No limo drive-thrus for this Presidency

Much has been written about the White House's planned organic garden, where children--presumably the President's as well as others--can learn about healthy eating. Sasha and Malia have already absorbed the concept that fast-food can be very bad for you--much to the frustration of Michelle Obama. Here's an excerpt from a story that was published yesterday on the New York Times' website:

Yet her efforts to teach her daughters about eating right have been successful enough that there are now certain fast-food places — she declined to identify them — where the girls themselves refuse to go.

“Some of them I want to go to, because it’s quick and easy,” Mrs. Obama said, “and you figure, ‘Well, we ate fine all week, guys, let’s go get this.’ They’re like, ‘No, Mommy, we won’t be eating there.’ And I feel like, ‘Darn, where are we going to go?’

The article also reveals that Mrs. Obama is a big fan of French fries. “I could live on French fries,” she said.

Germ Fighter in Chief

It was probably just an innocent oversight. “The United States is one of the safest places in the world to buy groceries at a supermarket or pills at a drugstore,” President Obama observed during his weekly radio address this morning. And meals from restaurants, an option apparently appreciated by our Consumer in Chief? Why wasn’t that thrown in there? Did his speechwriters get burned in the Quiznos giveaway fiasco and now harbor a grudge?

It may be an academic point. The President used his address to announce the formation of a Cabinet-level task force, the Food safety Working Group, to hammer out ways of better safeguarding our food supply. Presumably our whole food supply, including that branch of the pipeline that ends on a restaurant plate or sandwich wrapper.

Given how many things must be starred on Obama’s to-do list, the inclusion of “Improve food safety” underscores just how off-kilter the food protection system has been knocked. It should also stop the industry’s grousing that the party it traditionally favors isn’t sitting in that big cornerless office on Pennsylvania Avenue. Coming on the eve of what food safety specialists know as E. coli Season, the efforts by a Democratic White House can only be a good thing for a business that makes its money by selling food.

Best of all, the Administration is spending $1 billion on an upgrade of food-safety labs and the hiring of more Food & Drug Administration inspectors. It’s the additional funding that all stakeholders, from consumer advocates to food manufacturers to trade associations, have cited as critical to reinvigorating a withered FDA. The only party that seemed to disagree was the one previously occupying the West Wing.

More funding is still needed to help local jurisdictions hire sanitation inspectors, the individuals who visit restaurants to ensure they’re helping themselves in averting food-borne illness. Some towns have cut back or altogether eliminated those frontline watchdogs because of forced cutbacks.

Seems to me the industry has never had a better chance of making sure those grass-roots safeguards are in place.

More important than restaurants

In my 51 years, I’ve squirreled away a few items as touchstones for important moments in history.

I have a notice that was mass-mailed to parents around 1960, letting them when and where they could get free polio vaccines for their kids.

There’s a Kennedy silver dollar, given to me by a family friend as a reminder of how our hopes soared and crashed.

I kept my draft card, along with the Marine Corps collar insignias a former brother-in-law wore in Vietnam. There’s a cassette recording of Nixon’s resignation speech, captured on an old Panasonic. And I have the explanatory pamphlet that was sent to every American home in the 1980s to calm fears and raise awareness of the AIDS epidemic. It’s nestled in the wire copy announcing the start of the first Gulf War, under a copy of The New York Times of Sept. 12, 2001.

Today I added a new piece to the collection, the print-out of a news alert from cnn.com. It reads in its entirety, “Barack Obama has been sworn in as the nation's 44th president.”

Sorry to veer off-topic, but today is an extraordinary day. Back to LTOs, dayparts and bankruptcies tomorrow.

Colicchio, Orman, valet parking & other tidbits

News tidbits have been piling up in my Miscellaneous folder like coffee grounds at the bottom of a barista trainee’s espresso. Indulge me as I review a few restaurant-industry developments that might’ve slipped past you in recent days:

Chicago wants standards for restaurant valets: An ordinance passed Tuesday by the City Council would require valet companies serving restaurants to provide enough lot parking for 15% of a capacity crowd’s cars. The measure was pushed through, after being toned down from a 25%-of-capacity requirement, to combat what government officials have dubbed fly-by-night valets—concerns that go into business with nothing more than a few matching windbreakers for the attendants. They merely double-park cars on the street, creating a hazard. Other areas have taken aim at the same problem with proposals to mandate insurance as well as off-street facilities.

Suze Orman leaves restaurants steamed: The quirky personal-finance guru has tossed a hornet’s nest into restaurant management offices from coast to coast by urging consumers to forego dining out for at least a month. The advice is one of the core recommendations of her new book, “2009 Action Plan,” which aims to help readers weather the times. It also urges them not to spend anything for a day, and not to use their credit cards for a week.

Some members of the industry expressed dismay and disbelief that the popular TV figure would issue such advice when the restaurant industry is reeling (this week’s standout casualties in New York alone: The Plaza Hotel’s Palm Court, Ruby Foo’s and Fiamma). I’m sympathetic, but dining out is not a patriotic duty.

China gives U.S. brands the finger with new piracy mall: If you lament the homogenization of world culture, consider the retailing concept that’s reportedly about to open in the People’s Republic. Among the establishments shoppers can peruse: McDnoalds, Bucksstar Coffee, a fried-chicken place called KLG, and Pizza Huh. After having a meal, they could continue their hunt for the best price on Adidos or Dama sneakers.

Those aren’t typos. The place’s schtick is to offer knock-offs of copyrighted brands without the usual nod and a wink. And this is all out in the open, completely on the up-and-up, though U.S. restaurant brands may have a decidedly different opinion.

