With his suspenders, slightly rumpled button-down shirt, moustache and mop of curly strawberry blond hair, Gold was an easy-to-spot silhouette around town, peering through the order window of his favorite food trucks and sending chefs into near-panic when he would show up at restaurants unannounced.

Affectionately known as J. Gold, he explored L.A.’s endless culinary offerings in his beat-up green Dodge Ram 1500, racking up 20,000 miles a year as he traversed the sprawling city in search of his next great meal. It was typically found in places “jammed into a strip mall, sharing a parking lot with a doughnut parlor, a kebab house and a check-cashing emporium,” as he described Culver City’s Mayura.

“I loved that when I went out with him — and I think this was true for a lot of people — he picked me up in his ridiculously oversized and always on-the-ropes truck and he dropped me off, even if it meant he was driving across the entirety of Los Angeles four times in a night,” Meehan said. “The pre- and post-meal conversation in the truck was part of the Jonathan Gold experience, and it was not optional.”