JACKSONVILLE, Fla. – When temperatures drop, most people head indoors. For food truck owners, the cold means bundling up, shortening shifts and getting creative to keep meals coming.
“You’re looking at, like, 10 degrees lower than outside. It is extremely cold. Remember, it’s a lot of metal, so metal, obviously, holds the coldness,” Chef Love, owner of Chef Love Soul Cuisine, said. “So there’s no way of getting heat in.”
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The metal shells of the trucks make interior temperatures feel colder than the air outside, owners say, and that has forced changes to normal routines. Chef Love said he recently pushed back opening times two days in a row, opening at 9 a.m. instead of his usual 7 a.m., a move that affected business and inconvenienced some regulars.
“You may have DoorDash or Uber, but for the most part, everybody would stay home,” he said.
Safety and comfort measures have become part of the daily grind: layers, gloves, hot drinks and shorter, quicker shifts to limit exposure to the cold while still serving customers. A customer who stopped by said the cold wasn’t a deterrent.
“They have good food and I’m hungry,” the customer said. “I come in the cold, rain, shine.”
While the temperatures may be freezing, the food — and community support — remain hot.