SheeFood

Love Those Cupcakes

I love cupcakes. When I splurge and eat out at SPIN! Neapolitan Pizza, I make it an even bigger splurge with a trip to the cupcake store around the corner. But my last trip around the corner disappointed me. Why would anyone try to compete in the growing cupcake restaurant segment and still ice the cakes with typical bakery Crisco icing? Anyone who makes cake at home doesn’t use that nasty icing. Granted, it’s cheaper, but buttercream is the most popular and flavorful. Sigh.

Anyway, my main point is that cupcakes are still where it’s at. Yes, they were so 2009-10, and food editors have moved on. But I’m not ready to move on, and neither are a few others.

• For its 40^th anniversary, Starbucks launched some petite desserts, including mini cupcakes and cake-pops with 200 calories or less. The cupcakes are red velvet and vanilla bean.
• Au Bon Pain added cupcakes this winter and is considering keeping them on the menu. Flavors are french vanilla, double chocolate and red velvet at $2.99 each or two for $5.
• The largest cupcake chain, Crumbs Holdings LLC, is currently being acquired by 57th Street General Acquisition Corp. Why? “The cupcake category is a unique subsection of the burgeoning fast-casual segment of the restaurant industry, and Crumbs has emerged as the cupcake leader with significant long-term potential,” they said in a release.

So, I’m not alone in my love for the small cakes. 57^th Street plans to expand the 34 Crumbs stores to 200 by the end of 2014. (They also plan to take the company public, so stockholders, be watching.)

Another compelling reason to think there’s still some cupcake power out there, consider that incidences of restaurant menu mentions of cupcakes increased 163% from 2007-10, according to Mintel Menu Insights.

And while we have our eye on cake, it’s interesting to see where restaurant cake trends are. Who can miss the rise of red velvet? Menu mentions of red velvet increased 550% in the past three years!

Chocolate cake, not surprisingly, is by far the leading flavor, followed by carrot cake, which increased 22% in the past three years. The types of cake falling a bit out of favor on menus is strawberry shortcake (down 9% in the past three years); torte (down 11%); and upside down cake (down 22%). Keep an eye on tres leches cake. It was up 90% in menu mentions over the past three years.

Tell me your favorites.

Incidences of cake mentions on restaurant menus over time

	Q4 2007	Q4 2008	Q4 2009	Q4 2010	Number of Items	% change from 2007 to 2010
	#	#	#	#	#	%
Cake - Chocolate	145	132	154	156	587	8
Cake - Carrot	36	42	37	44	159	22
Cake - Shortcake	22	26	18	20	86	-9
Cake - Mousse	17	16	18	20	71	18
Cake - Torte	19	16	18	17	70	-11
Cake - Tres Leches	10	14	15	19	58	90
Cake - Pound	8	12	15	12	47	50
Cupcake	8	10	7	21	46	163
Cake - Upside Down	9	12	9	7	37	-22
Cake - Flourless	8	5	11	13	37	63
Cake - Lemon	6	7	8	11	32	83
Cake - Fudge	7	8	7	9	31	29
Cake - Red Velvet	2	3	7	13	25	550

Source: Mintel Menu Insights

Restaurants Discover Vegetables

There’s slight applause starting in foodservice. Can you hear it? Vegetables are emerging from backstage to take more of a lead role on the plate, and no one is pushing them back. In fact, they are almost like a curious new genre of food that the world is ready to listen to. “Let’s see what you have,” is the emerging attitude.

Last week Jamba Juice debuted its new line of three fruit and vegetable smoothies. Guess what the vegetables are in Berry UpBeet, Apple ‘n Greens and Orange Carrot Karma. It’s vegetables’ grand entrance in that chain, and it follows what’s happening all over the foodservice industry.

The reasons are varied. In some cases, it’s to healthy up menus. Denny’s has revamped its kids’ menu, including a side of High Diving Veggies (celery, cucumbers and carrots with ranch dressing). On its kids menu, The Loop Pizza Grill offers sides of steamed vegetables.