Tom Colicchio has another big idea: Regular readers will know I regard the New York chef’s recent brainstorm, Tom: Tuesday Dinner, as a more innovative idea than anything that’s come out of Detroit since the minivan. Now, according to the blog site Eater.com, he’s followed up that brilliant stroke of with a new marketing venture: Damon: Frugal Friday.

Damon is Damon Wise, the chef de cusine of Colicchio’s Craft restaurant. Every Friday beginning tomorrow, Wise will develop a one-day menu of items priced under $10. According to promotional information cited by Eater, the dishes will fall into eight categories, ranging from the familiar (salads, small pizzas, cheese plates) to the eyebrow-raising (“food in a jar,” “meat on a stick”). The materials cite such examples as crispy pig ear, deviled egg salad, and caper berries and piquillo marmalade.

Like Tom: Tuesday Dinner, the new special-night meal will be served in one of Craft’s private dining rooms. With the downturn in New York’s party business, it’s a smart way to put vacant space into money-generating use.

Chipotle is heading abroad: After poking a toe into a foreign market with the opening of a lone store in Toronto, the college students’ cult favorite is jumping across the pond. The company disclosed this week that it will develop a single restaurant in London as a possible beachhead to European expansion. Since the 800-unit chain doesn’t franchise here, it’s unlikely to license overseas. It’s a shame that the company isn’t still a half-sister to Pret a Manger, the all-natural grab-and-go chain that, like Chipotle, once counted McDonald’s as an owner. The two might be compatible partners, and Pret owns London.

Starbucks offers to caffeinate those who give back: The coffee giant continues to play to the socially minded with a new promotion keyed to Obama’s inauguration. The President-Elect has asked every American to volunteer their time for the public good next Monday. Agree to do your part, Starbucks announced yesterday, and there’ll be a free tall coffee waiting for you afterward.

Meanwhile, some media have reported that Starbucks is about to announce an arrangement with MSNBC whereby the cable channel’s live coverage of the inauguration will be simulcast within the coffee chain’s 650 U.S. stores.

The Blagojevich-foodservice connection

With all the news pouring out of Illinois about Gov. Blagojevich’s eBay approach to filling Barack Obama’s Senate seat, you may have missed the connection to the restaurant industry. Among the names that apparently came up in secretly recorded conversations was Service Employees International Union, the new-age labor organization that’s hell-bent on organizing more foodservice workers.

The New York Times reported that the criminal complaint filed against Blagojevich cites the union as one of the parties the governor approached with a quid pro quo offer. The union works behind the scenes to get Blago a job as head of a union confederacy called Change to Win, and in exchange SEIU gets an ally in the Senate and help in pushing its agenda on Capitol Hill.

The revelations underscore what should be a big worry for the industry: The ally who would have been considered for the empty Senate seat, according to press reports, is Valerie Jarrett, who took herself out of contention because Obama wanted her as White House advisor. That choice has since been made, meaning a strongly pro-labor voice will be at the new President’s right hand.

Among the measures that will undoubtedly come out of Congress next year is the so-called card check law, which will take away secret balloting on whether or not a restaurant’s staff should allow a restaurant to represent it. The wrinkle in the Blago story underscores just how strong a threat the trade may be facing.

Friday's grabs for Obama's coattails

Subway might’ve scored a coup by signing Michael Phelps as a pitchman, but T.G.I. Friday’s figured out a way to ride the stardom of an even bigger celebrity, and for free: Barack Obama.

The granddaddy of casual dining gave a drum roll and cymbal smash today for what it’s trumpeting as the World’s Largest Inauguration Party. On Jan. 20, while the moving trucks are probably still unloading at the White House, all 930 of the worldwide chain’s units will be celebrating the change in Oval Office occupants, according to the announcement.

The best, of course, is reserved for outlets in the United States. People who can’t get to Washington for the all-night parties can raise a little whoopie throughout the month by popping in a Friday’s for a half-price appetizer—provided they spring for an entrée. “Now that’s cool!” effused Friday’s.

The pull is even stronger for members of the chain’s Give Me More Stripes frequent-guest program: A free appetizer of chips (red and white; what happened to the blue?) and dip (can you froth up Curacao?) if they stop by a unit on Jan. 20.

And anyone who takes part in the Inauguration Day festivities gets a free button. Movie fans will know that kind of Friday’s swag is sometimes known as “flair.”

But I shouldn’t pick on Friday’s. It’s actually a good idea for a promotion. Indeed, the attempt seems to be part of an emerging trend. Having trouble getting customers into your restaurants? Throw a party!

The Riese Organization, a Friday’s operator in Manhattan, plans to host one in its Tropic Zone restaurant on Monday to celebrate the repeal of Prohibition 75 years ago. The guests of honor at the Times Square soiree will be 400 bartenders, waitresses, chefs and DJs, according to the announcement.

That event comes fairly close on the heels of the New York City event on Dec. 1 to celebrate the anniversary of the Bloody Mary.

The way I see it, with careful calendar planning, I could stay drunk with a lampshade on my head until the restaurant industry rebounds.

A boon and he's not even President yet

The District of Columbia's governing Council has agreed to allow bars and other alcohol-serving establishments to keep the drinks flowing until 5 a.m. during the four days the city is likely to be packed from Barack Obama's inauguration, according to the National Restaurant Association and the The Washington Post. The NRA's SmartBrief newsletter reported that restaurants can also keep their doors open 'round the clock, though only food can be sold after the early-morning last call.

The report said the concession was granted at the request of the Restaurant Association of Metropolitan Washington, which apparently hoped to help its members capitalize on the historic occasion.

Bars in the city usually have to close their taps by 2 a.m. The mandated closing time will be pushed back from Jan. 17-21.