Great Taste Magazine

Now is the time to vote for the James Beard Foundation Awards. Please vote for our local chef James Beard. Participating in the James Beard Foundation Awards process has never been easier. Tell us your name, e-mail address, and state of residence, then submit your suggestions for nominees in up to 19 categories, ranging from Best New Restaurant to Rising Star Chef of the Year.

The flagship Yard House, which opened on December 7, 1996, at Shoreline Village in Long Beach, will celebrate its 15th Anniversary this Wednesday from 11am-9pm. Guests who donate $25 or more to Miller Children’s Hospital of Long Beach on Wednesday, December 7, between 11am and 9pm at the Yard House Long Beach location will receive a $25 Yard House gift card while supplies last. Gift cards can be used on a future visit at any of the company’s 35 locations.

When Steele Platt, founder and chairman of Yard House Restaurants, embarked on a leisurely bike ride back in the early 1990s little did he know that he was about to formulate an innovative restaurant concept. Pedaling along the bike path, he happened upon an abandoned waterfront restaurant at the water’s edge in Long Beach. As he peered through its dust-covered windows, Platt had a light bulb moment as he envisioned a new and pioneering restaurant concept that would have three key components: Great Food, Classic Rock, and The World’s Largest Selection of Draft Beer. And, on December 7, 1996, Platt’s vision became a reality when Yard House, boasting a two-story Keg Room coupled with 250 taps of beer, opened its doors to the public. Fifteen years later Yard House has 35 restaurants in 12 states and more than 5,000 employees.

To commemorate the 15th Anniversary, a bicycle will be on display to symbolize the company’s humble beginnings that started with a two-wheel ride and a simple idea.
 

In Dallas on November 30, Jersey Mike's Founder and CEO Peter Cancro, along with several franchise owners, presented Susan G. Komen for the Cure® with a check for $1.1 million on behalf of the franchise system and its loyal and generous customers. This was the culmination of the company's six-month Mike's Way to a Cure® awareness and fundraising campaign for the charity. Susan G. Komen will distribute 75 percent of the funds raised in each market back to the local area where the dollars were raised and 25 percent of the funds will be earmarked for research.

In an open letter of thanks, Cancro wrote, "After meeting Nancy Brinker, Susan's sister and founder of the organization, at the Honoring the Promise Gala held at the John F. Kennedy Center in Washington, DC, I was greatly moved by the stories of those affected by breast cancer. I knew then that this was a cause we needed to be involved with.

"Travelling throughout the country and at our national conference in June, I heard stories from our customers and from our committed franchise owners about how breast cancer has touched so many lives. Everywhere we went the commitment to the cause was overwhelming.

As a means of bringing back holiday parties, Stonefire Grill launched a Facebook contest seeking the most deserving company, family or neighborhood to win a free, fully catered party for up to 100 guests. “From the scores of submissions we received, there was no way we could chose only one story,” said Justin Lopez, community relations director of Stonefire Grill. “We are pleased to announce our top 7!”

Winners include:
· Nicole Kosoff—Woodland Hills:
A 16-year-old high school student who organizes friends & volunteers to sew pajamas for kids living in homeless shelters.

· Carole Davis—Huntington Beach:
She throws a New Year’s Eve party for senior citizens at Rodgers Senior Center, many of whom are alone for the holidays.

· Judy Diamond—Northridge:
Her tenant tirelessly volunteers at the Van Nuys Rescue Mission and she wants to surprise him with the gift!

· Brittany Chin-Lee—Malibu:
This college student works at the Student Activities Center at Pepperdine University, she organizes a meal for a group of students who aren’t able to go home for the holidays. This year she will have Stonefire Grill!

· Catherine Virola—Canoga Park:
She works at a center that helps developmentally disabled young adults who heavily rely on the staff. Catherine will host a party for all of her co-workers!

· Gretchen Haener-Calderone—Porter Ranch:
Last year, 60 carolers surprised Gretchen’s father, who watched his wife of 59 years pass away 2 years ago. This year she will surprise the singers with the catered party as a thank you!

· Cathy Gonzalez-Pasquinelli—Cypress:
Her children attend an elementary in Cypress where a few of their classmates have fallen on hard times including a 2nd grader battling cancer and a 1st grader whose home burned down. Cathy plans to surprise those 2 kids and several others in need of a great Christmas!

Lopez said that $13,000 in gift cards will be presented to other finalists who submitted entries.

Stonefire Grill, a leader in the fast-casual genre with 7 locations to date, was established in 2000 by sisters Mary & Maureen Harrigan as an homage to their family dinners where delicious food and spirited conversation were served up nightly. All items on the menu are available “to go” and each restaurant is even designed with a special entrance dedicated to takeout — the modern mother’s version of providing a wholesome, delicious meal for her family. Locations are in Valencia, West Hills, Fountain Valley, Irvine, Chatsworth, Pasadena and Thousand Oaks.

