by Restaurant Business Online
Menu Talk, formally Menu Feed, is a podcast hosted by Pat Cobe of Restaurant Business and Bret Thorn with Nation’s Restaurant News. We are veteran reporters on the menu beat and eager to bring you inspiring conversations about what’s happening in restaurant kitchens, including weekly interviews with chefs, operators and food professionals.
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11/15/2019
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April 15, 2025
<p>Hosts Pat Cobe, senior menu editor of Restaurant Business, and Bret Thorn, senior food & beverage editor of Nation’s Restaurant News and Restaurant Hospitality, had a busy week going to chain restaurants’ promotional events in New York City.</p><p>Pat had high tea featuring Portillo’s menu items, and Bret went to a preview of the first United States location of Chinese chain Pull-Tab Coffee, whose signature menu item is a sort of reversed iced cappuccino: Coffee foam on top of milk on the rocks. </p><p>He also went to Bar Tender, a two-day pop-up in Brooklyn created by Wingstop, featuring the chain’s upgraded, crunchier chicken tenders in 12 different flavors (he didn’t try them all, but he did his best).</p><p>They also discussed the big chain news of Wendy’s new Frosty options. They can now be blended with syrups, and starting in May there will be mix-ins available — like Dairy Queen Blizzards.</p><p>Also big news: McDonald’s has upgraded its lemonade, doing away with Minute Maid (although its orange juice is still in stock), and replacing it with a beverage of lemon juice, lemon pulp and sugar. </p><p>Then Bret shared an interview with Juan and Gee Smalls, the owners of three-unit Virgil’s Gullah Kitchen & Bar in Atlanta, featuring the food of the Gullah and Geechee people of the coastal areas from North Carolina to Georgia. They’re first-time restaurateurs, motivated by what they saw as a need for venues owned and operated by Black gay people. The couple discuss their learning process and plans for the future.</p>
April 8, 2025
<p>Pickles are moving from sidekick to main event on restaurant menus, as the Menu Talk co-hosts witnessed recently. </p><p>Bret Thorn, senior food & beverage editor of Nation’s Restaurant News and Restaurant Hospitality, attended Popeyes’ pickle reveal at the chain’s flagship Times Square location in New York City. The restaurant was decked out in green from top to bottom, and Bret got to taste Popeyes new pickle menu, which included fried pickles, a tart pickle glazed chicken sandwich and pickle lemonade. Although not on the menu, servers also handed out Pickle Margaritas infused with pickle juice, and pickles with smoked salmon, caviar and crème fraiche, courtesy of NYC deli landmark, Zabar’s.</p><p>When Pat Cobe, senior editor of Restaurant Business, interviewed Popeyes chef Amy Alarcon following the event, she mentioned the hydrating properties of pickle juice, which is mixed into Popeyes’ signature cane sugar-sweetened lemonade. Coffee chain Dutch Bros also introduced a pickle juice energy drink this month, the Pickleback Rebel. </p><p>Moving on to non-pickle items, Pat talked about the inspiration behind Jack in the Box’s culturally connected milkshakes. The latest is the Pink Pineapple Express that ties into 4/20, the unofficial “holiday” celebrating cannabis. Bret mentioned that Ike’s Love and Sandwiches and Jimmy John’s are both offering special munchies for 4/20 as well. </p><p>Other food news of the week focused on the never-ending parade of ranch dressing variations and Subway’s latest footlong snack—Doritos Footlong Nachos. </p><p><br></p><p>Bill Nevruz of Shaw's Crab House | Photo courtesy of Lettuce Entertain You Enterprises</p><p>Then the two shared an interview with Bill Nevruz, an executive partner in Lettuce Entertain You Enterprises and the divisional president of Shaw’s Crab House in Chicago. Shaw’s is celebrating its 40th anniversary this month, and Nevruz described the festivities around that milestone, including a throwback menu that features items like sauteed frogs’ legs, clams casino and crab-stuffed shrimp. Of course, signatures including oysters, sushi and king crab legs will also be on hand, along with two anniversary cocktails—an Old Fashioned and a Martini—both garnished with oysters and caviar. </p><p>Listen as Nevruz relates Shaw’s story and how the restaurant has earned its reputation as a premier seafood destination far from both coasts.</p>
April 1, 2025
<p>Beverage concepts are proliferating across the country, and for good reason. As Pat Cobe, senior menu editor of Restaurant Business, reported recently and discussed on this week’s podcast, Gen Z has become a generation of afternoon treat-buyers and they enjoy rewarding themselves with something colorful and refreshing that they can exhibit proudly on social media. Hence the proliferation of beverage concepts such as HTeaO, Sip Fresh, and Krak Boba, among many others. </p><p>In fact, she and Nation’s Restaurant News senior food & beverage editor Bret Thorn noted that big chains have gotten in on the act, launching their own beverage-focused concepts such as Taco Bell’s Live Más Café and McDonald’s CosMc’s.</p><p>In food news, the co-hosts groused a bit about the relentless spread of hot honey (Subway jumped on the bandwagon last week) and suggested alternatives, such as sweet Thai chile sauce, or maybe brown sugar with habanero. Maybe hot honey is becoming table stakes at restaurants, but it’s not going to get anyone’s attention anymore. </p><p>Other chains are flexing their creative muscles, however, such as Pokeworks, which just came out with a line of “Hot Plates” that resemble a Hawaiian midday staple called the plate lunch, made with some kind of center-of-the-plate protein accompanied by two scoops of rice and macaroni salad. Pat and Bret observed that Hawaiian food is becoming more prevalent on the mainland and is worth looking into. </p><p>Fogo de Chão is making sure that its customers can spend as much money as they like when they visit with the introduction of an Indulgent Churrasco menu, about $20 more than the concept’s all-you-can-eat Churrasco Experience and featuring luxury items such as lobster and bone marrow. </p><p>Then Bret shared an interview with Jesús Méndez, a restaurateur and bar owner in Birmingham, Alabama, who recently opened Salud Taqueria, bringing Mexican street food to the center of the city. </p>
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