Idea Articles

By the time Mike Roberts and crew teamed up with the branding guru Adrienne Weiss, president of Adrienne Weiss Corporation, they had been pitched over 600 names for their fledging concept. They considered YPC, Your Personal Chef. City Acre was tossed around. The Lifted Fork seemed okay. But none of them hit all the notes. None of them were big enough. Weiss has helped shape the branding for heavy hitters like Disney, the NBA, McDonald's and Build-A-Bear Workshop.

Buffalo Wild Wings is switching to a new portioning policy for its chicken wings to bring the menu price more in line with the cost to the chain. Instead of serving a set number of pieces, the casual chain will factor the size of the wings into the count.

Street food continues to impact the culinary world at the highest levels. An example is the Citrus and Ancho Braised Lamb Tostada that wows guests at the Omni Bedford Springs Resort in Bedford, Pennsylvania. Scott Mole, executive sous chef of the 216-room luxury resort, says he found inspiration for his creation, which showcases tender leg of lamb redolent of citrus and smoky chiles, in the tostadas of a humble little Mexican street food stand in southwestern Michigan.

Discounts for guys with guns. Upcharges for custom meals. Charging waiters for dashers. And a St. Louis restaurant keeps serving after the power goes out. Idea #1: Open-carry night. A Virginia restaurant is offering a 15 percent discount to patrons who bring their guns to eat with them. Brian Crosswhite, owner of The Cajun Experience in Leesburg said positive reaction has outweighed the negative.

For several years, Hank Holliday, owner of Peninsula Grill in Charleston, South Carolina’s Planter’s Inn, talked about doing a cookbook to showcase the restaurant’s culinary legacy. His vision was as ambitious as the restaurant, which had catapulted into national prominence soon after it opened in the mid ’90s. To create the weighty, lavishly photographed book he envisioned in less than a year, he turned to executive chef Graham Dailey and said “let’s self-publish.”