NYC, a frozen lemonade truck; Carpe Donut NYC; Itizy, for handcrafted ice cream; Liddabit Sweets, which creates small-batch caramels, honeycombs and candy bars; Williamsburg's OddFellows Ice Cream Co.; Popitbaby, a natural fruits popsicle stand; and La Cholita Cuencana, an Ecuadorian food truck beloved in Ridgewood.
The final category of announced nominees was Best of New Jersey, which now has vendors The French Quarter, Hunger Construction, Molly’s Milk Truck, Home by the Range and Tony Boloney’s Moustache Mobile competing for the title.
Tickets are on sale for the festival, which takes place Sept. 7 at Industry City in Sunset Park, and range from $85 per person to $1,250 for a package with special perks for the very serious street food fanatic.
