Restaurants
Robots Offer Helping Hand At Dutch Restaurant
After seeing robotic waiters in China last fall, Shaosong Hu adopted the idea for his Dutch restaurant, the Royal Palace. Hu says that the robots will help ease service for both staff and customers at his pan-Asian restaurant locations throughout the Netherlands. The red and white robots will serve food and drinks and return used plates and glassware to the kitchen.
Dutch restaurants have been closed for more than two months and, as of Monday, reopened restaurants are limited to a maximum of 30 customers. As he reopens, Hu says the robots will help maintain new social distancing rules and help curb the spread of COVID-19. When asked about whether the robots were stealing human jobs, Hu responded that the robots are not replacing humans. On the contrary, the robots will help free the Royal Palace staff from mundane tasks, he explained, so that the staff is able to give customers even more personal attention.
Restaurant Sales Show Signs Of Gradual Recovery
The week ending April 12 marked the restaurant industry’s lowest point during the coronavirus lockdown with a year-over-year drop of 41% in overall sales. But six weeks later, the week ending May 24 saw only an 18% drop in sales, according to market research company NPD Group. About 320,000 U.S. restaurants are now permitted to resume on-premise dining, according to NPD, and sales have slowly begun to climb.
Drive-thru lanes, which usually account for about 70% of restaurant chain transactions, saw the earliest sales increases. Fast-food restaurants started seeing positive same-store sales growth around mid-May, according to Black Box Intelligence reports. Full-service restaurants, however, have taken longer to recover. The week ending April 12 saw a 79% decrease in full-service sales compared to last year, the lowest point during lockdown. As of the week ending May 24, transactions were down only 42%, a more gradual recovery. As states around the country continue to phase in dining-room service, analysts expect all restaurant sales to continue to rise.
High-End Restaurant Delivery From Ghost Kitchens May Be Here To Stay
Krispy Rice is just one of many new fine-dining restaurant concepts with no actual dining room. The bento box delivery service comes from SBE, the hospitality company behind California’s popular Katsuya sushi restaurants as well as Bazaar by José Andrés, Umami Burger, and others. Here’s how it works: when a customer places an order at Krispy Rice, the order is sent to the ghost kitchen nearest their location, then the meal is prepared and delivered. A series of ghost kitchens fulfilling Krispy Rice orders broadens the restaurant’s delivery area, reduces delivery times, and keeps the food fresher, helping to solve the problem of plated restaurant dishes not traveling well.
Beautiful and functional packaging is key, and the concept has been catching on. Consumers have come to rely on restaurant delivery, and many are willing to pay a premium for high-quality, expertly plated meals delivered to their homes. Even Uber founder Travis Kalanick is getting into the game. Since leaving Uber, Kalanick has been opening CloudKitchens in major metropolitan areas to serve as ghost kitchens for restaurant brands. SBE is also poised to rapidly grow its ghost kitchen footprint, as the company is nearly half-owned by Accor, the world’s biggest hotel chain. After successful trials in Los Angeles, SBE plans to expand into New York and other cities. “We’re looking at 34 to 35 locations by the end of the year and each of those locations brings five brands to the table,” says Martin Heierling, SBE’s chief culinary officer.
Owner of Popular YaYa’s BBQ Killed By Louisville Riot Police
Last Sunday night during police brutality protests in Louisville, Kentucky, the fifty-three year old owner of YaYa’s BBQ, David McAtee, was shot and killed by local police. In a statement, Police Chief Steve Conrad said someone shot at officers, and officers “returned fire.” The identity of the suspect or anyone who returned fire has yet to be confirmed. While video evidence appears to show that McAtee discharged a weapon, it is unclear whether he shot at officers.
YaYa’s BBQ is located across the street from Dino’s Food Mart, where a large crowed had gathered on the evening of the shooting. McAtee had said he was planning to one day build a restaurant after buying the lot near Dino’s at 26th Street and Broadway. McAtee’s mother and nephew told reporters of the local newspaper, The Courier-Journal, that McAtee regularly fed police for free and donated food to organizations in the neighborhood. Louisville Metro Council President, David James, said McAtee was a personal friend, someone who knew what was going on in the neighborhood, and often gave free food to people in need. McAtee’s death has been troubling for a community still protesting the killing of Breonna Taylor, a young black emergency medical technician killed in her Louisville home by white police officers.
