NYC food truck run by Navy vets serves up premium coffee
LONG ISLAND CITY, N.Y. (PIX11) --- On Sept. 11, Jimmy Lai's mom was missing for 16 hours before she showed up at the family home in Queens covered in ashes. She had walked home from the Finacial District.
The terrorist attacks prompted Lai, 36, to join the Navy, leading him and fellow veteran, Danny Singh, to start a business. The longtime friends are the co-owners of Deploy Coffee, a popular food truck specializing in brewed beverages at 47-40 Center Blvd. in Long Island City.
"I wanted to show other vets that they can be entrepreneurs," Lai said. "There are not enough veterans doing their own business."
Lai and Singh were deployed in parts of the Middle East at different times before they met in Japan. Singh was living in Florida before he sold his home and moved to New York City to start the business.
After getting the permits and the equipment arrived from Italy, the truck was up and running in February 2022. It has quickly become a neighborhood staple. The cold brew lattes are particularly popular with customers, who are mostly dog walkers and new moms with strollers, the vets said.
"It's been fantastic. Long Island City has embraced us," Singh, 34, said. "This is what keeps us here."
Deploy Coffee has found its niche n the crowded food truck scene in New York City. The locals love Uncle Gussy's, El Toro Rojo, and Terry and Yaki, according to Ben Goldberg, president and co-founder of the New York Food Truck Association.
Uncle Gussy's is known for serving up delicious Greek food and El Toro Rogo has some of the best Mexican food in the five boroughs. Terry and Yaki stands out as the only halal Asian food cart in the city, according to the NYFTA.
Lai, who used to have a truck that served food before opening Deploy Coffee, said some of his favorites are Cesar's Empanadas and Latino Bites.
"The city's food truck scene thrives due in part to its large selection of diverse cuisines and fuels the appetite of a city that never sleeps," Goldberg said.
For more information on Deploy Coffee, follow the vets on Instagram.