"fast" news and stories

There is a reason why Frank Bruni drove through the South and not, say, Montana, on his hunt for the best fast food in the country. It is because there is more fast food eaten in the South than in any other part of the country.

According to Scarborough Research (pdf), while the average American adult eats fast food about 5.2 times per month, residents of Birmingham, Alabama dine at fast food restaurants 6.5 times per month. Given that the examples used by the research firm were McDonald's and Subway, it seems likely that they only included major chain restaurants in their survey, too. Rounding out the top five for fast food consumption were Louisville, KY; Austin. TX; Memphis, TN and Raleigh, NC, ranging from 6.4-6.2 average visits.

The company also looked at the cities in which "sit-down" quick service restaurants, like Applebee's or TGI Friday's, were frequented. Orlando, Florida came out on top, with 4.5 visits per month. The other top cities included Cincinnati, OH; Fort Meyers, FL; Tampa, FL and Atlanta, GA.

Cities like Syracuse, NY and Philadelphia, PA were towards the bottom of the fast food visit rankings, with only 4 visits per adult per month, and Honolulu, HI, Buffalo, NY and Spokane, WA had the fewest "sit-down" visits, at 3, 2.9 and 2.5, respectively.

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The full title of this new Rachael Ray book is Express Lane Meals: What To Keep on Hand, What To Buy Fresh for the Easiest-Ever 30-Minute Meals. Quite a mouthful, wouldn't you say? But in almost the time that it takes to say the name of the book, you can have a meal on the table because Rachael Ray is that fast.

This book has a great premise. At the beginning of the book, Rachael gives her readers a list of pantry ingredients that they should always keep in their home, including various spices, flour, milk, fresh fruits and vegetable, pasta and assorted canned goods. Once you've taken the list to the store and stocked up, you will have all you need (except the actual cooking equipment, which you might need to make another trip for) to fix every recipe in the book. All the recipes call for ten items or less - hence the name of the book - and there is a backup shopping list with each one, so you can be doubly sure that you have everything you need before you start. Sticking with her easy-to-read style, the recipes are not intimidating and should be a good start for a beginning cook or a good starting point for a more experienced cook who is short on time.

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Health magazine put together their list of what they considered to be the "best foods for busy women." What they clearly meant to say was the "best pre-packaged meals/snacks for busy women". There isn't anything necessarily wrong with this sort of meal, but I would hardly go so far as to say it is the "best," since my definition of "best" does not generally include a lot of shelf-stable pre-packaged meals. Nevertheless, here are their picks:

Breakfast
South Beach Diet Denver-Style Breakfast Wrap
Post Raisin Bran Cereal Bars

Lunch
Starkist Albacore Lemon & Cracked Pepper Tuna Fillet
Thai Kitchen Thai Peanut Noodle Car

Dinner
Lean Cuisine Dinnertime Selections Chicken Portobello
Uncle Ben's Ready Rice Whole Grain Brown

Snack
Kettle Brand Bakes Hickory Honey BBQ

Dessert
Edy's/Dreyer's Slow Churned Light Ice Cream French Silk
100 Percent Whole Grain Chips Ahoy! Cookies

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Papa John's is planning to roll out pizza to consumers in 10 minutes or less! The third largest pizza delivery chain in the United States is releasing what will be the fastest made-to-order pizza ever. Guaranteed.

Basically, Papa John's is promising that its Papa's 10 Minute Carry-out Customer Guarantee will have your pizza made-to-order and completely ready for handoff in not more than 10 minutes or it will be free. The offer will apply only to carry-out orders during lunchtime, but a company spokesperson said that they are in the process of upgrading their ovens in one third of their stores, cutting total pizza baking time from 6 to 4 minutes. The company is currently missing the 10-minute mark less than 1% of the time at its test stores. The move is designed to allow thechain to compete with fast food establishments like Jack in the Box and Wendy's, where customers can spend an average of 10 minutes in line at the drive-through. 

A Pizza Hut spokeswoman said "In our experience, freshly baked, high-quality pizza takes more than four minutes. And we think it's worth waiting for." If the Papa John's promotion fails, it could be costly for the company. If customers don't perceive a change in the quality of their pizzas, though, this could en enough to make other pizza companies reevaluate their timing, too.

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With drive-thru service now accounting for up to 70% of fast food sales, the mind boggles to hear that companies are trying to speed up their drive thru service. One method of speeding up service is to route calls to call centers - instead of simply receiving them inside the restaurant over a speaker or radio - to increase accuracy. Companies have found this to be relatively effective, particularly in areas where their employees have limited English skills. The call centers enter the menu items onto a central computer, which transmits the order directly into the restaurant's computers. Another strategy is to replace the traditional written menu board with a photo illustrated or digital one, hoping that tempting food imagery will help customers choose their food faster. There are even computer programs that average how much food needs to be cooking at any given moment.

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