PPP Flexibility Act Goes Into Effect, Aiding Restaurant Industry
President Trump has signed the Paycheck Protection Program Flexibility Act, a boon for America’s struggling independent restaurants and small businesses. The Paycheck Protection Program was first signed into law in March, but the $2.2 trillion coronavirus relief packaged had allowed businesses only eight weeks to spend federal loans. The new bill extends that time to 24 weeks, aiding independent restaurants, many of which have only just begun to resume limited dine-in service. Originally, PPP also required that businesses spend 75% of loans on payroll and 25% on non-payroll costs, but the new act change eases those numbers to 60% and 40%, respectively.
Both the National Restaurant Association and the Independent Restaurant Coalition have been lobbying for these changes for weeks. The travel industry will also benefit from the changes, says Tori Emerson Barnes, executive vice president of public affairs and policy for the U.S. Travel Association. Travel businesses have continued to incur expenses with nearly no revenue due to lockdowns and social distancing requirements. Barnes even called for PPP to extend eligibility to non-profit and quasi-governmental entities.
Black Sheep COVID-19 Playbook Guides Restaurant Reopenings Worldwide
Black Sheep Restaurants, a hospitality group operating 25 restaurants throughout Hong Kong, developed a “COVID-19 playbook” early on in the coronavirus crisis. The group had survived other viral epidemics, and the 17-page guide was intended to be shared internally only. But management later decided to make the playbook available online for the benefit of other restaurateurs. With guidance on everything from masks and temperature checks to dealing with unruly customers, the playbook has been embraced by restaurateurs around the world seeking to safely reopen their businesses. Restaurants consulting the Black Sheep playbook include Eleven Madison Park in New York City, TIRPSE in Tokyo, Room 4 Dessert in Bali, and Chefs Warehouse and Cookery School in Cape Town, Africa.
Beverages
How To Read A Wine By Its Cork
Wine critic Dave McIntyre explains that the cork in a bottle of wine can tell you whether the wine was properly sealed and stored. A ring of color at the base of the cork tells you that the bottle was properly stored on its side or upside down so that wine contacts the cork. This storage method reduces the likelihood of the cork drying out and exposing the wine to excessive oxygen. No ring on the cork indicates that the bottle was probably stored upright, which often increase the wine’s ullage, the gap of air between the wine and the cork. A storage area with low humidity can also increase the ullage. Either way, in an unopened bottle, the ullage should be about a quarter to half an inch. While older wines often have a somewhat large ullage, excessive ullage in a younger wine is a red flag to not buy it.
While sniffing a cork may offer some clues about the wine’s quality, it is not the definitive test for spoiled or “corked” wine. Even if the cork has tainted the wine, the telltale odor of “wet dog” may not be evident in the cork itself. Similarly, a cork may smell bad, but the wine may taste fine.
Binge Drinking Linked to Estrogen Hormone, Study Says
Researchers at the University of Illinois in Chicago have found that high estrogen levels may make alcohol more rewarding to female mice. Their study, published Monday in the Journal of Neuroscience, builds on existing research suggesting that treatments for binge drinking may be more effective if sex differences are considered.
“Women more rapidly transition from problematic alcohol drinking to having an alcohol use disorder and to suffer from the negative health effects of alcohol, such as increased cancer risk, liver damage, heart disease, and brain damage,” said co-author Amy Lasek, a psychiatrist at the University of Illinois. Lasek’s research focused specifically on how the brain’s estrogen receptors regulate alcohol sensitivity. The increased neural activity, she suggests, may translate into more intense feelings of pleasure among women when drinking. Though the study was conducted on mice, its findings may help lead to new, sex-based treatments for alcohol use disorder.
Cooking
With Restaurants Closed, Food Banks Receive Tuscany’s Finest Food
Giuliano Faralli is the director of his local Caritas, a charity run by the Catholic Church in Montepulciano, Italy. Caritas distributes grocery bags to 500 families in Pienza, Chianciano, and other Tuscan towns once a week. In February, the group delivered food to about 120 families, but since lockdowns began, the number of families registered with Caritas grew to more than 3,000.
