A Local Seafood Giant is Getting Into the Food Truck Game

Ballard-based Trident Seafoods rolled out its food truck the Fork & Fin for the first time last weekend.

By Michael Rietmulder November 3, 2017

Since the onset of America’s food truck craze, the mobile kitchens have been used as restaurant incubators. Oftentimes, aspiring restaurateurs literally test drive their concept with taproom and street fest crowds before plunking down even more startup cash on a sit-down joint.

Less conventional is it to see a big-money company scale down to sling boat food out of a retrofitted FedEx truck. But Seattle-based Trident Seafoods hasn’t always done things the conventional way. While becoming a billion-dollar company supplying fish to Costco and Safeway, among others, Trident has kept a relatively low profile in its hometown. That changed last Sunday, at least slightly, when the seafood titan debuted its new food truck at the Seahawks game.

The Fork & Fin rolled out its menu of fish tacos, fish and chips, and less traditional dishes like a barbeque fish burger and something billed as peanut butter and jelly fish sticks (it looks better than it sounds). Add a couple sauces and sides of slaw and furikake ranch fries, and you have the makings of a solid on-the-fly meal.

While it doesn’t bear the Trident name, the Fork & Fin feels like an extension of its mission to promote Alaskan pollock. Each dish is made with the firm, white fish it touts as “cod’s delicious cousin” (though you can upgrade the burger to salmon for a buck).

According to the Seattle Times, the 44-year-old company is heavily invested in pollock, having built an Alaskan plant capable of handling 3 million pounds of fish per day. A few years ago, the pollock market hit a rough patch when Russia sharply increased its production. Trident CEO Joe Bundrant, son of founder Chuck Bundrant, is apparently hellbent on pushing the fish.

“I will tell you that is my laser focus of the last four years. We have got to get more people eating more wild Alaska pollock in more ways — more often, globally,” he told the Times.

At any rate, Seahawks fans who care not for Trident’s bottom line will have another grub option during this weekend’s tilt. Fork & Fin will be parked inside CenturyLink Field’s north entrance from 11 a.m. until the end of Sunday’s game against Washington.