The World considers America as the father of
Modern Fast-Food industry!
Will they extend their valued support to this industry or will they allow its Self-Destruction!!
First time I visited the United States of America it was in 1982. My wife’s father Mr. J.N. Parimoo was then posted in Washington DC as Senior Correspondent, representing India’s Premier Publication the Times of India. Being an ardent fan of McDonald’s, my first priority was to visit their restaurant to relish their amazing Burgers and appreciate the advancement of technology in food and how it has changed the face of food industry forever. Since then nearly forty years have passed, legend of Raymond Albert Kroc (October 5, 1902- January 14, 1984) is long gone, and a million new players have emerge. Do I see American food moving in the right direction or the decline has started? I guess, I do want to pen down my thoughts and my experiences for all my friends who read my blogs.
· For me, exposure to the American food started with my first visit to DC and Boston when I was working as Manager Airport Restaurant and Flight Kitchen, Calcutta in 1980-82. Then MacDonald’s was the harbinger of ‘Fast Food Revolution’, with amazing products like Big Mac, Chicken Nuggets, Milkshakes and fries. I also got exposed to Danny’s Dinner, IHOP, Dunkin Donuts and Burger King. My favorite was Big Mac, Milk Shakes and Fries. I also loved dinning at Danny’s or IHOP. Life was amazing at Washington DC, with worlds most advance Metro Subway. Pizza Hut Chain, casual dining restaurant with Salad Bar became a force to reckon, Pizzas became one of the most favorite food of eighties and nineties.
· In the following visits, I saw Burger King emerge as a leader with help of latest food technology and high-quality food standards. Brands like Wendy’s, Hardee’s and many more appeared on the scene to assert their presence. We also saw in casual dining, the emergence of brands like TGIF ( Thank God Its Friday) becoming a prominent leader in their segment along with a new breed of Tex-Mex food serving Americanized Mexican Food. Then appeared cafés like Au Bon Pain serving bakery, sandwiches and croissant with coffee, convenient for people on the go or short of time. For dessert we witnessed the mushrooming of Ice cream Parlors with various Innovations. Every visit was a kind of an eye opener- as I was exposed to new food, improved technics, better tastes and equally better standards.
· Then in late nineties we saw the Restaurant Industry getting further revolutionized with the opening of King of Restaurant business, called Cheese Cake factory, nearly all their restaurants were with over 300 covers. This American casual dining chain became leader of the American class and quality of food till date. With nearly ten page menu, they boast of world cuisine. Their service is the most welcoming, friendly and yet casual. This Phenomenal concept has not been copied or improved in last thirty years. Similarly, we also saw the popularity of Frozen Yogurt as health food.
· On my last visit to USA in February 2019 just before Covid took charge of the world, we got stuck in America for over eleven months. Living in southern America, I savored American food with great passion, like no one can make better fried food then the southerners’. Tried and tasted amazing chicken Burgers at Chick-Fil-A the best and the most successful Fast Food chain of America. Also tried fast growing chain in the US, Raising Cane’s and Zaxby’s are a single product chicken based chains. Today these are the most consistent and fast growing chains in America. By this time I also became a great fan of Coffee, it became one Cappuccino a day-as essential as brushing teeth every morning, fully realized the magic of Starbuck in America.
· I can safely say that, I have most passionately tried the food served by nearly all popular food chains in America. My favorite is, Subway for small pizzas, Fire House Subs for their vegetarian subs & salad, Taco Bell, Chipotle & Del Taco for Tacos, Burritos and Quesadillas, Popeye’s for Hot biscuit, Arby’s for roast beef. Jake in the box, Hardee’s, Shake Shack for loaded burgers, Church’s for fried chicken, PJI in Laurel for amazing chicken sandwich and Onion Rings, Kentucky Fried Chicken for Pot Pies, Sonic Drive Inn for shakes, Dominos Papa Johns and many more, localized concepts some with amazing food. This does not include long list of casual dining restaurants in New York, DC, New Orleans, Hollywood Beach Florida, Hattiesburg, Boston, Philly, Houston, Jackson, Laurel, Biloxi and many more on the Highways of US of America.
