Olive Garden is “Italian inspired”, but at the mercy of its provincial, unsophisticated diners.

The Olive Garden is subjected to the whims of the people who eat at Olive Garden, and the chain has no choice but to bend to their wistful, suburban, and tyrannical needs. That means value (a $6.95 unlimited soup, salad, and bread-sticks lunch special), overcooked pasta, frosted plastic salad bowls, and avoiding confusing words like “gnocchi.”
Olive Garden Headquarters knows that their diners have limits: “Capers, with their salty, pickled flavor, are too unexpected for many customers, says a spokeswoman.”
And the restaurant chain will do whatever it takes to make customers happy: “At Olive Garden, pasta is served soft, not al dente or slightly firm, the traditional Italian method.” Is it authentic or not? “We don’t use the word authentic,” said the president of Olive Garden. He prefers the term “Italian inspired.”

The chain does indeed take “inspiration” from Italy: Chefs at Olive Garden HQ went on a trip to Northern Italy and had “a fresh-torn pasta dish with olive oil, garlic and herbs.” Somehow that dish was “reverse-engineered” into “baked pasta romana—a mix of lasagna pasta, rich cheese sauce, spinach and either a beef or chicken topping.” Originally it was chicken with roasted tomato sauce, but diners didn’t find it “cravable.” And the chain pushes the limits of gastronomy: “Earlier this year, a pear and Gorgonzola ravioli with shrimp went too far.” The chain deemed the dish too “culinary forward.”

And all Olive Garden wants to do is update the damned dishware, but they can’t. The frosted, “semi-translucent, plastic, flower-shaped salad bowl” that delivers unlimited refills has been in use for decades, and every time Olive Garden tests new bowls, diners revolt. “There is a lot of love for that bowl,” said Dan Kiernan, executive vice president of operations for Olive Garden. This is hard to believe in today’s marketplace, although it must be true and the company wants to keep their customers happy at all cost.

Link to:   Olive Garden article Wall Street Journal

Culinary Tidbits . . . Contrary to circulated Tweets McLobster will not be going mainstream across the United States. At present, locations are sporadic, and limited to a few New England states.

· Tuesday, November 29: Design Miami Pavilion, 4:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m.

· Wednesday, November 30: Art Basel Outdoor Art Exhibit, 7:00 p.m. to midnight

· Thursday, December 1: The Stage in the Design District, 38th and 1st Ct, 12:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m.

· Friday, December 2: The Stage in the Design District, 38th and 1st Ct, 12:00 p.m. to 5:00 p.m.

A new concept Hamburger chain startup from Florida with franchising options available. More information

Chef Richard moved to Los Angeles in 1977 and opened his own patisserie shop Michel Richard to great praise on Robertson Blvd. He then traveled back and forth to France mostly dining, learning and cooking in three-star Michelin-rated restaurants. In 1987 he opened Citrus, where he found the flexibility to adapt French cuisine to the tastes of Southern California.

Citrus started Michel Richard’s culinary journey in the United States. Just after it opened Citrus was voted The Best Restaurant in the United States by Traveler’s magazine and then in 1988 he was inducted into the James Beard Foundation’s “Who’s Who” in American Food and Wine.  A year later he opened Citronelle, offering a menu similar to that of Citrus, only with a fine dining atmosphere and a view of the Pacific located in the Santa Barbara Inn Hotel.

He then went on to open Bistro M in San Francisco, and Citronelle in Baltimore and Philadelphia. In 1994, he opened Citronelle in The Latham Hotel in Washington DC. In 1998 he  moved from Los Angeles to Washington DC to devote full-time attention to Michel Richard Citronelle. But Chef Michel was destined to go to the west once again. Recently he has opened a large 24 hour restaurant at Ceasars Palace Resort & Casino in Las Vegas. It boasts an extensive bar menu and two Happy Hours in a 24 hour period.

Link you might enjoy: Is Starbucks Going Into The Fresh Pressed Juice Business?

AppSuite is a leading provider of iPhone and Android application development for the Food and Beverage industry. AppSuite develops low-cost restaurant apps for fine dining restaurants, casual restaurants, coffee shops, bars and clubs. AppSuite’s restaurant app and content management system (CMS) allows restaurateurs to rapidly deploy an iPhone or an Android App without the high cost of developing their own app. AppSuite’s CMS platform allows the restaurateur to conveniently build, brand and expand their business to the growing population of mobile users.

