Sweet 'n Sassy Food Truck Brings Creole Cooking and Soul Food to East Tennessee

Spicing Up the Food Truck Scene

The East Tennessee food truck scene is vibrant and healthy, with numerous trucks available virtually any day of the week. With such competition, setting your food truck apart can seem like a daunting task, but that didn't stop Chef Tandalyn Burton from entering the fray. After 30 years in foodservice, Burton decided it was time to open her own food truck, and she knew exactly what this truck would offer: Creole cuisine and classic soul food.

"When picking the concept for my food truck, I was just trying to find… a niche or a market that hadn't been tapped yet in Knoxville," she explained. "Everybody was doing pretty much the same thing, and so I was like, 'Let me do something that I do really well, that everybody else isn't doing.'"

One doesn't need to look very hard to find a food truck serving barbecue or burgers but finding shrimp and grits or catfish po'boys is a little more difficult. Recognizing the gap in the market, Burton seized the opportunity, especially since she'd already found success serving soul food in her catering business.

"I cater an event at the Knoxville Museum of Art once a month, and one day, I just decided to do shrimp and grits," she said. "It was a hit. I ended up doing catfish and grits one day, and it took off like crazy… I did it an event, and everybody kept requesting it. Everybody was like, 'You're the shrimp and grits lady!'"

Not only was "The Shrimp and Grits Lady" a label Burton happily accepted, it ended up being the catalyst for her food truck idea.

"I was like, 'Okay… I'll be the shrimp and grits lady,'" Burton said with a grin.

A Long-term Friendship Brings Dreams to Fruition

At the time, Burton was running her own part-time catering business with a logo featuring a baby picture of her five-year-old daughter, who also provided the inspiration for the company name. Like many young girls, her personality was, well, sweet and sassy.

After 30 years cooking in venues ranging from Club LeConte to the Knoxville Convention Center to The King's Academy, Burton knew she wanted to take the next step in her culinary career. Armed with the Sweet 'n Sassy name, she considered bottling her custom-made spices and sauces, but ultimately opted for a bolder move: her own food truck. Before she did that, however, she had to start with a very important piece: the truck.

"The challenge with starting a food truck was finding a truck," Burton explained. After approaching other food truck owners on the Knoxville Food Trucks Circle, she eventually located and purchased an old barbecue truck, but it wasn't exactly ready for service.

"Literally, it was like an empty an empty shell on the inside," she said.

Through her catering business, Burton had dealt with KaTom in the past, dropping by when necessary to get supplies, but the prospect of a starting a food truck required a new level of reliance. Fortunately, Burton already had a connection to help get her truck ready for action: a friendship with KaTom's Director of Outside Sales, Nick Taylor. Burton and Taylor's daughters had played basketball together over the years.

"We've got six kids, they've got six kids… we just had a lot of commonalities," Burton said of Taylor. "They're a really sweet family."

Beyond sports competitions, Burton and Taylor's friendship and shared experience in the foodservice industry led to conversations about potential future business endeavors.

"We had kind of had this conversation a couple years back," Burton said, referring to her food truck dreams. "He was like 'When you're ready, come and talk to me; I'll help you lay the inside out and get it together.'"

In the fall of 2024, Burton did just that.

"I gave him a buzz and told him what I was thinking about," Burton said. Her industry background already gave her an idea of what she wanted her truck to look like on the inside; KaTom, as always, was ready and eager to help a foodservice operator bring their vision to life.

KaTom Helps Foodservice Operators Large and Small

Burton didn't simply opt for Taylor's help because of their friendship; it was his reputation for delivering for his clients in a prompt, professional manner.

"They helped me get my stuff ordered: my fridge, my freezer, my flattop, the fryer… the whole thing is KaTom," Burton said. "Nick's that kind of guy; he takes care of business. Nick's on it."

Sweet 'n Sassy's officially launched at the Knoxville Area Urban League's Shoes for Schools event in August 2024, and the business has continued at a steady clip.

"Not even a year, but we've been rockin' and rollin' ever since," Burton said. "I would like to open a restaurant; my endgame is brick and mortar."

But she has no plans to give up the food truck, even when she opens a physical location. She'd eventually like to pass operation of the food truck over to someone else while she runs her restaurant, a plan she already knows will involve KaTom.

"I'll be calling KaTom again, being like, 'Hey, I got a building, let's do this!'"