Is Your Food Safety Program This Hardcore? It Should Be.

McDonald’s hasn’t grown into a multinational restaurant chain without doing a lot of things right.  And whatever you think of their culinary achievements (or lack thereof), you can’t deny that they’ve built an empire in food service. If one lesson is clear from the rise of McDonald’s, it should be that you don’t build an empire without a premier food safety program.  As a recent article in ...

Asian Carp Have Only One Predator: Restaurants

Invasive species take over new habitats so quickly because they usually have no natural predators in their new home, allowing them to reproduce quickly and overwhelm native populations competing for the same food.  The latest foreign invader to make headlines in the U.S. is Asian Carp, a fast-moving, quick-breeding intruder that has taken over the Mississippi and Ohio watersheds with amazing speed. The carp was originally brought...

The Public Smoking Ban Debate Continues

Los Angeles has taken the ongoing regulation of smoking in public places a step further and banned smoking in the outdoor patio areas of restaurants.  The city council voted unanimously in favor of the ban, despite repeated pleas by local restaurants that the ban would hurt business in an already down economy.  The ban will take effect one year from the time the mayor signs the ordinance.  The city plans to take that time to...

What To Watch For In 2010

About this time every year the food service industry starts buzzing about the trends that will shape consumer preferences and affect business in the next 12 months.  We are lucky enough (or unlucky, depending on how you view it) to be in the midst of a transition period for many restaurants, and that makes the trends for 2010 even more compelling. These trends have already been ...

Why Card Check Is The Symptom, Not The Disease

Like it or not, small business owners like many in the food service industry are experiencing a period of drastic change labor laws.  As health care reform becomes a reality, several other projects championed by Democratic lawmakers will start nudging their way back to the top of the agenda – including the much maligned Employee Free...

Why Fine Dining Is Shedding Formal Dress Codes

Fine dining restaurants have been the hardest hit segment of the foodservice industry since the country slid into recession two years ago.  Many establishments have closed and other have turned to deep discounting to stay alive during a time when consumers just aren’t willing to spend a lot of money to go out to eat. As if all that weren’t enough, many fine dining restaurants are having trouble attracting younger patrons...

Tonight’s Special: Pork a la Petri

Late last month it was announced that scientists in Holland have successfully grown pork meat in a petri dish.  The meat was developed from special cells called myoblasts that are specifically programmed to repair muscles in a live animal.  If they are left in a super rich broth of nutrients, as the experiment in Holland shows, they will grow indefinitely, creating a possibly endless supply of synthetically grown, but otherwise...

The Public Smoking Ban Counterculture

There has been much ongoing debate over the effect of public smoking bans on restaurant business.  As more and more states move to ban smoking in almost all public buildings, a counterculture has been pushing back by openly flouting the bans in their communities. This counterculture is especially strong along the Illinois-Indiana border since Illinois passed a statewide public smoking ban earlier this year.  Indiana has no such...

Chefs Say Cut Portion Sizes, Not Ingredients

One of the biggest trends in food service these days is nutrition labeling for entrees and the development of “healthy” menu items that appeal to growing consumer concerns over what they eat. A recent survey of 433 chefs conducted by Penn State and Clemson universities has shed some light on what chefs are thinking about...

These Guys Boosted Sales 400% With Creative Marketing

Photo by Dean Rutz, Seattle Times Ivar’s Seafood Restaurant in Seattle, Washington pulled off a brilliant piece of restaurant marketing recently, resulting in a 400% increase in clam chowder sales.  The story was originally reported in the...