Our Recession Menus Are Getting Noticed!

Paul, a blogger over at the Restaurant Marketing Zone, recently mentioned MustHaveMenus' Recession Specials menus collection in a blog post detailing how to attract customers in a down time. He explains how offering a budget-friendly options to your customers is a win-win situation and that restaurants should jump on this opportunity before the economy swings again.

Keeping current of world trends is an important part of running a successful restaurant—after all, do you want to be the one serving the overpriced tasting menu right now? Or riding trends that have long passed, like wrap sandwiches (my personal non-favorite), low carb Atkins-style menus and "fusion" dishes?

Thanks, Paul! I look forward to more of your ideas.

What's New: Restaurant Inventory Forms

A week ago, I introduced our new Restaurant Management Toolkit, starting with our collection of signs.

Since then, we have uploaded a number of new tools to the the site, including inventory forms. Now, I was lucky to NOT have to deal with these as a server, but I often remember running across stained and torn copies shoved haphazardly on shelves, under the bin of coleslaw in the walk in coolers, and even tramped on in the parking lot. What if you didn't have to keep track of blank copies of the form? What if you could just print one out when the manager, chef or owner needed one?

Right now, we have Dairy Inventory, Produce Inventory, and Meat Inventory forms, among others. Is there a form that you would like to see? If so, leave a comment or email me at erin@musthavemenus.com and I'll get our designers working on it!

Visiting Standing Stone Brewing in Ashland, OR

I recently posted an article on MustHaveMenus about the Standing Stone Brewing Company in Ashland, Oregon, and how they are succeeding in these down economic times. Alex Amarotico, Standing Stone's owner, was kind enough to sit down with me for an hour and discuss marketing, sustainability, connecting with the community and more. He even treated me to a sampler tray of Standing Stone's eight hand-made ales. My favorite, the India Pale Ale, was so good I had to stop myself from ordering another pint. I had to go back to work, after all.

In the next week or so, I'll also be posting an article on Standing Stone's commitment to sustainable practices. They have even been named #28 in Oregon's 100 Best Green Companies by Oregon Business. And I am sure I'll post a few odds and ends that I learned from Alex and Standing Stone's business model. Stay tuned!

BBQ Menus and More!

Every week, I send out the Menu of Week email newsletter to our subscribers. This week's menu is featured above, the delightful Bones Barbeque Menu.

Barbeque season is in full swing, and while I haven't been invited to one yet, I do have plans to crash a barbeque in the near future. Or, at least throw one of my own and invite my cats.

Of course, MustHaveMenus is the place to go to find professionally designed menu templates, but did you know we also offer many restaurant marketing and restaurant management resources on our website?

Rebecca Olien wrote a great overview of how to add barbeque to your list of catering services. A great many of our clients are caterers, and may be missing out on this fun, profitable option that should be a part of their catering services.

We're adding, on average, two "how to" articles a week. You can keep on top of the latest articles by subscribing to the MustHaveMenus Article Feed.

If you like to be added to the Menu of the Week mailing list, leave a comment or email me at erin@musthavemenus.com.

What's New: Restaurant Management Tools

Seven years as a server, and I'm glad to say that I never seriously injured myself. Other people weren't so lucky—I saw bad knife cuts, coffeepot spills and, once, an incident involving a huge glob of butter and someone's ear.

Most state and federal regulations protect the customers and the employees of restaurants from inadvertent harm. These regulations usually require signs be posted that warn people about temperature, handwashing and more. Now, you can buy these signs from restaurant supply stores, and spend a pretty penny, OR you can download the signs from MustHaveMenus, as part of our Restaurant Management Toolkit. Available in both English and Spanish, our kitchen signs are just the start of the Restaurant Management Toolkit. In the next few weeks, we'll be adding management essentials like inventory tracking sheets, recipe costing sheets and more.

Are there any Restaurant Management Tools you'd like to see offered? If so, leave a comment or email me at erin@musthavemenus.com.

MustHaveMenus in the News: Recession Specials Menus

MustHaveMenus.com Announces Recession Specials Menus

Free Restaurant Twitter Backgrounds

You can't aimlessly surf around the Internet without coming upon a random mention of how Twitter is going to be the NEXT! BIG! THING! in Internet marketing. And for restaurants, that is certainly the case. Consider the success of @kogibbq, the roving Korean barbecue taco truck that tweets its location in and around Los Angeles. With almost 28,000 followers and many devoted fans, Kogi has really harnessed the power of Twitter marketing.For those who want to learn more about using Twitter to market your restaurant, here's a great article I found on Restaurant Marketing Zone.

MustHaveMenus has put together a set of free Twitter backgrounds for those in the food industry. Featuring hip, cute icons of the restaurant industry, MustHaveMenus' backgrounds will get your Twitter page noticed. Our backgrounds can also be used on your restaurant's MySpace page, or as your own personal desktop wallpaper.

Let me know if you use one of MustHaveMenus' free Twitter backgrounds. I'll be choosing one lucky restaurant/food service business to cover as a case study in the near future. My email address is erin@musthavemenus.com.

Happy Twittering!

Thanks to @jennprinzing for "starring" in today's blog entry. Be sure to follow @musthavemenus on Twitter.

Cookie Controversy: Macaroons

Here's another recipe from Chef Karen. I ate two of these for breakfast this morning, lucky me!

I learned to make Macrons au Amaretti Nicois in Paris. That’s what real macaroons are, not the sticky sweet American version. When I offer to make macaroons, there’s always some not-so-subtle pressure to make them sweet. So, this weekend I did as I usually do when asked to pick one recipe over another, I made them both.

Civilized Macaroons
1 ½ c. shredded coconut
1/3 c. evaporated cane syrup
dash salt
2 egg whites at room temperature
dash vanilla

Mix everything into a paste.

Roll about a walnut sized piece in your hands and place on a parchment covered baking sheet.

Bake at 325 until lightly browned, about 12 minutes. Let cool before removing them from the parchment paper.

Indulgent Macaroons
1 -14 oz bag shredded coconut (pick the squishiest bag on the shelf)
1 can sweetened condensed milk
dash almond extract
2 TB cocoa nibs
3 TB finely chopped dried orange-cranberries

Mix ¾ can of the sweetened condensed milk with the other ingredients until it is a thick paste. If your coconut is dry, add a drizzle more of milk.

Shape into small round balls and place on parchment covered baking sheets.

Bake at 325 until just starting to brown, about 12 minutes.