Food

Continuing with our recap series, here are the top blog posts from the Food blog for 2018. These posts got the most views, regardless of when they were published.

Read on...and if you see content you like, be sure to join the HBC Community for regular updates, whether it's Beverage, Food, Hospitality or Recipes.

Stewed tomatoes. Macaroni. Stir-fried cabbage.

Haute cuisine it's not; but in the hands of Chef Amory James and his army of volunteers in hairnets, home-style recipes like these change lives. Every day, FeedMore's Community Kitchen in Richmond, Virginia, dishes out more than 3,000 healthy meals for the region's needy children, elderly and homebound clients. We asked Chef James for a few pro tips and took a look behind the scenes of this innovative nonprofit.

The chefs spoke. And we listened.

Chefs in kitchens around the world told us they needed an advanced culinary blender at their side. They needed a blender that was versatile enough to allow them precise control, but had enough power to handle all the fresh ingredients that are the mainstay of modern kitchens. Most importantly, they needed a blender that could unleash their creativity and help them to put their signature of flavor in every dish, no matter what the style of cuisine. We took note of everything they said — and we delivered.

The days of plain roller dogs and two pots of coffee are over. In the realm of food and beverages, convenience stores can no longer stick to the tried and true.

For millennials, especially, it's all about customization, says Joe Chiovera, principal at XS Foodservice & Marketing Solutions and a 19-year c-store veteran: "It's not only in the ingredients, it's when I want it and how I want it." Toasted, pressed, cold, in a bowl, in a burrito or bunless? Young customers are accustomed to having options.

Here's what convenience store companies need to know about adding customized beverage and food offerings. 

Saddled with student loans, stuck in low-wage jobs, supremely geeked out and still living with their parents — millennials, at least as they are painted by the headlines, don’t appear to be the best prospects for restaurateurs. But look beyond the stereotypes and it’s clear that millennials, who were born between 1979 and 2000, love to eat out. They're dedicated foodies who eat in restaurants nearly 10 times per month — significantly more than Gen Xers or boomers. They currently account for 22 to 24 percent of restaurant spending in the US, and they are expected to account for 40 percent by 2020.  

Fried chicken. Meatball sandwiches. Country-fried steak.

Those are just a few of the hospital food offerings the Physicians' Committee for Responsible Medicine (PCRM) found in a 2011 study. Dietitians surveyed more than 110 hospitals and found an abundance of fast-food outlets as well as cafeteria and patient menus "dominated by foods high in fat, cholesterol, calories, sugar, and sodium."

The findings didn't surprise Susan Levin, PCRM's director of nutrition education, but she believes hospitals have a duty to do better. Most people are hospitalized because of a chronic illness brought on by poor diet or lifestyle choices, she points out, so why not take the opportunity to teach them how to eat right?

We spoke with two innovators in healthcare foodservice who won awards for doing just that. Drew Patterson is culinary director of Ohio State University’s 1400-bed Wexner Medical Center, which won Best Wellness Concept from Food Management in 2015 for its Michael D. Bloch Café. Dan Henroid is director of Nutrition & Food Services at the University of California San Francisco Medical Center (UCSFMC), which won Best in Show. Here are some of their best practices for hospital foodservice.

Chefs (and everyone else) have long known that the aroma and appearance of a dish profoundly influence how it will taste. But now the new science of neurogastronomy indicates that the sounds in the spaces where food is served also influence taste.

Not all that long ago, conventional wisdom said the best Mexican food could be found only near the border, in Texas, Arizona or California. Then chefs around the country began stretching the definition of fine Mexican dining. 

The move to a greener operating style is paying off for restaurants of all sizes. Fully 79 percent of consumers prefer dining at certified green restaurants, according to the Green Restaurant Association. "Consumers are a lot more educated now than they used to be," says Michael Oshman, founder of the association. And going green, he says, helps solve two perennial challenges for restaurants: "How can I save money, and how can I bring customers in?"

Beautiful, delicate pintxos—a type of tapas from Spain's Basque region—with olives, cucumbers, anchovies (right).

In Asian nations, there's a big appetite for small plates. Tapas culture—the sharing of dishes among groups of friends—has close ties to the dining culture in China and other Asian nations, making it a natural fit, says Miguel Utque, vice president of the recently formed Spanish Chefs' Association in Asia.