The Los Angeles Convention and Visitors Bureau and American Express are excited to announce that dineLA Fall 2011 Restaurant Week resulted in a 24% increase in diners from last year’s program. Attracting over 35,700 diners to 304 restaurants throughout the city during its two-week run, dineLA continues to remain one of the country’s largest restaurant weeks, with the city’s top restaurants offering specially priced three-course prix-fixe lunch and/or dinner menus twice annually. The program enters its fifth year with the upcoming dineLA January 2012 Restaurant Week, January 22-27 & January 29-February 3, 2012, and is expected to continue to generate increased revenue citywide.

“Fall 2011 Restaurant Week is a testament to dineLA’s impact on both the restaurant and the consumer,” says Mark Liberman, President and CEO of LA INC. “The program has continued to blossom, and this season we saw a 24% growth, driven in part by an upsurge of online reservations as reported by our partner OpenTable. Heading into the 5th year of the program, dineLA Restaurant Week has proven to be an amazing opportunity for Angelenos and visitors alike to explore our vast culinary scene while contributing to L.A.’s economy.”

This season, one-third of diners reported experiencing dineLA Fall 2011 Restaurant Week for the first time, utilizing the program as a platform to explore the vast number of newly participating restaurants. CHAYA, a supporter of dineLA since the program’s inception and co-host to this season’s Mayor’s Press Conference, reported a booming number of new guests, with Executive Corporate Chef Shigefumi Tachibe noting, “It was wonderful to see smiling new faces in the dining room this dineLA season. We love the opportunity to introduce the restaurant to new diners and dineLA Restaurant Week is always a great way to do just that.”
 

The National Restaurant Association’s Restaurant Performance Index (RPI) – a monthly composite index that tracks the health of and outlook for the U.S. restaurant industry – stood at 100.0 in October, essentially unchanged from September’s level of 100.1. October’s steady RPI level was the result of softer sales and customer traffic being offset by a more optimistic outlook among restaurant operators.

“Although sales results were somewhat softer in October, restaurant operators reported net positive same-store sales for the fifth consecutive month,” said Hudson Riehle, senior vice president of the Research and Knowledge Group for the Association. “In addition, each of the four forward-looking indicators improved in October, which pushed the Expectations Index to its highest level in four months.”

The U.S. restaurant industry entered 2011 hopeful after ending 2010 with two consecutive quarters of one percent traffic increases, but the continuing economic saga of high unemployment and low consumer confidence kept visits to restaurants flat in the first three calendar quarters of the year, according to The NPD Group, a leading market research company.

Restaurant traffic was just above the line at +0.2 percent in the quarter ending March and just below the line at -0.4 percent for both the second and third calendar quarters, according to NPD’s CREST® service, which continually tracks consumer use of U.S. restaurants. Quick service restaurants (QSR)/fast food, which represent 78 percent of industry visits, held up the industry with a one percent gain in the first quarter ending March, and visits flat in each the second and third quarters. Visits to casual dining restaurants, which represent 11 percent of industry traffic, declined two percent in both the first and second quarters of 2010 and by one percent in the third quarter. Midscale/family style restaurants, which represent 10 percent of industry visits, saw traffic decline by two percent in the first quarter and down by four percent in the quarter ending September.

Starfish, Asian Coastal Cuisine, is now serving lunch every Wednesday through Saturday 11 Am – 2:30 PM by popular demand. Enjoy all your favorites from our menu or carry out. We will be holding a food drive for Second Harvest Food Bank of OC December 9th – 11th. Help us give to those in need as we will be collecting food and monetary donations. You will be receiving a raffle ticket to win prizes such as bottles of wine, Starfish gift cards, boxed music CDs and more!

She started working before World War II, when the restaurant was still called Fischer's, and she was 16. Today, Dorothy Zehnder turns 90, and continues her daily work in the kitchen of the world-famous Frankenmuth Bavarian Inn Restaurant. Read more »

We are working on a study looking at the restaurant management views on the new labeling laws. Professors Charles Platkin, PhD, JD, MPH and Ming Yeh, PhD, from the City University of New York School of Public Health at Hunter College in New York City are conducting research on restaurant owners' perceptions of a new menu labeling law. Read more »

The San Diego Bay Wine & Food Festival is pleased to announce that the winner of the 8th Annual "Chef of the Fest" Competition is Chef Daniel Barron of Blue Point Coastal Cuisine. Celebrated as one of the largest culinary showdowns in Southern California, the competition challenged seasoned and up-and-coming chefs in the San Diego culinary scene to prove their skills in the kitchen. Read more »