Just like the Internet explosion in the mid 90′s required restaurants to build and develop websites to reach out to their customers, the rapid growth of the “New Mobile Frontier” is driving restaurants to re-focus their marketing efforts to the technology platform adopted by their customers.  The best thing about a restaurant app is that an “app” is an actual application branded to your business that can do more functions than any website or mobile optimized website.  A true app can send notifications to your customers, pop-up scheduled marketing messages, give your customers turn-by-turn directions and most importantly, allow your customers access your business whenever and wherever they want.

The total number of people owning a smartphone outnumbers those owning a PC by at least 4-1. As a result, more and more people will be relying on their mobile devices for web access and daily activity. Your business should consider AppSuite’s Cafe’ App product if you would like to: 1. expand your business to the mobile world and reach your customers wherever they are 2. build customer loyalty with special offers and updates 3. and grow your brand with a unique presence.

If you believe a website is vital to your business, why wouldn’t a restaurant app that does more than your website be just as (or more) important to your marketing and communication efforts? There are multiple reasons why restaurants and other businesses are employing the mobile app strategy within their marketing tactics, but the most common is to have an advantage over their competition. Nearly 65% of small businesses agree that wireless technologies help provide a better competitive advantage for businesses.

Link To: “The Eatery” by Massive Health a Restaurant App

Forbes quoted Mario Batali as comparing bankers to Stalin and Hitler. Now that the suits won’t be snapping up Mario’s tables it should be easier to snag a table.

One financial institution “has sent a memo to employees that it will not honor receipts from BABBO or a Batali establishment” and that another group has “canceled all of their reservations for the remainder of the year.”

Not a good move, I would say.

Link To:Eataly To Spawn New Locations Over Next 10 Years

A convenience store in Odenville, Alabama has installed a vending machine dispensing meat, and it is turning out to be a great success. Of course, this is nothing new the Japanese have been doing it for years and their is a

Convenience Store Installs Meat Vending Machine   Video

Below is a Link To:

100 Years Old Spanish butcher has vending machine dispensing meat   Article

These are two completely different films with entirely different messages but both are worth your time.

Farmageddon

Nov 04 – Nov 06  (Kristin Canty, 2010, USA, Bluray, 86 min) http://nwfilmforum.org/

Americans’ right to access fresh, healthy foods of their choice is under attack. This film tells the story of  small, family farms that were providing safe, healthy foods to their communities and were forced to stop, sometimes through violent action, by agents of misguided government bureaucracies, Farmageddon highlights the urgency of food freedom, encouraging farmers and consumers alike to take action to preserve individuals’ rights to access food of their choice and farmers’ rights to produce these foods safely and free from unreasonably burdensome regulations.

The LA Times called it, “An eye-popping wake-up call revealing how the USDA and FDA have increasingly waged war on America’s small farmers even when they can prove they are contributing healthful products to our food supply.

The Bride Wore Black

Jeanne Moreau

Directed by Francois Truffaut

In François Truffaut’s 1968 “The Bride Wore Black,” which begins a New York run this week and will then play in many other cities. Truffaut is sometimes viewed as a relative lightweight among the company of big-name ’60s and ’70s European directors, and there’s no doubt his work is uneven. What begins as a French cinephile’s almost obsessive tribute to Alfred Hitchcock becomes progressively weirder and wittier. Jeanne Moreau as the ultimate femme fatale heroine in this knife-twisting tale of murderous revenge and unexpected romance, “The Bride Wore Black” is well worth rediscovering.

November 4, 2011
Film Forum
New York, NY

November 25 – December 1, 2011
Northwest Film Forum
Seattle, WA

December 9 – 14, 2011
Pacific Cinematheque
Vancouver, Canada

December 10, 2011
Pacific Film Archives
Berkeley, CA

January 1, 2012
Cinema Arts Centre
Huntington, NY

February 3, 2012
Webster University Film Series
St. Louis, MO

February 9, 2012
Union
Milwaukee, WI

February 17 – 19, 2012
Jacob Burns Film Center
Pleasantville, NY

March 16 & 18, 2012
Museum of Fine Arts
Houston, TX