·
My list of favorite today is, 1) Chic-fil-A - Serving amazing food only six days a week, by
miles the best chicken burger in America. Due to quality, taste and their
customer relationship they earn double the revenue of any well doing Macdonald
and that also with Sunday closed. 2) Panera Bread - the best bakery
based casual dining serving soups, sandwiches to die for and simply amazing salads and that also at reasonable price. 3) Zaxby’s - Again a single
product concept with real crispy fried chicken. My favorite is Kickin Chicken
Sandwich with Tongue Torch sauce and crispy fried mushrooms. 4) Raising Cane’s
– This is again single product chain doing phenomenal business, serving just chicken
fingers with their special sauce and Texas Toast with coleslaw. And lastly 5) The
Cheese Cake factory – Now this is the unforgettable dining experience in
the world. Their vast menu, unbelievable variety and amazing food quality, coupled
with their superlative service standards all together contribute to the unique
experience which may be the best in the
world. They have been leader of food Industry for over 30 years and no one to
challenge them yet - anywhere in the world.
My latest visit to USA
this year (2024), post Covid, has shaken my belief in the American
capabilities. My experience in quality, food, innovation and hygiene has taken a
severe beating. Let me try to give you few of my bad experiences in last 12
weeks;
1. Visited MacDonald and ordered Crispy Chicken Burger with fries and coke. The Burger patty had chicken skin inside the fillet and when I pointed it out to the staff they just ignored, I just had to discard the burger. Fries by now had become soggy, and then I tasted one chicken nugget, which was rubbery and had a cartilage inside. What has happened to MacDonald’s, position as world’s number one fast food brand? You can feel the deterioration all around, in terms of service & hygiene. I am sure and glad that Ray Kroc is not alive to see this decline. One thing is still reasonably okay, and that is their Breakfast. It is rather unnerving to see the decline of the God of fast food. This is only one example; people have stories about bad experiences.
2. In India I am use to having coffee (Cappuccino) regularly around forenoon. This habit I have had for more than 15 years, even during the Covid times I use to pick up coffee every day from Lee Café, Laurel MS. Now with Starbuck in Laurel I was really delighted and have been going there every day for my coffee. Even with this brand I saw, a casual administrative approach, they didn’t have sugar for one whole week. Erratic staff attitude, few times we had to wait for coffee for over 35 minutes. Mind you this is only one year old Starbucks store. This is again a common complaint, all around, unfortunately they have no competition.
3. With the great Burger King, a brand which was considered technically far superior in technology, quality and hygiene standard, my experience was total disaster. Their famous original Chicken Sandwich and Crispy Chicken Burger had precooked soggy patty with stale limp lettuce, similar was the fate of their Crispy chicken burger. Beverage machine had no ice, so I had to drink warm coke. Restaurant was dirty and not well kept. Hard to believe and it is the truth and everybody in America knows it.
4. Panda Express can certainly be awarded for serving the best substandard Chinese food. Most chicken and meat dishes have more corn flour covering then the chicken or meat inside. Noodles thick and nearly Al dente, spring rolls are neither crisp nor tasting Chinese. Commercialization has taken toll on the quality. This is not only with Panda Express but most of Asian food court outlets.
5. Every visit since the eighties Mexican restaurant has been high light of good food. But this time I saw total deterioration in quality, hygiene and food standards. It seems everything is cooked by immature part time cooks. Only good food I ate was at Johnny Sanchez, restaurant owned by celebrated Master Chef Aaron Sanchez in New Orleans.
6. As a food professional, what has disappointed me the most was, the realization that, even at Cheese Cake Factory, quality of food can go down? Out of five visits to various locations, I was totally disappointed with quality of food; some of the dishes were just insipid and inedible. But in few locations food preparations were quite okay, not memorable, but reasonably fine.