The Warrior Cookbook is now available for purchase. Compiled by Fullerton locals Doris and Bob Muschek, this unique cookbook was created to benefit the Warrior Foundation, a volunteer organization dedicated to “help injured and disabled military heroes.” The Warrior Cookbook contains 3 years of hard work and dedication from Doris, Bob and many other contributors in the form of recipes, wine pairings, witty anecdotes, poetry and entertainment suggestions. Read more »

RATIONAL has done it again! Just a couple of weeks ago in Las Vegas, RATIONAL launched the most amazing cooking appliance ever, the Self Cooking Center white efficiency. If you joined us at the Palms Hotel you remember the delicious smell as our chefs prepared a full load of perfectly-baked croissants – right on the floor of the Key West ballroom. Read more »

The explosion in coffee shops that has taken place over the past couple of decades has paved the way for coffee to move beyond drinks. Potato chips are the latest category to be inspired by coffee with new Calbee Pari Pari Variation My Potato, Mocha Cocoa Potato Chips. New in Japan, this product is the innovation of the week from Datamonitor’s Product Launch Analytics. Read more »

Custom Party Bars launched on Monday, November 28th in Southern California. The brainchild of CEO Brett W. Gross, Custom Party Bars fuses two innovative divisions: Custom Party Chocolate Bars – a chocolate lovers dream of creations for every occasion, and Custom Party Bartending Services which offers clients many options to customize their bar services specific to their event. Read more »

Chris Kern’s Forgotten Grapes is a wine shop unlike any other in southern California, as we specialize in wines from the Forgotten Grapes, namely wines from lesser-known and uncommon varietals, regions, and producers. You’ll find a wide assortment of uncommon and unique wines from all over the world, not to mention traditional grape wines from small, boutique producers and off-the-beaten path wine appellations. Read more »

Pelican Hill® the nation’s leading luxury Resort located along the coast of Newport Beach, today announced the opening of its new online store, ShopPelicanHill.com. Just as the holiday shopping season arrives, the Resort’s newest retail outlet offers guests the opportunity to bring a little of the Pelican Hill experience home.
Read more »

NSF International, an independent global organization that certifies products and writes public health standards for food, water and consumer goods, announces its first call for nominations for the 2012 Food Safety Leadership Awards (FSLA) Program. Now in its ninth year, this program recognizes individuals that demonstrate outstanding food safety leadership in the food industry. Read more »

Nosh, a mobile app for iPhone/Android let's diners see the menu of the restaurant, and allows them to see the most popular menu items, pictures and individual reviews of items. We currently have over 200,000 menus in our database and over 1.5 million dish-level ratings. Nosh has a strong social component where users can then add their own reviews and share their experience with their friends on Facebook, Twitter, FourSquare (and soon Google+). Read more »

Marianne Danielson has joined Island Hotel as its new senior private events manager, and has been tapped to work with Executive Chef Bill Bracken to oversee the hotel’s recently launched off-site private events division, as well as manage on-site functions and activities for the luxury Newport Beach property. Read more »

Located at The Grand Del Mar, Addison – San Diego’s first and only AAA Five Diamond, Forbes Five-Star restaurant – has named Anthony Secviar as its new chef de cuisine. As of December 1, Secviar will work closely with Addison’s Relais & Châteaux Grand Chef William Bradley to create the contemporary French cuisine that has garnered much critical acclaim and a slew of awards since the restaurant opened in 2006. Read more »

TAPS Fish House & Brewery in Brea Downtown is partnering with the Heart of Downtown Food Bank for the third consecutive holiday season. Guests who bring in a $25 or more gift card to Ralphs will receive a TAPS Sunday Brunch Extravaganza certificate worth $36. The Food Bank will use the cards to purchase meats and poultry, often in short supply at food banks. Read more »

The Urban Kitchen Group announces the appointment of Lauren De Rouen as chef de cuisine of CUCINA enoteca, the newest concept from celebrated restaurateur Tracy Borkum. De Rouen brings more than 10 years of culinary experience to CUCINA enoteca, having previously served as executive chef at of both Leatherby’s Café Rouge and Pinot Provence in Orange County. Read more »

And the winners are… Our panel of judges has selected the winning entries showcasing Maple Leaf Farms duck in both the Chef and Student Categories:
Chef Category:
► Grand Prize: Thai Style Pulled Duck Sliders
by Chef Greg Reggio of New Orleans, LA ($5,000 Prize)
► Second Place: Pulled Duck Ciabatta Sandwich
by Executive Chef Steven Jayson of Orlando, FL ($3,000 Prize)
► Third Place: Korean BBQ Duck Tacos
by Chef Greg Reggio of New Orleans, LA ($1,500 Prize) Read more »