By Marco Shalma

City Hall’s latest food plan looks noble on paper: expand street-vendor licenses, create opportunity, unlock entrepreneurship. Who’s against that? Nobody. New York was built on hustle and food carts. But talk to restaurant owners, property managers, or anyone who’s paying insurance, rent, and taxes; and you’ll hear the other side.

Every city official I’ve spoken with says the same thing off the record: “We’re being held hostage by the politics of fairness.” They’re not wrong. What started as a social-justice conversation has turned into a policy blind spot. Instead of helping unlicensed vendors rise into the system, the city is lowering the bar and crowding the sidewalks with no real structure. It looks compassionate. It’s actually chaos.

Ask anyone trying to do things the right way, permits, compliance, payroll. They’re getting boxed in by rules that cost money while new vendors get the spotlight for “authenticity.” Meanwhile, the Department of Health, Sanitation, and Small Business Services are already stretched thin. You can’t run a city that tells one side to pay rent and the other to “set up where you can.”

Yes, equity matters. So does sustainability. Real inclusion means lifting people up to the same standard, not bending the rules for optics. You don’t build fairness by punishing those who followed the process. You build it by making that process accessible, efficient, and transparent so the next generation of vendors can compete fairly, not survive in the shadows.

This reform might feel righteous today, but long-term? It risks burning out the very people who made New York’s food scene credible in the first place.

Another week, another hustle. See you in the streets.

Carbone will charge you $83 for spicy rigatoni and make you wait two months for it. Zero Otto Nove on Arthur Avenue has been making the same dish for sixty years at $16. Both use San Marzano tomatoes. Both import their pasta. One just skips the… Read More

This week, the city’s talking loud, the food scene’s louder, and the people actually feeding New York are still getting the short end of the stick. Here’s what’s lighting up the block right now:

1. NEW OPENING TO CHECK – Harlem Burger Co. 2.0 (125th & Lenox)

No PR machine, no influencer preview. Just perfectly grilled patties, a Dominican-born chef who actually lives uptown, and a backyard vibe that feels like summer all year. This is what we mean by “from here, for here.” Pull up before the city finds a way to fine them for being successful.

2. SOMEONE SAID SOMETHING – Mayor Adams on ‘Food as Medicine’

The Mayor’s back on his plant-based crusade, talking about “healing through diet.” Cool message, wrong messenger. Maybe fix the $28 salad problem first. If a single mom in the Bronx can’t afford lettuce, it’s not a wellness issue, it’s an economics issue.

3. NEW PRODUCT – Bodega Cold Brew Cans

You’ve probably seen them popping up small-batch cold brew made in the Bronx, sold out of corner stores, not Whole Foods. That’s the kind of innovation we need: culture-first, not copycat.

4. I CALL BULLSHIT – Restaurant “Service Fees”

The 3.5% “wellness fee,” the 5% “community support fee,” the mysterious “operations surcharge.” Just raise your prices, own it, and stop gaslighting the diner.

We’re in the middle of a food culture shift. The city wants order; the streets want flavor. Support the ones who cook, not the ones who capitalize.

Another week, another hustle.

See you in them streets.

— Marco Shalma

They pulled up in 2019 with one dream: bring real birria to New York. No neon sign. No influencer campaign. Just a red truck, a boiling pot of consommé, and the kind of confidence that comes from knowing your recipe hits.

Birria-Landia parked under the Williamsburg Bridge, and the lines never stopped. Queens, the Bronx, Jersey, people crossed boroughs for tacos dunked in that spicy broth.

Behind the counter? Two brothers from Tijuana, working sixteen-hour days, sleeping four. They built everything from a truck that still smells like chili and slow-cooked beef.

Now it’s a New York staple.
Four trucks. Thousands fed.
No shortcuts. No gimmicks. Just birria done right.

If you’ve ever waited in that line,
you’re part of the story.

This is what New York tastes like.

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