Chasing Our Tails founder has big plans for Dairy Queen building
By Per Peterson
It’s been 50 years since the iconic red barn on the west end of U.S. Hwy. 14 was built. Before it closed in January 2018, the building had been home to a Dairy Queen. If all goes as planned, food will soon be served there again.
Chasing Our Tails founder Steve Trachtenberg on Saturday told the Tracy Area Headlight Herald that he plans to soon take over ownership of the building to open a market/cafe that will offer hot meals and fresh-baked breads, as well as ice cream and coffees. The building is currently owned by the Tracy Development Corporation. A “sale pending” sign has been hanging on the front of the building for a few weeks.
“What we’re going to do — for lack of a better term — is a fresh-concept restaurant,” Trachtenberg said in an interview from his not-yet-completed Chasing Our Tails office on 4th St. “Fresh menu printed every day. Fresh concept. We’ll do a true special of the day.”
Trachtenberg’s end game is to create a brand that includes locally-grown product. His plan is to open for breakfast and lunch, with coffee and ice cream.
“If anything is being done after 3 o’clock, it would be coffee and ice cream,” he said.
Trachtenberg said his fiancée Elena Kalogeropoulos knew from the moment she arrived in Tracy that she wanted to do something special in the building.
“When Elena came to Tracy on Day One, she saw that Dairy Queen building and said, ‘I want that building.’ We know the Dairy Queen isn’t going to come back, but we want an ice cream place,” Trachtenberg said. “We would like to do some stuff that’s going to inspire the area.”
Kalogeropoulos said she was saddened to learn that Tracy had a Diary Queen that couldn’t remain open.
“I am a big ice cream fan,” she said. “Steven and I felt that if we had the opportunity to purchase the location we would make it an amazing addition to the current culinary story of Tracy.”
See this week’s Headlight Herald for more on this article.