More and more restaurants are exploring ways to make their operations “sustainable.”  Yes, it’s a buzzword, and yes, it’s a trend most commonly associated with San Francisco restaurants and other yuppie hideouts.  That doesn’t mean most of the restaurants out there can’t utilize sustainability in their operations. Trends show that …

Think of your restaurant as a 5 gallon bucket.  Every day you fill that bucket with customers.  Sometimes there’s a steady flow, sometimes it’s just a trickle, and sometimes it seems like a flood.  No matter what kind of day it is, every customer flowing through your doors grades their …

The Stew blog, written by the Chicago Tribune’s food beat staff, posted an interesting article recently talking about the little perks that make a restaurant meal a more pleasant experience. Yet as great as these perks are, they seem pretty generic – best practices that any restaurant worth its salt …

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 …

If you have already purchased restaurant equipment in 2009, or are planning on doing so before the year is up, make sure you get your accountant to take a special 50% depreciation allowance for all equipment that is purchased, installed and used by December 31st. This tax provision was extended …

Los Angeles has long been famous for roaming taco trucks that service the myriad neighborhoods of this sprawling metropolis, serving classic Latino fare.L.A. is also known for its distinct Asian cuisine, which is often blended with more traditional American foods to create wonderful hybrids. Well, now Korean BBQ, a hot …

The technology needed to allow a person to sit in one room and communicate visually and verbally with a person in another room somewhere else far away has been around for some time now.  It’s been imagined in the movies for decades, going back to Star Trek all the way …

One area of the restaurant industry we have continually focused on here at The Back Burner is management.  I don’t have to tell you that restaurant managers are often overworked and under-appreciated, and that’s on top of the stress involved with trying to manage a business in one of the …

Every restaurant has had to deal with revenue and expense challenges over the last year.  And many have probably wondered whether green practices and products in their restaurants are worth their while, both in terms of cost to purchase and the time it takes to implement new green consumer trend …

Every restaurant serves coffee.  It’s one of those standard beverages that any food service establishment takes for granted: restaurants of all kinds have always served coffee, and will continue to serve it forever.  But unlike other standard beverages like Coke or Pepsi that are made by a third party, coffee …