7. Today I have already completed over 80 days in US of America and on average have consumed at least one meal outside in the restaurant, fast food outlet or decent Dinner. My experience has been average to disappointing. Most of the casual Dinners are not Chef Centric Restaurants trying to serve anything prepared with compromised recipes and presentation, as long as the size of meat, chicken or fish is big enough, the taste or flavor remains inconsequential. Most of the time proteins are hard and tasteless. You might be able to compare the quality of food in these causal dinning outlets, with the food served in England during the seventies – which was average irrespective of quality in terms of taste or flavor- simply put it was just cooked protein . I feel that today in America there are at least two dozen mediocre or substandard Restaurants, for one good restaurant. It also reminds me of my country and quality of the food going through the same cycle.
8. In some ways, I feel that renowned Fast Food Chains may be held responsible for taking the professional cooks away from the Restaurant Industry. They did this by developing modern instant cooking system for preparing Burgers, Pizza or Fried Chicken by untrained and unqualified staff having basic education for limited menu items. They also worked with delivery supply chains to prepare ‘Mise en Place’- a French culinary phrase for putting in place Or Gather - ready to produce pre-prepared frozen food items ready for frying, grilling or baking. This system was so successful that nearly the entire industry started adopting this method, to avoid high cost of qualified chefs. But for regular restaurants or even fast food outlets with large menu size started adopting the same system and that has compromised the food standards and is responsible for the decline. This system worked well for fast food chains till they had a mile long menus and uncontrollable numbers of outlets. This is the reason why short menu chains like Chick fill A, Raising Cane’s, Zaxby’s along with few others are doing well, but all major Brands with large menu are having quality issues. America must get the qualified Chefs Culture back to bring quality into the food.
9.
Talking of my country India, Indian food in America
continues to be a liability to our class and culture. Even today nothing has
changed from the sixties and seventies- it’s the same table cloth, same strong smell
of Indian spices, same kind of depressed and worn out look and same kind of
food- below average and extremely expensive. Reason for that also remains the
same, which is staffs who are not qualified cooks but are preparing food under
supervision. There are few good restaurants and some of them are Michelin Star
certified, but as things are, I have my reasons to doubt the capabilities of Michelin
committee to understand Indian food. If same standards are applied, we will
have over dozens Michelin Star Indian restaurants in each city.
Coming back to
American food Industry, what has really happened after Covid?, Why they have
stopped being innovating and progressive for the food?, simply enough, there
has been no innovation, improvement or enhancement of service, technology or
product quality. It appears as if they are still trying to adjust to new world
order. What’s more disturbing is that the food quality has fallen to levels
which are even lower than what they were during the Covid period.
Mind you, the Industry
is doing well, and it is a boom time all around, anyone producing average or little above
average food is doing well. Rates of food items have doubled in the last three/four
years, as such returns are comforting. All projections are rather positive and
lead to higher demand. New projections for future are pointing at a ‘Big Leap’ in
the food and beverage industry, especially in the short snack food segment. Declining
quality standards, I think, is the main reason for retarded demand/growth in few
of the fast food outlets and restaurants segment, which needs to be, addressed
post haste.
I also fear
that in the race to introduce new technologies and increase profitability, they
are ignoring the vital factor of improving the food standards using the same
technology. There is also a possibility of business stagnation or even decline
in the Fast Food and Restaurant industry because of superior technology being
introduced in the Take – Home segment of semi prepared snack meals - which is
doing remarkably well by any standard.
Today food
industry in Australia, UK and South East Asia, has taken the lead over American
Industry. This is happening only because due importance is being given to not
only quality of food but also to the quality of the manpower who are actually producing
the food. Simple example to note, is to compare food prepared in various
International prestigious competition programs like Master Chef Australia or UK,
where everyone can see the level of skills and compare to the American competitors.
Finally, I
feel that American Industry has the capability to bounce back. They need to
revisit their strengths, make their menus compact and food more flavorful and
appealing. There is also a need for food ‘Management Company’ to conduct a
thorough study of what and where things are going wrong. Fast food chains need
to improve their quality of products through supply chains management and also up-skill
and re-skill their staff with the same values for which Macdonald’s and Burger
King stood for and conquered America. Americans’ need to introspect a bit and
appreciate the fact that major part is quite in place and needs some fine
tuning, but quality, taste, flavors and presentations are equally important. I
am sure; I will see better trends in my next visit to USA. God Bless you
America.
