Restaurant prepping for Pig Out
Tony Brito is no stranger to long hours in front of a hot stove.
As temperatures climbed into the 80s on Tuesday, Brito stood over a pot of boiling rice in the kitchen of Aracelia’s Mexican Food Restaurant on East Trent Avenue.
It’s a chore he’ll repeat dozens of times while getting ready for Pig Out in the Park.
Aracelia’s is among nearly 50 restaurants that will participate in the massive food fair, which opens Thursday and runs through Monday at Riverfront Park.
The restaurant has had a concession at the Labor Day festival for 15 years. Last year, the booth served 700 to 800 customers each day, said owner Aracelia Duncan.
“You just have to prepare for everything,” said Duncan. In addition to the restaurant on East Trent, Duncan owns two delis at the Riverpoint campus, which she manages with the help of Brito, her son.
The two started planning for the event in July by ordering hundreds of pounds of additional ingredients.
Brito chops, shreds and simmers ingredients before and after lunch and dinner rushes at the East Trent restaurant.
“I’ll make probably 20 gallons of salsa today and probably 20 tomorrow and 10 more gallons (each day) as needed,” Brito said. “It’s not a couple of days prep thing.”
In five short days, customers visiting Aracelia’s outdoor booth will consume an estimated 300 pounds of both shredded beef and chicken and 250 pounds of ground beef. Those ingredients will be combined with seasonings, sauces and fresh chopped veggies to create chicken enchiladas, beef burritos and beef nachos.
Forty large pots of beans and 40 pans of rice (each containing roughly 75 servings) will dress up the entrees. Customers with a sweet tooth can cap off their culinary adventures with banana chimichangas.
During the festival, a delivery truck will make daily trips to transport precooked beef, chicken and other supplies to the park.
The Spokane Parks Department provides each vendor with a small amount of space in a refrigerated truck, but Brito also hooks up a refrigerator inside the booth.
He will work with a mix of friends, family and temporary employees to assemble ingredients into tasty family recipes.
Although Brito had occasionally traveled from Portland to help his mom with the festival, he didn’t become totally immersed until he moved back to Spokane.
Now a veteran with four straight festivals under his belt, Brito looks forward to the familiar faces, music and friendly customers who will swarm the booth.
For Aracelia’s, Pig Out is more about reaching out to potential customers than making an immediate profit.
The larger rewards come from an estimated 30 percent increase in customers who visit their restaurant in the weeks following the event, he explained, and in making initial contacts with people who become valued regular customers.
And 13-hour work days come with the territory. “That’s the best thing I learned from my mom is with any successful business you have to live and breathe it.”