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Reality shows that involve cooking have taken over the airwaves, and it’s hard to switch on the TV without seeing “real” chefs go head to head over a simmering white sauce or lightly braised chicken. But before there was MasterChef and Chopped, there were fictional TV chefs who made us laugh, cry and want to run to the kitchen during commercials to get a bite to eat.
Whether you think of them as the pre-game warm-ups of the restaurant industry, or the sound-checks of the hospitality business, pre-shift meetings are a vital part of running a successful restaurant. Starting each shift in your restaurant without a pre-shift meeting or “pep-talk” is to overlook a great opportunity to connect, encourage, and educate your team.
Instagram is everywhere and in a previous post we discussed how to create Instagrammable food to promote your restaurant. However, for a restaurant’s purposes, Instagram is so much more than rainbow toast and unicorn shakes. It’s more than customers coming in, ordering something, photographing it and then sending it off to the digital world known as Instagram.
For those of us old enough to remember the robot from the TV show Lost in Space (or young enough to still enjoy it now on syndication), wildly waving its arms to communicate, here’s a news flash: the world of robots has changed. Robots in the food industry have less to do with R2-D2 or Woody Allen’s Sleeper, than with, speed, automation, efficiency, and customer service.
The restaurant industry is notoriously competitive and physically draining; however, sometimes the hard work and financial investment pays off and your restaurant turns into a huge success. If that happens, and if you’re an ambitious and confident business owner, your thoughts might turn to opening a second restaurant based on the belief that doubling locations could mean doubling your success.
Restaurant Staffing Apps
It happens to all restaurant owners: Ahead of one of the week’s busiest nights, half of your kitchen staff calls in sick, and you’re looking at a disaster. It’s too late to find replacements and you’re existing staff is stretched thin as it is. Only recently, you would have panicked, asked friends and relatives to pitch in (knowing full well that they’re inexperienced and unskilled), and kept your fingers crossed.
There’s no denying that French fries are the most awesome of side dishes and that they’re impossible to resist or to have “just one of.” They’ve been around the United States for about 200 years and, contrary to popular belief, a few fries with ketchup are not fatal. While the combination of carbs, sodium and fat may not be ideal, a few fries on the side won’t destroy a diet forever or add an immediate 10 pounds to your waistline.
Offering wines on tap is one of the hottest food-and-beverage trends right now, and many restaurants and bars are expanding their wine programs with on-tap offerings in a variety of ways. Because technology is always advancing, adding wine-on-tap is a possibility for older, existing restaurants, and even more convenient for brand-new establishments.
In the food-service industry, a restaurant’s atmosphere can run the gamut from high-end and elegant to fast and furious. Chances are, though, that your restaurant’s style is somewhere in between – say, casual and laid back, with an emphasis on good food and good times. For many people, dining out means getting together with friends for a long leisurely meal; for others, though, having a good time means inviting along their loyal pet.
Commercial refrigerated merchandising units – a.k.a. merchandisers – can be found in food-service operations of just about every type. They are designed to openly display prepackaged chilled foods or beverages through a glass door or an open front, so that customers can reach in and take the beverage, cake, sandwich, or snack that they crave without bothering the wait staff or cashier.