Corporate Cuisines

Scott Hardie | October 25, 2014
Restaurant chains just keep copying each other. In our corner of town, there were already four Subways and two Firehouse Subs, and into this market we just saw the addition of two Jersey Mike's and a Jimmy John's. Does southeastern Sarasota need this many sub sandwiches?

I'd like to see more cuisines represented. I have wondered for years why there isn't a successful national chain of French food, served fast casual. Judging from Panera and Atlanta Bread Company, the bakery portion of a French fast-casual restaurant could probably support the whole enterprise single-handedly. Some French cuisine is elaborate and delicate and would not be easy to replicate, but let the snobby purists complain while you serve mass-produced imitations. If the food is good, and the branding and marketing and other elements do their job, people will buy it.

Last night I got a craving for Hawaiian food, or Polynesian food in general. Is there a market for such a restaurant outside of tourist areas? They could operate a tiki bar on premises and make a hefty side income from that. The theming takes care of itself. I'd eat there all the time if it were possible.

Would you eat at these places? What cuisines do you wish were better represented by the restaurant industry?

Steve West | October 25, 2014
When I saw Pulp Fiction, there was a line regarding The Big Kahuna, that Hawaiian burger joint. I've been intrigued since. I love Indian cuisine and the only fast food type place similar to the Japanese/Chinese places that give you samples on a toothpick, was The White Tiger (which I adored) but closed.

Scott Hardie | October 28, 2014
Yeah, I know what you mean by the sample-on-a-toothpick-at-the-mall places like Panda Express and Hibachi-San. I have eaten at a standalone Panda Express restaurant that had its own walls and doors and parking lot and everything, so I know that they exist. Personally, I like their food, but I eat at Chinese buffets and demonstrably have low standards. We have a Chinese man working with our company this month, and I asked him what he thought of restaurants in the area. He had apparently only been eating at the Chinese restaurants, because he didn't have much to say about the others, but he did say that Panda Express was by far the worst. "That is not Chinese food," he said almost angrily.

Steve West | October 28, 2014
Funny. All the employees are Asian at my local Panda Express. That doesn't make it authentic, of course - just ironic. Personally, whatever it is (I'll take his word that it's not Chinese), I like it.

Scott Hardie | October 29, 2014
During high school, when she was trying to land a summer job, Kelly was excited to get called in for an interview at Panda Express in the mall. When she got there, they turned her away. It didn't take her long to figure out that her last name (Lee) was the only thing that got her the call in the first place.

I've often wondered if that was legal. Small businesses can employ whoever they like, but once they grow beyond something like 15 people, aren't they supposed to be subject to laws about discriminating by race? Then again, I guess it only matters if someone challenges them on it.

Samir Mehta | October 30, 2014
[hidden by request]

Scott Hardie | November 15, 2014
Yes, that's what I've heard about food trucks too: They allow inexperienced chefs to get their feet wet in the business, and they allow experienced chefs to try out stranger concepts than would be possible in a restaurant concerned with rent and overhead. There's been a rotating series of them parked outside my office every day for a year, so I've gotten to try quite a few, and most of them serve pretty good food that would taste at home in a restaurant, although that feeling is undermined a little by the paper plates and plastic forks.

Kelly and I headed out this morning to a local pie-and-breakfast restaurant only to find it out of business. It's the second such business to fail in that building in two years, and the sign says that another one is going to open soon. It disappoints me to see talented local chefs fail in that spot, when I know that Bob Evans or Perkins or Dennys or IHOP or Bakers Square could open there and have a line out the door on a weekend morning. It disappoints me so much that people will flock to the same familiar brands they can get anywhere instead of 1) trying something off the beaten path and 2) supporting local entrepreneurs. Bah, whatever; the restaurant business is brutal.

Scott Hardie | November 24, 2014
I am pleased to learn that there is a Hawaiian restaurant chain. Someday I'd like to try it.