While the Italian government has authorized commercial businesses to reopen, many food producers in small Tuscan villages have elected to remain closed, partly due to a lack of tourists to buy their products. To avoid waste and help pay the producers for their foods, Faralli has coordinated the donation of high-quality Tuscan food products to Italian families in need.
When building family food packages, Faralli consults a nutritionist and regularly includes pantry staples like pasta, tomato puree, beans, canned tuna, biscuits, flour, and sugar. But tucked among these staples, the packages also include premium foods like PDO (Protected Designation of Origin) Prosciutto Toscano, Finocchiona (salami seasoned with wild fennel seeds), and Pecorino di Pienza. Some packages even include Cinta Senese, prosciutto made from an ancient pig breed that costs about $45 per pound. These premium local foods are typically exported to upscale restaurants or sold to tourists, but food producers are happy that Italians in neighboring villages now get to enjoy them in donated food packages.
Home Delivery Of Premium Fresh Ingredients Is Likely Permanent, Say Retailers
In the absence of restaurant sales, farmers, fishmongers and wholesalers are making house calls, and the change could be permanent. Dozens of premium food purveyors now sell direct to consumers, many for the first time. To spur sales, some have lowered or dropped minimum order requirements and/or delivery fees. Baldor Specialty Foods, the Bronx wholesaler specializing in fine produce and meat, dropped its minimum order for home delivery from $250 down to $200 and expanded its delivery area from New Hampshire to Maryland. Other restaurant supply companies that once sold local vegetables by the case to chefs now offer them in packages of 16, eight or four ounces.
Around the country, ingredients like wild morels, specialty cheeses, grass-fed beef, locally milled flour, green almonds, finger limes, sea urchin roe, sushi-grade tuna, oysters, and fresh-caught fish are now available through online stores and home delivery. Four Star Seafood, a San Francisco based seafood wholesaler, has had enormous success with selling direct to home cooks. “We certainly don’t want to let this go when this is all done,” said co-owner Adrian Hoffman. “Selling directly to consumers is almost a better business in that it spits out enough cash to pay off everything we owed.” In March, the company rerouted its 13 fish trucks from Bay Area fine-dining restaurants to the homes of individual customers. “The cash flow model is incredible,” said Hoffman, echoing the sentiments of other fine food wholesalers and purveyors who have begun to see big economic opportunities in direct-to-consumer sales.
Portland Chef Demonstrates Beeswax Curing Technique For Fish
Chef Jacob Harth, owner of seafood-focused Erizo restaurant in Portland, Oregon, lightly ages his fish with beeswax, an ancient preservation method. This gentle curing technique coats the fish in melted beeswax, which lets some oxygen in and out, allowing the fish to dry slowly while protecting it from spoilage. The fish texture concentrates a bit and the beeswax adds a unique aroma and texture to the skin.
At Erizo, Harth makes extensive use of this preservation technique to ensure a year-round supply of high-quality fish. He first coats the gutted whole fish in a paper thin layer of melted beeswax, then hangs the fish to dry for about a week. After removing the beeswax and beheading the fish, Harth often grills butterflied whole fish or trimmed pieces and serves them with a simple sauce to highlight the cured fish’s unique texture and flavor.
Supply Chain
New York City Serves More Than 1 Million Free Meals A Day During Pandemic
Since mid-March, New York City has served more than 40 million free meals and counting. The city partnered with Unqork, a Manhattan-based no-code software application company, to build a digital platform allowing residents to order free meals through city-licensed taxi and ride-sharing drivers desperate for work. The city’s Emergency Food Home Delivery program is now serving nearly 900,000 meals a day, said Kathryn Garcia, the city’s Department of Sanitation commissioner, who is coordinating the meal program. Meals are prepared by 40 different vendors ranging from private catering companies to a foodservice operation that supplies meals to airlines. Vendors are typically reimbursed $7 to $9 for each prepared meal.
