Cafe Momentum now offering lunch service as it brings on new chef, updated menu

Cafe Momentum is building momentum with a new chef, new menu and new lunch service.

Downtown Pittsburgh’s Cafe Momentum is one of three, alongside a flagship location in Dallas and another in Atlanta. The nonprofit restaurant provides culinary internships for young people who get caught up in the criminal justice system, as well as resources and career education beyond the culinary industry, teaching skills in a classroom setting like communications and conflict resolution. The space previously housed Wolfie’s Pub and Pizzuvio, which fully closed in 2020 and were taken over by Cafe Momentum in early 2022.

“What we want is for all of the people that are involved in the criminal justice system to get out of the criminal justice system and in order to do that, they need to have a skill set and the soft skills necessary to hold down a job,” executive director Cheyenne Tyler said. “We are not in it to create culinary professionals, but what we are in it to do is to create young people that can explore careers in a safe space and have the support necessary to do whatever it is that they truly want to do.”

The kitchen is now being led by Chef Robert “RC” Carter, who was previously the executive chef of Cioppino Restaurant and Cigar Bar, which closed last year. Carter decided to join Cafe Momentum after hearing about its program. He joked that he’d been doing a lot of the elements of the job previously, albeit not as directly.

“The teaching, the learning, the mentorship are all the things that if you call yourself a chef you have to be able to do anyways and they’re some of the most rewarding parts of the industry,” Carter said. “If you are able to grow people, they will follow you along and you can see your own growth in certain people, because I gave you a style for you to start with, now you develop your own style.”

He said that his expectations had already been surpassed and that “some of what these interns are able to do is completely mind boggling.” He said that his goal is to provide an environment where the interns want to learn, rather than feel forced to learn, which in turn produces better results.

“Last night, a classic French technique, I showed a young lady how to marinate a duck leg for confit and she did it perfectly,” Carter said. “It is mind blowing to me that I can teach that to someone who has never been to culinary school or even knows about French technique.”

Carter’s updated menu includes entrees like duck and braised short rib alongside Pittsburgh influenced favorites, like french fry topped salads.

Pittsburgh’s Cafe Momentum is the first of the Cafe Momentums to offer a lunch service, which Tyler said is to help showcase the cafe’s efforts to the broader Downtown community. Lunch service will be offered between 11 a.m. and 2 p.m. Tuesday to Friday.

“We are the first to host a lunch service and I believe that is the best path for Cafe Momentum Pittsburgh to showcase our food, showcase what we’re doing and then bring people back,” Tyler said. “We recognized that we want to be a staple in the community, our Downtown community specifically with the business community, attorneys and law firms, other nonprofits and foundations (and) whenever we have big events that are coming, (like) the NFL Draft, we want people to know who we are. So we decided to open for lunch and have a midday meal with a mission.”

The space also recently received a $914,300 grant for its efforts from the state of Pennsylvania.

“Giving young people opportunities, such as those provided by Cafe Momentum, will provide them with invaluable information on sustainable careers and, potentially, a path to such careers in food services and hospitality,” State Rep. Aerion Abney said in a prepared statement.

https://www.bizjournals.com/pittsburgh/news/2025/03/03/cafe-momentum-lunch-service.html