What You Need To Know
- Dreamville Festival ends after two days of music and food
- Festival returns after three year absence
- Food truck owners benefited from setup
- Rich Garner owns the Caribbean Kicker
In its return to Raleigh after a three-year wait, because of the pandemic, the second ever festival welcomed many musical acts and fans.
Sunday marked the end of the two-day 2022 festival. The event lineup included artists like Ashanti, Lil Wayne, Young Jeezy and Fayetteville’s own J. Cole. The mix of beats and lyrics coming from the various stages weren’t the only stellar part of the weekend.
The food was something to write home about as well.
For food truck owners like Rich Garner, it was a good time to see people who were hungry for more than music.
Garner said, “When you have so many people at one place and at one time, your preparation is a little bit different. You have to make sure everything is together, and everything is at temp and that you are matching everybody’s energy.”
Slowly but surely, crowds began trickling onto the grounds at Dorothea Dix Park Sunday afternoon. Many people attending made a bee-line for vendors like Garner’s Caribbean Kicker.
The taste from the islands by the owner and cook made hungry stomachs full. Garner said events like this are good for business.
He believes it’s the kind of thing Raleigh should have more often. “Man, it’s been amazing. It’s been amazing,” he said.
Whether you are walking to a stage to see an artist or leaving a performance, you are bound to get a little hungry.
Saturday, day one of the festival, he said his crew of street-meat chefs, food runners and more from the Caribbean Kicker served over 2,000.
"Really, our goal was to serve fresh food to a lot of people in a seriously short amount of time,” the owner said.
And business was booming. Several people who had eaten at his stand the day before returned Sunday, including 17-year-old Caleb Simmons. Simmons said, “I had the jerk chicken quesadilla yesterday. It was really good. I like the spiciness to it.”
Garner said he wouldn’t mind setting up at events of this scale more often. “This is the only one in North Carolina of this magnitude,” Garner said.
Besides the menu of artists, their food lineup, like the jerk chicken quesadilla, arguably matched the quality of music on stage.
“It’s really a surreal feeling to know that while we are serving all this food they are on the stage getting it in,” Garner said.
The owner and operator said it couldn’t be a better time to be serving food on four wheels.
“It really helps when you are mobile because you can basically go anywhere at any time,” he said. “Like the Dreamville Festival.”