Sung-Yoon Kang wears many hats as owner and operator of Ka’ Chi food truck: cook, menu designer, grocery shopper, marketing and social media manager, web administrator, party and event concierge, commercial truck driver, office manager, amateur meteorologist, bookkeeper and part-time mechanic.
Before Sung-Yoon was a man of many hats, he was a banker who grew restless behind a desk all day. Both Sung-Yoon and his wife, Dawn, were brought up in restaurant families and wanted to continue the culinary tradition with Sung-Yoon’s career change in 2010.
They knew a bank wouldn’t give a loan to a start-up restaurant, so the Kangs turned to the West Coast food trend that was slowly popping up along our coast—the food truck. After four months of searching online, making phone calls and inspecting 12 trucks, they found a 23-foot food truck to call their own in Texas. In April 2011, as one of the first food trucks in our area, they started serving Korean barbecue—the backbone of Sung-Yoon’s upbringing.
“I think BBQ in general means different to things to different people. To some people it’s all about the cut of meat (Bulgogi or rib-eye or sirloin, Kalbi or short-ribs, chicken or spicy pork), how it’s prepared and cooked (with wet marinades, never a dry rub),” said Kang, “while others will say that BBQ is the act of gathering together to eat in a communal setting. Korean BBQ to me incorporates both of these ideas.”
A revolving circle of friends, family and his wife (when she isn’t teaching) help Sung-Yoon with paperwork, grocery shopping, meal prep (making marinades and sauces) and serving at events. Ka’Chi can be found at 10–15 events a month, slinging their signature chicken banh-mi style sliders at area beer, wine and food festivals, fried kimchi rice balls during a lunchtime lineup at The Porch at 30th Street Station or short-rib tacos at private catering events. Ka’Chi rotates four to five unpretentious menus from family recipes throughout the year, starting with the freshest ingredients and addicting sauces and marinades made fresh from scratch.
During a light week with just one truck stop, Sung-Yoon puts in between 30–40 hours; a week with multiple stops, often back-to-back, can be 80–100 hours. If Ka’Chi has a gig on Saturday, you can find Sung-Yoon grocery shopping on Monday, prepping on Tuesday and Wednesday and emptying the fry trap, cleaning and fueling the truck on Thursday and Friday.
Saturday prep means picking up 100–150 pounds of ice for his drink cooler, packing up the food, dishware and paper goods, driving to the event, dishing out delicious meals all day and returning back to his kitchen to unload and clean until after midnight. Sung-Yoon and Dawn have become paperwork gurus because each town and county has its own sets of licenses, permits and paperwork on top of health inspections.
Owning a food truck has been much more difficult than Kang imagined. “We’ve already seen a whole bunch of trucks close up in the three years we’ve been open,” he said. “It is much harder than most people think…physically demanding, mentally challenging and emotionally draining. But when you have loyal, repeat customers that follow your truck sometimes waiting over an hour to eat our food, get referrals and have people tell you the food is just like how their mom made it, it is very rewarding. Not to mention, the camaraderie among the truck operators is pretty tight.”
Ka’Chi is entering their third full season, which runs from April to November. For year-round Korean with a twist, there is their newly opened Ka’Chi Kitchen in Booths Corner Farmers Market. This full-service restaurant is open from 9 a.m. to 9 p.m. on Fridays and 9 a.m. to 8 p.m. on Saturdays and is located at 1362 Naamans Creek Road in Garnet Valley.
To find out how to have your very own communal Korean barbecue experience, follow their Facebook or Twitter, view their schedule or visit their Booth’s Corner location.
- Ka'Chi Collage: Nina Lea Photography
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