As the Emergency Food Home Delivery delivery program launched, the New York City Department of Education also began efforts to feed children by offering free “Grab-and-Go” meals prepared by cafeteria employees. The program quickly expanded to include adults as well, and now it is serving about 540,000 free meals a day. Combined, these two programs are serving nearly 1.5 million free meals a day.
New Online Grocery Markets Surge In Africa
When coronavirus restrictions shut down open-air food markets in sub-Saharan Africa, online grocery stores expanded to fill the void. The online markets came just as 73 million people in Africa were deemed acutely food insecure (without access to nutritious, affordable food), according to the World Health Organization, and another 147 million were on the brink of extreme poverty and malnutrition, according to the Washington D.C.-based International Food Policy Research Institute.
African tech companies such as Fresh In A Box are now making sure those under lockdown can get fresh food. Fresh In A Box launched in Zimbabwe in October 2018 selling surplus fruits and vegetables from local farms, but the service now distributes about 2.6 tonnes of fruits and vegetables a day from nearly 2,000 farmers, says co-founder Kudakwashe Musasiwa. Customers order online and get a weekly delivery of produce at home. Zimbabwean nurse Sinothando Mpofu says the fruits and vegetables are better quality than what’s typically sold at the supermarket and at a third of the cost.
Other online grocery services such as Uganda’s Market Garden and Namibia’s Tambula have also begun to thrive. Their success is due in part to stay-at-home orders but also to smartphone access, which has only recently reached the majority of people in sub-Saharan Africa, according to figures from the Pew Research Center.
Agriculture
Pandemic Adds To Spanish Cava Industry Struggles
Spain’s €1.2 billion cava industry has had a rocky few years after a grape farmer’s strike, foreign buyouts of family firms, and a sales hit from the Catalonia separatist movement, all of which occurred prior to the coronavirus pandemic. When the country went into strict lockdown, restaurants closed, the tourism trade plummeted, and the market for celebratory bubbles lost its sparkle.
About 60% of Spain’s 214 cava producers have furloughed employees, according to Damia Deas, chairman of the Institut del Cava business group, which represents 70% of cellars. He believes sales could decline between 25% and 40% in 2020, a stark contrast from last year when 250 million bottles were produced, the second most on record. During the lockdown, domestic sales have fallen the most, said Deas, but there was a slight sales increase in May compared to April, thanks to increased consumption by Spaniards at home.
Sturgeon Caviar Becomes Key To Yakama Nation Conservation Program
In 2009, Donella C. Miller started the Yakama Nation White Sturgeon Management Project in Toppenish, Washington, 160 miles southeast of Seattle. Miller and her three person crew have since released over 91,000 white sturgeon back into the Columbia River to help maintain the dwindling sturgeon population. The population has been threatened since the 1800s by increased commercial fishing and hydroelectric dams, which now produce nearly half of the hydro-electricity in the United States but also reduce river flows during the critical spawning season from May to July. Although white sturgeon are huge fish that can grow up to 20 feet long, weigh more than 1,500 pounds, and live for decades, they spawn only every few years, making a robust spawning season critical to their survival.
Last year, after nurturing a group of adult females for a decade, Miller harvested their eggs before releasing the fish back into the river. She sent the roe to be processed into caviar, then began selling it to Crafted, a farm-to-table restaurant in nearby Yakima. Crafted chef Dan Koommoo has served the sturgeon caviar in dishes like housemade bucatini topped with caviar and cold smoked sturgeon cured in beets. Miller hopes the high price that caviar commands will help fulfill the Yakama tribe’s broader mission to protect the Columbia River ecosystem. To help make the Sturgeon Management Project even more profitable, Miller plans to process the caviar herself in the near future, expanding the operation to include a sanitizing and packaging area.
Regulations
Chicken Industry Executives Indicted For Price Fixing
On Wednesday, a CEO and three other industry executives were indicted for colluding to fix prices in the wholesale chicken market. The indictment alleges current and former senior executives at Pilgrim’s Pride Corporation and Claxton Poultry Farms illegally inflated prices from 2012 to 2017. Jayson Penn, Chief Executive and Roger Austin, former vice president of Pilgrim’s Pride were both charged. The president of Claxton, Mikell Fries, and vice president Scott Brady, were also indicted. Since 2016, leaders of the $65 billion U.S. chicken industry have been suspected of conspiring to fix prices, as poultry buyers sued producers.
