Denver's First Vegan Food Truck Finally Lands on Colfax for Good

Thirteen years. That is how long Justin and Brittney Gurule ran Vegan Van out of a truck and a commissary before they finally got four walls and a front door.

And now they have them. The married couple behind Denver's first vegan food truck opened their first brick-and-mortar restaurant at 1490 Eudora Street along East Colfax on October 17, 2026. No more chasing festival spots. No more figuring out where the truck is parked today. You can just walk in.

Here is the thing most people do not realize about Vegan Van. This is not some new concept riding a trend. Westword named it Best Vegan Food Truck back in 2013, the same year it started rolling. That is a long time to build a following out of a kitchen on wheels. For years they ran out of a Park Hill commissary at 5155 E 39th Ave, and now they have traded that whole truck life for a storefront on the Colfax corridor.

The building has a sad story

So right here is the part that got me.

The building at 1490 Eudora was not supposed to be a vegan fast-food joint. It was being transformed into a fine-dining restaurant called The Fifth String by chef Amos Watts, who co-owned the project. Watts died unexpectedly in April 2024. He was 43. The construction was never finished.

Think about that for a second. A chef pours himself into a space, starts building the dream, and then he is gone before anyone ever gets to eat there. The room sat as an unfinished idea.

And now a family-owned vegan operation that spent more than a decade just trying to get a permanent address has picked up that space and made it their own. There is something about that I keep coming back to. One person's unfinished dream becomes another family's first real home. Colfax does that. It absorbs stories and keeps moving.

What you are actually eating

Let me be clear about what this place is, because vegan can mean a lot of things.

This is plant-based fast food. Knockoffs of the stuff you grew up on, done without meat. We are talking seitan Crunchwraps, chalupas, tacos, meaty sandwiches, wraps and loaded fries. Comfort food, scratch-made, 100% plant-based.

The one everyone is going to talk about is the Breakfast Crunchwrap. Thirteen bucks. Inside you get tater tots, vegan bacon, a JUST Egg scramble, queso and sour cream, all wrapped up. That is a legitimate breakfast, and the fact that none of it is animal product honestly does not register once you are eating it.

And they are open for breakfast, lunch and dinner seven days a week, 9 a.m. to 8 p.m. That matters. A food truck is a sometimes thing. This is an any-day thing. You want a Crunchwrap at 7 p.m. on a Tuesday, it is there.

The numbers back up the hype too. Vegan Van carries a 4.9 rating from more than 2,000 reviews on Uber Eats and sits around 4.8 on Google. You do not fake that kind of volume. People have been ordering this food for years and coming back.

They did not pick an easy block

Now, let me give you the full picture, because opening on East Colfax right now takes some nerve.

This whole stretch is in the middle of a