Cold Friends Kitchen is a contemporary food truck in Pittsburgh that travels back and forth between the South Side’s Velum Fermentation and Lawrenceville’s New Amsterdam. On the outside, the truck displays its skull and burger logo in bold purple and white, a sign of its creativity in food-fusion. What’s inside the truck, however, is even more intriguing.
Cold Friends Kitchen is Much More Than Just a Food Truck
Co-Owner Gabriel Knecht is one of two food professionals (his friend and longtime co-worker Thomas Bango being the other) running this food truck and everything he does is to better the lives of others. This includes the truck’s Pay It Forward program, which comes from Knecht’s past experiences with homelessness and addiction. (Much of the Cold Friends Kitchen team are in recovery themselves, as well.) After years of working to get sober and plenty of couch hopping, Knecht’s eventual success allows him to give back like others did for him in his youth.
“I adopted Pay It Forward from a couple of European restaurants that have always done this because it’s a different culture over there,” explains Knecht. “It’s $10 flat, and it’s usually a burger and fries, which is a $15 item, but we reduced it. I wanted to prove to these homeless people that there are people out there that do care about them. It gives people an outlet to be able to help the cause.”
Building the Community Up
For Knecht it’s not about getting publicity for what he’s doing, it’s about making a connection and giving hope to those at their lowest. He himself spent nights in the cold on street-side benches and under the Mon Wharf holding on to a practically empty bottle. He knows firsthand that the last thing these people want is a camera in their face, trying to exploit their story.
“I know from being there, that in these situations you’re just like, ‘I need a sign, I need some reason to keep going,’” says Knecht. “When we give these dudes a hug and ask them their name, it’s the first person that has looked them in the eye that day. It’s so isolating to be that person.”
Crafting a Menu of Experiences
Besides the Pay It Forward aspect, Cold Friends Kitchen also boasts a large menu with over 20 items, which is a lot for a food truck. Their selections include appetizers, smash burgers, sandwiches, bowls, soups, and many dishes which you wouldn’t imagine coming out of a food truck like their Pork Belly Bites.
“The Pork Belly Bites are my signature dish,” says Knecht. “I’ve been building those for around four years now. Every time we would bring that dish somewhere, we’d change it. But, now it’s in its final form and it’s amazing.”
Much of the food is made to accompany a pint of beer since the truck often sits outside of Velum Fermentation where you can pair up their brews with Cold Friend’s bites. Fried finger foods, creamy mac and cheese, and even a few international street-food dishes, fill the menu.
“A lot of it [the menu] is influenced by my time in Ireland,” says Knecht. “There’ll be a little chip shop in a tiny village somewhere making fish and chips and fries, and they do curry fries. It’s like English-style, bad canned gravy with handfuls of processed cheddar cheese over frozen fries. But it is, like, cheesy, gooey, spicy deliciousness, and it’s exactly what you want when you’re drinking. So, now we have a curry poutine on the menu with a vegetarian, charred shallot curry gravy. It’s refined and upscale, but still comforting.”
Changing the Food Industry
So with such an interesting mix of elevated and comfort classics, you may be wondering, why a food truck? Why spend all your time in a small, cramped space without a fixed location? Well, for Knecht, there was no other thought in his head after spending years working within the restaurants of Pittsburgh.
“Our whole thing with the food truck is it’s a “screw you” to corporate restaurants,” explains Knecht. “Like, we’re gonna do what you. With literally a tenth of the staff, half of the overhead, and in a metal box in six degree weather during the winter at 3 a.m. And it’s going to be better.”
Having a truck also allows Knecht to create a tight-knit team where there’s trust between all. It’s important to him that he gives his workers a consistent place to work where the boss cares just as much about the workers as they do the business. It’s another way that Knecht can work to change lives, even if it is starting at a smaller scale. And what better place to start making change than Pittsburgh?
“Pittsburgh makes a great proving-ground for stuff like this because Pittsburgh likes Pittsburgh and Pittsburgh supports Pittsburgh,” says Knecht. “Even in the face of all the hate and all the unrest right now, there needs to be things like this.”
Story by Kylie Thomas
Photo Courtesy of Cold Friends Kitchen
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