Restaurants

What Can I Get You Folks? - Where Your Leftovers Go

by Hanna Raskin, Posted Jan 22nd 2010 @ 11:00AM

When I was a senior in high school, I participated in the first-ever Take Your Daughter to Work Day. Since confidentiality laws prevented me from accompanying my psychotherapist parents' to their sessions, I ended up trailing a server at an upscale restaurant – an assignment that probably would have made Gloria Steinem shudder.

I'd never been in a restaurant kitchen until I cleared tables at The Lord Fox, a fabulously patrician eatery that still serves beef Wellington and crab-stuffed avocados. I recall having two concurrent revelations that day: Servers don't get a lunch break, and most diners leave food on their plates. To the disgust of my schoolmates who'd also landed the restaurant work gig, I nibbled on leftover steak sandwiches, ate the bacon out of BLTs and finished off any remaining French fries before rinsing the dishes.

Filed under: Restaurants

Macaroni Grill Revamps Lunch Menu

COMMENTS 82

by Sarah LeTrent, Posted Jan 20th 2010 @ 4:00PM

Macaroni Grill Sandwich Macaroni Grill's Prosciutto Sandwich. Photo: Business Wire.

Macaroni Grill wants to entice the Ladies Who Lunch with their new health-conscious offerings.

The Italian-food chain is one of many quick-service restaurants to face a decline in sales in the aftermath of caloric-disclosure laws and unwelcome press about its belly-ballooning meals.

As a result, the chain is rolling out an entirely revamped 60-item menu -- refocusing on Italian-Mediterranean flavors and more healthful choices. The new midday offerings are the latest phase in the menu overhaul.

Filed under: Restaurants, News

A New Tool in The Chef Arsenal: Tweezers

COMMENTS 6

by Jennifer Lawinski, Posted Jan 20th 2010 @ 3:00PM

Getty Images

Tweezers. They're not just for plucking your eyebrows or removing splinters anymore.

In some of the country's hottest kitchens, chefs are turning to the tiny tongs -- the medical variety used by doctors in the operating room -- to put delicate finishing touches on dishes that mere fingers would surely bungle, the New York Times reported.

"I was using tweezers to handle a thin stream of strawberry purée frozen with liquid nitrogen because if you touch it, it falls apart," Grant Achatz, the chef at Alinea, a high-end restaurant in Chicago, told the Times. "Tweezers allow boundary-pushing with scale and texture."

Filed under: Restaurants, Chefs

Johnny Rockets Expanding to Appeal to More Consumers

COMMENTS 28

by Nicki Gostin, Posted Jan 14th 2010 @ 5:30PM

Photo: Thomas Hawk, Flickr

If you have a spare $300,000 lying around and you've always wanted to open up a franchised sports bar then you're in luck.

Johnny Rockets, the restaurant chain best known for its Happy Days style diners, is launching sports bars and mobile kitchens. (According to NRN.com that tidy little sum is what you'll need to open a franchise, far less than the $750,000 for a regular Johnny Rockets).

A Johnny Rockets Sports Lounge opened last year in a Six Flags amusement park in Queensbury, N.Y. and tonight there is a media bash for another one that opened last month on the Upper East Side of Manhattan.

Filed under: Business, Restaurants, News

What Can I Get You Folks? - Runny-Nosed Customers

COMMENTS 2

by Hanna Raskin, Posted Jan 12th 2010 @ 4:00PM

Photo: Getty Images

Eating out can be a rather nasty business. Even in restaurants that exceed their state's cleanliness standards, food is generally handled by a succession of bare hands – some of them crawling with germs. Innumerable elements of the prototypical great dining experience – crowding together with friends, sharing appetizers, shaking the manager's hand at the end of an evening well-spent – are an epidemiologist's worst nightmare.

As servers, we're constantly exposed to all sorts of viruses. That's why it galls me that so many diners make the situation worse by ignoring hygiene altogether.

Of course, we can't quarantine cold-sufferers. But having the sniffles is not license to leave your wadded-up tissues all over your booth and half-sucked lozenges on your table. Why must so many diners treat linen napkins like handkerchiefs?

Filed under: Restaurants

Carhops "Skate" Through Training at New Sonic Drive-In

COMMENTS 39

by Catherine Donaldson-Evans, Posted Jan 12th 2010 @ 3:30PM

Sonic Photo: slworking2, Flickr

By Catherine Donaldson-Evans

They weren't skating on thin ice, but the carhops at a new Southern California Sonic Drive-In were definitely skating.

Employees of the soon-to-open restaurant in Duarte, Calif., have been training for the job on roller skates, as they'll be tasked with zipping up to customers' car windows on wheels carrying trays of food and drinks.

Sonic has set itself apart from other fast-food chains with its 1950s theme. Key to its business are its skating carhops.

"It's a fun job," Sonic franchising partner Steve Jones told Slashfood. "Customers see the carhops having fun on the job and then they want to be one."

