The Hatchery has officially finished its 2nd season and closed out the year with a festive Holiday Celebration featuring live music, Santa, and a fundraiser. We have lots to be grateful for this year, including an outstanding and reliable food truck team, loyal and curious customers, and a supportive community. We are sharing some of our 2024 highlights below. Despite these positive reflections, we still feel like there is plenty of work to do to expand our visibility and our outreach next year - connecting the consumer from hatchery - to farm - to table!
Our most popular dishes
Highlights in 2024
The food truck was recognized by an array of press this year including Coastal Virginia Magazine, The Local Scoop, Virginia Tourism, and Southern Living Magazine! See articles here.
We hired a fantastic, reliable, well experienced and seasoned chef - Doug DeForge who helped us more than double our sales over 2023.
We hit the road, and served up at some exciting events including VIMS' event to celebrate oyster restoration in the Bay featuring Governor Glenn Youngkin, and VIMS' Seafood Feast celebrating the William & Mary’s Batten School of Coastal & Marine Sciences, and also Ware Academy's 75th Anniversary Celebration. (Photos shown below!)
We visited 4 of our nearby customer's farms and produced a tour mini-series featured on our Youtube channel. Our intention with this project was to connect our customers to the other farm side of aquaculture and let them see a behind-the-scenes tour of oyster farming.
We partnered with Chesapeake Oyster Alliance and Mathews Economic Development Authority to install a floating dock to provide more aquaculture tours to the public and invited groups, allowing guests to see oyster husbandry from hatchery to farm, then try the end product fresh at The Hatchery Food Truck. This included a partnership with Mathews Deadrise Charters to expand tour opportunities from Callis Wharf.
What's your favorite way to eat an oyster?
Fried
Raw
Roasted
Not a fan of oysters, yet!
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