Who to call, what permitting actually costs, and a free checklist to work through before the inspector shows up.
Requirements reviewed 2026-07-28 against IDPH Retail Food; City of Chicago Mobile Food business licensing.
Your City or County Health Department (Chicago Department of Public Health and BACP within city limits)
Illinois sets a statewide food code baseline built on the FDA 2022 Food Code, but retail food establishments including food trucks are regulated by the local health department for the jurisdiction they operate in. Chicago runs its own licensing entirely separately from surrounding Cook County.
IDPH Retail Food →The order matters — several of these are expensive to do out of sequence.
There is no statewide Illinois food truck licence. IDPH sets the code; the local health department licenses and inspects. Chicago, suburban Cook County, and the collar counties are separate processes with separate paperwork.
Preparing and selling food from the truck requires a Mobile Food Preparer licence. Selling individual, pre-prepared, totally enclosed portions requires a Mobile Food Dispenser licence. The two are not interchangeable and the wrong one blocks onboard cooking.
Chicago requires both mobile licence types to also hold a Shared Kitchen User licence in order to service the vehicle at a licensed commissary kitchen. Operators routinely miss this one.
All food sold from a mobile unit, and all food prepared on a truck, must have been previously prepared or stored in a licensed brick-and-mortar food establishment such as a commissary kitchen. Preparing food on the street or sidewalk is not allowed.
Chicago-licensed trucks carry an active GPS device reporting location, and may not vend within 200 feet of the entrance of a brick-and-mortar food establishment on the public way. Both shape where a Chicago truck can actually make money.
Chicago's mobile food licences run on a two-year term rather than annually, which makes the headline figure look larger than the equivalent yearly fee elsewhere. The Preparer licence, for onboard cooking, costs materially more than the Dispenser licence. Outside Chicago, each county health department sets its own fee and renewal cycle. Take current amounts from BACP or your county rather than from any summary.
Inside Chicago, licensing runs through the Department of Business Affairs and Consumer Protection while food safety inspection runs through the Chicago Department of Public Health — two departments, one truck. Everywhere else in Illinois, the county or municipal health department does both. A Chicago licence does not carry into suburban Cook County.
Only with a Mobile Food Preparer licence. A Mobile Food Dispenser licence covers the sale of individual, pre-prepared, totally enclosed portions and does not permit onboard preparation. Preparing food on the street or sidewalk is prohibited either way.
No. Illinois licenses food trucks locally, and Chicago's process is separate from suburban Cook County and the collar counties. Trading across those boundaries means dealing with each jurisdiction.
Chicago bars mobile food vehicles from vending within 200 feet of the entrance of a brick-and-mortar food establishment on the public way. Combined with the GPS reporting requirement, it is the single biggest constraint on where a Chicago truck can park and trade.
Chicago writes its food truck rules and regulations into Municipal Code Chapter 7-38 - including the licence classes and the 200-foot rule - on top of the Illinois Food Code. Suburbs and other Illinois counties license separately, so each jurisdiction you trade in needs its own check.
The $9 prep pack adds a print-ready checklist, a commissary letter template, an inspection log, and a temperature reference card.
Get the Pack — $9