Filed under: Fast Food, Restaurants, News

'The Balthazar Cookbook' - Cookbook Spotlight

COMMENTS 0

by Alexa Weibel, Posted Jan 8th 2010 @ 2:00PM

balthazar cookbook Photo: Amazon.com

'The Balthazar Cookbook'
By Keith McNally, Riad Nasr and Lee Hanson
Clarkson Potter Publishers -- 2003
Buy it on Amazon

If you ever thought delectable French food could only be attained at overpriced restaurants, this cookbook by Balthazar restaurateur Keith McNally and company will prove you wrong. And hats off to them for revealing the beauty of French cooking: For the most part, it necessitates a minimal amount of ingredients (of good quality, bien sûr), executed to perfection.

See what we tested and whether the book is worth buying after the jump.

Filed under: Books, Restaurants, Reviews, Cookbook Spotlight

Pulled Pork and Dolcetto - The San Francisco Chronicle in 60 Seconds

COMMENTS 0

by Alexa Weibel, Posted Jan 8th 2010 @ 12:00PM

pulled pork
Photo: stevendepolo, flickr

Cooking in bulk is a serious time-saver. Following the Chronicle's "Make Once, Eat Thrice" concept, braise a pork shoulder and pick from nearly a dozen suggested uses for it.
Though today she describes herself as an Italo-phile, when it comes to cuisine chef Lizzie Binder's culinary travels have taken her from South Africa to London and Scotland to San Francisco, where she serves as Executive chef at San Francisco's Bar Bambino. She shares her recipe for Minestra Maritata, a meaty Neapolitan soup that her family relishes as a favorite.
The Chronicle's wine editor recommends a variety of Dolcetto bottles as "versatile winter wines."
A columnist answers a prominent local chef's request for information about how to handle restaurant no-shows -- and both agree that a reservation counts as an oral contract.
Recipes: Butternut Squash Stuffed Shells with Rosemary and Walnut Butter, High Hat Cocktail, Red Pozole, Lemon-Ricotta Flatbread.

Filed under: Food News, Restaurants, In 60 Seconds

Chuy's Extends Reach to Southeast

COMMENTS 23

by Hanna Raskin, Posted Jan 6th 2010 @ 4:00PM

Photo: Nuevo Anden, Flickr.

Chuy's, the offbeat Tex-Mex joint where the Bush twins were famously nabbed for underage drinking, is looking to replicate its success in Tennessee with future expansion plans for outlets around Birmingham, Lexington and Memphis.

"Basically, in the next four years, we should be close to 50 restaurants," spokeswoman Ashley Ingle says. "We've branched out from Austin over the years, and we're kind of trying to replicate that hub in the Southeast."

Chuy's has opened restaurants in five Texas metro areas since 2006, when a venture capitalist pumped money into the franchise. But the chain didn't stray past the state's borders until this fall, when it opened a location in Franklin, Tenn. (Another restaurant group operates an unrelated chain of Chuy's in California and Arizona.)

"Nashville has a lot of similarities to Austin," Ingle explains, citing the freeway network, live music scene and Dell Computers' presence.

While the vast majority of Mexican restaurants around Nashville serve the same lineup of enchiladas and chimichangas, Ingle says Chuy's specializes in recipes drawn from the microgastronomic region that runs from New Mexico's Hatch Valley through South Texas' Rio Grande Valley. While dishes like the chain's signature steak burrito and chicken tortillas are likely familiar to eaters weaned on bean dip, Ingle says they're distinguished by the restaurant's use of freshly-made blue corn tortillas and fresh green chile sauce.

Filed under: Business, Trends, Restaurants

What Can I Get You Folks? - Policing Customer Theft

COMMENTS 9

by Hanna Raskin, Posted Jan 5th 2010 @ 4:00PM

Photo: Getty Images

Sellers of surveillance cameras and point-of-sale systems make a big deal about how much restaurant employees steal: According to some estimates, staffers nationwide cheat their employers out of more than $8 billion a year.

That's a massive number. Even scarier for restaurant owners, most of the losses don't come in the form of easily foiled capers in which employees are stuffing their pants with steaks or siphoning beer off the taps. Instead, presumably well-meaning servers are giving away appetizers, failing to ring up coffees and helping themselves to fountain drinks. With management's blessing, my coworkers and I probably drink about 40 to-go cups of soda and tea every night.

But restaurant workers aren't the only culprits: A startlingly high number of customers filch what doesn't belong to them, and their motives are rarely innocuous. Intent on securing a souvenir or, perhaps, saving money on silverware, many restaurant guests treat the table like an all-you-can-take smorgasbord. And as the recession wears on, the problem seems to be getting worse.

Cutlery's by far the most popular item with thieving foodies, who seem to fancy specialized utensils like oyster forks and lobster crackers. A pint glass with the restaurant's name on it might as well be inscribed with the words "steal me." And while I've heard of customers pinching plates, candleholders and art, diners in my section seem to favor smaller trinkets.

Filed under: Restaurants