According to Watt Global Media, the five largest companies control 61% of U.S. chicken production, with Tyson Foods Inc. accounting for 21% of that. The indictment includes Tyson Foods Inc., Pilgrim’s Pride, Claxton Poultry Farms, Sanderson Farms Inc. and Perdue Farms Inc. All five companies have denied the allegations. Producers claim that poultry prices increased over the years due to supply and demand factors such as rising domestic consumption and exports. In 2012, the U.S. Department of Agriculture began examining national wholesale prices for whole chickens, finding that they had risen 11% by the end of 2018. Prices decreased about 27% from the start of 2019 through the end of February 2020. The latest price reductions came as chicken companies expanded production to prepare for larger exports due the finalizing of new trade deals.
Bipartisan Agriculture Bill Addresses Farmers And Climate Change
On Thursday, U.S. senators presented a bipartisan bill that would direct the Agriculture Department to encourage farmers, ranchers and landowners to use carbon dioxide-absorbing practices to generate carbon credits. The proposed Growing Climate Solutions Act directs the USDA to create a program to help the agriculture sector gain access to revenue from greenhouse gas offset credit markets. In 2018, the average price of such credits was $3 per tonne, but demand for credits is expected to grow when airlines purchase offsets to comply with the industry’s Carbon Offset Reduction Scheme (CORSIA), which will begin in 2021.
The bill puts new USDA-certified protocols in place for farmers, ranchers and forest owners seeking to develop projects that generate offset credits under existing programs. The bill also offers a new revenue stream for farmers, ranchers and land owners suffering from economic impacts of the coronavirus and global trade tensions.
Atlantic Conservation Area Now Open To Commercial Fishing
A 5,000 square mile conservation area in the Atlantic Ocean has been opened up to commercial fishing after being closed in 2016. The area was initially closed to protect endangered species, and some environmental groups warn that commercial fishing in the area will hasten their demise. “These are fragile and vulnerable resources, and I am concerned for their future health,” said Rip Cunningham, former chair of the New England Fishery Management Council. As commercial fisheries struggle during the coronavirus crisis, the move throws them a lifeline, allowing fishing to resume in the Northeast Canyons and Seamounts Marine National Monument. “We’re cutting regulations from highways and roadways to fish,” said President Trump.
Food Processing
Meatpackers Spend Millions on Coronavirus Precautions
Chief financial officer of Hormel Foods Corp. Jim Sheehan reports that the company has spent $20 million on coronavirus precautions since March. Expenses include on-site temperature checks, plexiglass dividers, masks, and special bonuses for front-line employees to minimize the risks of COVID-19. The company, best known for its Spam, turkey, and bacon products, anticipates spending up to $80 million on virus-related expenses in the second half of 2020. Sheehan is currently budgeting for both temporary and permanent costs while looking for efficiencies such as buying less expensive masks.
Tyson Foods Inc. has spent even more, including $120 million solely on front-line worker bonuses, according to chief financial officer Stewart Glendinning. Most of the costs are expected to be temporary, but it all depends on what is required to keep Tyson workers safe. “If you’re a business you want to make money,” said Glendinning, “and the only way to do that is by continuing to operate the plants with healthy employees.”
Health
New Research Links Coffee Drinking to Lower Body Fat In Women
A recent study published in the Journal of Nutrition examined data from the expansive 10-year National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey of 50,000 Americans. Organized by the Center for Disease Control (CDC), the research found that women of all ages who drank two to three cups a day of coffee had an average of 2.8% less body fat than those who did not drink coffee. Women aged 20-44 who drank the same amount had 3.4% less body fat than nondrinkers, and those aged 45-69 who drank four or more cups a day had 4.1% less body fat. In men, the relationship between coffee consumption and body fat was less significant.
According to senior author of the study, Dr. Lee Smith of Anglia Ruskin University, “Our research suggests that there may be bioactive compounds in coffee other than caffeine that regulate weight and which could potentially be used as anti-obesity compounds.”