Guerilla Street Food—once a food truck—will soon have fixed locations across the St. Louis metro area. Owners of the Filipino food chain plan to open their fourth and fifth locations in Maryland Heights and St. Charles in early 2019. They plan to open in January in St. Charles inside Two Plumbers Brewery + Arcade (2236 First Capitol).
“They make delicious beer, and we are big video game nerds and we get along with the [Two Plumbers] owners, so this just seems like it makes sense,” said Brian Hardesty, who owns Guerilla Street Food with Joel Crespo.
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The plans to open inside a bar under a different name follows a trend among Guerrilla Street, which already has a partnership with 2nd Shift Brewery, and other restaurants. Elsewhere, for example, Byrd & Barrel, a fast-casual fried chicken restaurant, operates its Nug Shack at the Parlor arcade bar in the Grove, and Mac’s Local Eats sells smashed burgers at Tamm Avenue Bar in Dogtown.
“We have been wanting to go out to St. Charles for a really long time, so this is a much safer way to test the market, see what people’s interests are, and if they respond well to it, we will consider an actual brick and mortar,” said Hardesty.
The Guerilla Street owners plan to use the former Big Baby Q and Smokehouse space in Maryland Heights (11658 Dorsett) strictly for to-go orders and as a commissary for their food trucks, said Hardesty. They hope to open by March.
The barbecue restaurant is slated to close at the end of the year, and the owner, Ben Welch, plans to open a new restaurant downtown next year.
“The opportunity came up for the old Big Baby Q space, and we were already looking for a food truck hub that was more centralized because we hope to do more work in the county,” said Hardesty.
At Two Plumbers, they plan to offer the established favorites like their Flying Pig (pulled pork shoulder, steamed jasmine rice, slow cooked egg) and Chicken Adobo. But Hardesty said they also are testing “some handheld items that will be conducive to drinking a beer and playing videos games.”
