Top Chef contestant and Wisconsin native, Grayson Schmitz, will spend Sunday creating specialty pizza recipes for Streetza Pizza food truck. The event will take place at Verlo Mattress Factory Store in Greenfield, proceeds from the event will benefit IndependentFirst’s independent living skills training program.
“It’s going to be a great event,” said Scott Baitinger, founder of Streetza Pizza. “I’m happy about how quickly it came together and how more and more people are getting involved.”
Grayson will create two new pizzas on the truck with names based on her famous food “catch phrases.” Fans will be able to try both pizza varieties including “Sex in the Mouth” and “Like a Meatball” and vote on their favorite for $5. All proceeds from the event will be donated to IndependenceFirst programming.
Baitinger initially reached out to Schmitz on Twitter.
“I watch Top Chef and I nonchalantly thanked her for representing Wisconsin on the show and thought it would be great if she created some pizza recipes for the truck,” he said. “Within five minutes her publicist was in touch with me and we began the process of setting this in motion.”
That was earlier this week, and still Baitinger expects about 1,000 people to attend on Sunday.
Streetza Pizza was named the #1 food truck in the US, by Bloomberg Businessweek and has planned to give Schmitz full control of their truck during the event. The event will be held at 1 p.m. on Sunday at Verlo Mattress Factory Store, located at 6501 West Layton Avenue in Greenfield. Verlo will be making an additional donation to IndependenceFirst’s programs for each mattress purchased during the event.
Attendees will be able to vote for their favorite Schmitz recipe on OnMilwaukee.com until next Wednesday, Baitinger said. The winning slice will be added to the Streetza Pizza Food truck.
“We’re just happy to be involved in such a great initiative,” said Carol Voss, PR and marketing director of IndependenceFirst. “We love to have fun and Grayson is a fun, driven woman who pursued her life goals to be a Top Chef – People with disabilities get assistance from IndependenceFirst to achieve their life goals to live independently and be successful. This is going to be a great event.”
Baitinger plans to do at least one charity event a month at Streetza, and hopes he can draw more celebrity chefs to the truck for a possible battle between celebrity chef slices, he said.
“We’re looking forward to Grayson’s visit being the first of many for her and perhaps other celebrity chefs,” he said.
By seeing the event come together on Twitter, the band Waterstreet Bridge has offered to provide live entertainment for the event as well.
“It’s great to see it all come together,” Baitinger said.
Guests are asked to RSVP on Twitter, Facebook or the Streetza Pizza website.