For other restaurants, especially in fine-dining circles, vegetables fit in the local, seasonal trend, and chefs are always up for a culinary challenge—making previously shunned vegetables a star. On 60 Minutes, famed chef José Andrés called meat “slightly boring” and vegetables “unbelievably sexy.”

Look at the press that restaurant roof-top gardens have received lately. Consider that the number of farmers markets in the U.S. increased 6.8% from 2006-08, and then jumped 30.9% from 2008-10, according to Mintel's Vegetables—U.S., March 2011 report. Some 41% of the report’s survey respondents purchase some vegetables from farmers markets. Perhaps consumers really are ready for more than token vegetables on the restaurant plate.

The National Restaurant Association, Produce Marketing Association and International Foodservice Distributors Association have joined forces on a multi-phase project to identify opportunities to double fresh produce use in foodservice by 2020. In a press release, they revealed results of a survey they conducted of restaurant operators:

• 41% of operators said they expect to serve more fresh produce in the next two years.
• 72% said emphasizing fresh produce in their marketing efforts drives more customers to their restaurants.
• 46% said they look for fresh produce items that their customers can’t buy at the supermarket.
• 67% said they wish there was more information on how to incorporate fresh produce on their menus.
• 56% serve locally sourced produce in their restaurants.

Given all this, I expect that we will be hearing more from vegetables—the newly discovered food group.

Applause?

Tell me what you think.

Jody

Menus Discover Artisan

Fresh is so yesterday on menus. The menu descriptor artisan is where it’s at today. I think it’s because artisan conjures images of just what it is, hand-made by an artist. Of course it implies fresh, but it also breaths local, careful and hand-crafted. Consider these recent menu additions:

• Blimpie Subs added several new subs on artisan bread, including Onion Poppy Ciabatta Artisan Bread.
• Olive Garden added asiago cheese-filled artisanal ravioli tossed with chicken, peppers, mushrooms and caramelized onions in a creamy white wine sauce.
• Jimmy Vs Steakhouse and Tavern now has Local Artisan Lettuces Salad.
• Camille’s Sidewalk Café just rolled out Artisan Flatbread Pizza to all its locations, replacing its gourmet pizzas.
• Burgerville, for a limited time, has Echo Mountain Blue Burger “inspired by artisan cheese maker Ignazio Vella from Rogue Creamery,” a Burgerville partner since 2005.

According to the February 2011 Mintel Menu Insights report “Breaking More Bread,” the number of artisan mentions as a bread ingredient marketing claim increased 75% from 2007 to 2010. Meanwhile, fresh was down 1%; crunchy was down 14%; signature was down 3%; and classic was down 7%.

I would be remiss if I limited the artisan conversation to just a “menu mentions” focus. Here’s to all the artisans out there who are really doing artisanal bread, pasta, cheese, etc. Good for you, and keep it up. Don’t be discouraged that what you view as a livelihood, others think of as a great PR term.

I wrote an article on artisanal cheese for the recently released spring issue of Sizzle magazine (see “Cheese Culture” to the right). One of the chefs I interviewed took issue with the current pop-word treatment, citing Starbucks, which launched grab-and-go breakfast sandwiches on oven-toasted artisan rolls. This chef commiserated that there isn’t an official definition for artisan. “Hand-made equals oddly shaped bread at Starbucks.”

An owner of an artisan cheese shop that added on a restaurant later told me “In my mind, the word has been abused of late. It’s gotten into fast-food locations where they promote sandwiches on artisan bread, like Subway or Dunkin Donuts that don’t even make artisan bread,” he said.

But I wouldn’t worry. Many people do understand that artisanal means hand-crafted in small batches. And for those who don’t, the vast PR from the fast-food chains that have a budget to blazon the word artisan can only help the small companies that actually do the work but don’t have the bucks to promote the idea.

Tell me what you think.

Jody