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🧱Brick & Mortar🤠

Thinking out loud, envisioning TUCKEDito storefront.

Tuckedito

07 Nov 2022 • 6 min read

By: Mitch Wooderson

Thinking out loud, envisioning TUCKEDito storefront.

We'll probably add things to this as we think of them until the storefront actually exists.

💬 Sections in This Post

Dining
Menu
Kitchen
Staffing
Processes

🏪 Size Break Down

~1240 Sq feet

540 Sq feet (dining area)
300 Sq feet (Cooking Area)
200 Sq feet (dishes & refrigeration/walk-in)
200 Sq feet (0ffice/dry store)

🍽Dining

What's the restaurant look like?

Restaurant size and seating capacity

*size needs to support rent cost

People: 30
Sq Ft: 540 (18 sq ft per person)
Seats: 20
Standing bar on the side wall
Outside seating for sure. Something is needed outside to attract attention to the restaurant

Interesting Layouts 👇🏻

Service style

Fast Casual
Order at the counter and get called back up when your order is ready.

General ambiance, including décor and music

Good Vibes Group photo wall
Good vibes tunes, make music a staple (maybe have something live here and there)
Salsa/toppings cart by LA taco carts.

Options for styles of seating, lighting, and other fixtures

Bright but not fluorescent, neon light signs, good vibes
Simple but with intense pops of colors
Stools for bar and small tables
Open kitchen layout

Operating hours

Tuesday - Saturday (11-8)
Maybe Wednesday - Sunday instead?
Do we want to grab a work lunch crowd? If so, then open 12 T-F. If not, open at 430 and stay open until 9.
I think maybe not be open until and then take the food cart places for lunch.
Food truck prep done in mornings (better for open kitchen layout). Then restaurant prep begins at noon.

Unique Selling Points

Grab & go bow tie bowls (bow-tie on top to look like a present)
Great Vibes Happy Hour club (invite a friend, get a taquito)

📜Menu

Items

🌯 Taquitos

3-4 mainstays and 2-3 rotating

🌮Tacos

Can order "heavy" (fried and we put on thwwwq e toppings), or "light" (not fried, you put on the toppings)

Offer 2 or 3 at a time

Brisket - caramelized or white onion, sauce(B-sauce or salsa negra), cilantro (tortilla dipped in fat)
Chicken - red onion, spicy crema, cilantro
Carnitas - white onion, salsa verde, cilantro
Chorizo - white onion,
Ribeye (only on occasion) -
Black Bean Puree -

🥗 Bowls

Meat: Taquito mix or taco meat
Bases: Rice & Beans
Toppings: Red onion, white onion, caramelized onion, roasted poblano pepper, diced tomato, cilantro
Sauces: See below

🍚 Sides

Citrus Sweet Corn
Rice
Beans
Avocado tomato salad
Guac

🥫Sauces

B-Sauce
Lime Crema
Spicy Crema 🌶
Salsa Verde 🌶
Salsa Negra 🌶🌶
Schmoke 🌶🌶🌶

🍰 Dessert

Will be too easy not to offer

Churros
Strawberries con crema

Catering

🌯🌯Taquito Trays

10, 20, 30
come with sauce

🌮🌮Taco Trays

15 & 30
come with sauce

🌯🌮 "Variety" Options

Taquitos & tacos
Make your own bowl: meat, rice, beans, toppings

🚛 Sourcing

Ingredients must be vibrant
Deliveries? or can we still pick up produce ourselves?
Could we look to local suppliers? would need to see how this affected our profit margins. It would be cool to build out multiple storefronts in different towns, all using suppliers local to this area. Of course I'm sure this could get confusing and we would also miss out on economies of scale.

🏷 Other Items for Sale

Jarred Sauces
Taco Kits
To-go meals
Masa
Frozen taquitos
Merch

🔪Kitchen

What's it look like.

300 Sq feet (Cooking Area)
200 Sq Feet (dishes & Walk-in)

🥘🔪👨🏻‍🍳Equipment

*Listed in order of importance. "#" Denotes Essential items

#Flat Tops (1 or 2)

one for taquitos, tacos, meats (60-72in)
one small one for tortillas/sauces.(28in)

#Stove Top

6 burner
1 or 2 large low burners (this way the huge heave pots can easily be slid onto carts to move)

Possibly one huge carnitas pot on its own like in this picture

#Convection oven

double decker would be ideal so space underneath isn't wasted

#Meat Prep Table

Huge cutting board or butcher block, hole in it to wipe chicken into

#Sinks

food prep sink
hand sink
grease drain

#Steam table

next to griddle for taquitos

#Ice Machine

Walk in fridge

racks for meats, produce, dairy, and finished food with a cart dedicated to eat one to move things in and out
if no walk-in we will need to have 3-4 refrigerators.

Traditional Oven

for slow cooking (brisket, and pork shoulder)

Food Warmer

start out with a small one for prepped food (mainly taquito mixes)

Sauce Station

Area with big bowl, prep cutting board, and blender, to make sauce.
maybe an induction hot plate

🌮 General

Kitchen in front, dishwashing in back with carts and dish bins to move dishes to back
Everything on wheels

Mock Layout

🤷🏻‍♂️ Maybes

Al pastor trompo - if we could get detachable one we could take it to catering events and have it in store.

🤔 Things to Think About

What will our electrical and gas needs be?

💁🏻‍♂️Staffing

*will depend on size of kitchen (ideal size staff would be 5 people)

takes orders, manages money

Griddle Operator

manages everything on griddle

Order Expediter

keeps track of tickets and gathers completed orders
Places orders on pick-up counter

Taco/taquito assembler

during off hours this responsibility is shared between griddle man and order expediter
gets sides for orders

Tortilla maker (hopefully)

makes all tortillas

🛠Processes

Current Process as a pop-up taquito shop listed here 👇🏻

The processes listed below are what I envision for a TUCKEDito storefront. Neither of us have ever run a kitchen, so not sure what to expect.

Purchasing

Go by weekly and bi-weekly purchases listed in excel file.

Prep/Cooking

Sauces

sauces made every other day before opening
Prep for sauce done every other day before opening then place into a designated refrigerator space

Meat

meat prep done every morning while meat that was prep the following morning is being cooked.

Toppings

prepped each morning.

Inventory

We take physical inventory once a week and manually update our excel file. This way our purchasing list is correct when the file updates. The file weighs what’s needed for the week’s menu against the current inventory to get what we need to purchase for the week.