Elevation 5280 Food Truck Serves Up Classic Sandwiches

Chef David Adkisson owned a food truck once before, but mechanical issues put an end to that business. Not one to give up, he went all in with a new venture, Elevation 5280, in January.

Originally from Honolulu, Adkisson made his way to the continental U.S. after being adopted by his stepfather, who was in the Navy, when he was three years old. "We moved to the States right after that, and I ended up spending my childhood in Orlando, Florida," he says. "That's where I started cooking. My first job was at Disney at the age of seventeen."

Before that, "I did some retail jobs like Dollar Tree and just hated it," he recalls. "One day, I saw that Disney was hiring cooks, so I went in, applied and got hired, and that's kind of it. Long story short, that's just how it happened."

After several years of cooking at Disney, Adkisson and some of his buddies grew tired of living in the Orlando area. "'We're going to move to either Seattle or Denver,'" he remembers his friends saying. "They flipped a coin, and Denver it was."

When he arrived, he ventured to Colorado Boulevard to look for a job. "I hit a couple of places and then I saw Shotgun Willie's. I was thinking, this sounds like a reputable steakhouse, right? I walked in. It was all dark. The front guy asked me for my ID, and I was like, this is weird. I didn't ask for anything. Luckily, I had just turned 21. ... I filled out the application literally on a stripper table and was hired that day," Adkisson recalls, laughing, though his tenure there only lasted about a year.
He went on to work at various places including Arrowhead Golf Club, the Crowne Plaza and a few mom-and-pop restaurants before joining a paleo meal delivery service, which sparked the idea to enter the food truck business. "I was the executive chef there for about a year, and I knew nothing about paleo," he says. "I went from 300 meals a week to almost 1,000 at the end of the year. I had to teach myself everything about paleo. Near the end of doing that, a friend of mine had some money and she was like, 'Let's buy a food truck.' We took the concept of paleo and started our food truck. This was about seven years ago, and we called it TH Cuisine, the Healthy Cuisine."

Unfortunately, TH Cuisine only operated for a year before the transmission blew on the truck. Unable to afford repairs, the team had to sell it.

But Adkisson never let the unfortunate incident discourage him. He quickly found work but moved between several places over the years. "I just really couldn't find where I fit in," he says. Then last year he found work on another food truck through a friendship developed at a commissary kitchen.

When his friend opened a concept inside Max Taps Centennial, it provided an opportunity for Adkisson to re-enter the food truck business as an owner. "In January, my friend was like, 'I'm tired. I can't do both, and I'll sell you the truck for cheap and you can do your own thing with it.' So I contacted my friend who I opened the first food truck with and we decided to just go for it," he says.

While Adkisson originally wanted to offer Hawaiian food, he wasn't sure it would have wide enough appeal in Denver. Instead, he opted for something he enjoys. "My favorite thing to do was to cook really good sandwiches," he explains. "I took a lot of recipes that I created back in the day and thought, let's make it work on the truck."
Elevation 5280 hit the streets in January serving classic sandwiches with a personal twist. Adkisson's favorite is the patty melt. "I do kind of an original version, but I throw some Southwestern flair in there — add some spice and kick. I use my chipotle mayo and add some jalapeños. The flavors work very well," he notes.

His Cuban sandwich, he adds, has quickly become popular. "It's about a 24- to 36-hour process," he says. "I smoke my pork for four hours. I marinate it in my own mojo marinade overnight, then I braise it the oven for about twelve hours. It just melts in your mouth. And it's just classic. I don't add any extra stuff to it. It's just the mustard, the pickles, the Swiss cheese and the bread. You don't want to ruin something that isn't broken."

While the team is still building the truck's online presence, you can message it on Instagram @elevation5280foodtruck to get the schedule this summer.