Welcome to Arepas On Wheels!
After relocating from our home in Barquisimeto, Venezuela, we looked for a way to get on our feet.
What we found: our favorite food, arepas.
Meet the Salazar-Gil family.
We’re a family business!
Every day, owners Fernando and Maria work at the restaurant — usually our daughters help when we have big events.
About Us
What part of Venezuela are you from?
We are from Barquisimeto. It is the capital of the state of Lara that is in the center of the country, about four hours from the capital, Caracas.
What made you decide to start a business?
Desire to improve ourselves, to get ahead. In Venezuela, we had our own businesses. When you migrate to a country and you arrive, with you having to start from scratch, so we started from scratch. We arrived here, like the majority of venezolanos, cleaning, working in kitchens, caring for children — we did tons of things before we got to this point, but always with the want to do what we needed to do. And, well, here we are today, trying, trying to improve ourselves and always have something better.
Really what we are doing with the restaurant is making the product known and lightening the way a little to those who come behind us and educate the Charlottesville community what Venezuelan food is.
Have you had to change any products or make more to fit the American taste?
No, no no! Our food is the same – I cook here the way I cooked in my house in Venezuela, I cook here the way I cook in my house in Charlottesville. We haven’t changed our food. We use the ingredients from here, and I can’t find sweet chili peppers, it’s true. But one tries to cook the closest to what there is in Venezuela as possible. You find that things like the cuts of meat we use in Venezuela are different from the ones I find here, and then you adjust, but we keep cooking the same.
Have you found lots of Venezolanos here?
There are a lot of us. There is always someone coming to the trailer saying “I’m Venezuelan,” we ask where they're from and if they know anyone else [Venezuelan] here. They don’t know anyone, that they’re just arriving or attending the University [of Virginia] or they’ve been here for 30 years – because we do not belong to any of the cells as different family groups, but most of us know each other. However, there are many others who are incognito.
Would you say there is a Venezuelan community here now?
Yes, we are a community here.
Frequently Asked Questions (FAQs)
What are arepas?
Arepas are a type of sandwich that is made with a base of cornmeal that is mixed with water, shaped into a ball, and flattened out into a shape of a burger patty. Then it is cooked on the grill or griddle, and once the outside is crispy, it can be filled with lots of different fillings.
Basically, it is a sandwich, a Venezuelan sandwich!
Why did we choose arepas to be our main product to sell?
Because we are Venezolanos and that is our food. Like we describe on our flyers, it is the most emblematic product of Venezuelan food worldwide. We share it with Colombia because we share our history with Colombia, but it is really a Latin American product. Because it is our emblem, it is what identifies us as a nation, that’s what we chose. It is super versatile, but it can also be adapted to any culture and we all like it.
What year did we start?
On March 2nd, 2022, we opened the trailer, and the demand has been so great; the town of Charlottesville has been so receptive. They are always open to support local market, and that has helped us because arepas are a different alternative to everything you might find in a supermarket. It has gone so well that we could not do with just the trailer, the trailer was not enough, and the restaurant was opened on November 14th, 2022.
Where was our first event?
Our first event took place at Decipher Brewery. That was crazy, and since then we haven’t stopped.
How is the reception to the food in Charlottesville? Has it been successful?
When we opened the trailer it was crazy because we did lots of publicity on social media before opening, hoping for 20 or 30 people to come eat. We sold more than 100 arepas the first day, and we were not prepared for that! The line was so long, and we knew the majority of people, or our daughters did, they were people who had heard what we put out. And it was so much, the line never ended, the people waited up to an hour for us to give them arepas. And we said no one would return, “we were a disaster,” we thought at that moment, “the people aren’t going to want to return.” That was a Wednesday, the next Saturday the line was even longer!
Sometimes people come to the trailer saying, “I don’t know what you sell but I want to try it. Tell me what an arepa is.” But everyone is willing. And something really beautiful is what happens when they tell you that they don’t know what you sell but that they want to eat it. You ask them what they want and they say, “no, no, no, don’t ‘Americanize’ anything for me, I want to eat the traditional like you all eat.”
Where do we buy our ingredients?
At supermarkets, at Sam’s Club, at restaurant distributors.