Holly Moore

Did you click on the menu to enlarge it? But yes they have greens. Collard greens daily and turnip greens Monday, Friday and Saturday. The have about 15 sides offered daily and another two or three special sides each day. You'll be eating plenty good. Here's Busy Bee's menu from their website.

Along with the aforementioned Varsity, Mary Macs and Silver Skillet, I'd add the Busy Bee for Fried Chicken and Soul Food. Cheap, awfully good, friendly. Can't ask for too much more than that.

You'd be amazed at what a high school kid can do with a 6 foot grill and a couple of spatulas. He most likely wouldn't have the charm of the White Manna grill guy, but he could easily keep up with him. That's one of my strongest memories of the 1968 vintage McDonald's - the kids running the grill. They were the hero's of McD's back then and took pride in earning the coveted positon of grillman. Growth was part of it. McDonald's has two sales goals. Increasing per unit sales. Increasing overall chain sales. The easiest way was to increase overall chain sales was to open more stores. But there are only so many gullets and so much acreage. After 2000 stores, the opening of a new store often canabalized one or more existing store's sales. Good for McDonald's because two stores yielded more franchise fees than one store. Bad for the franchisee because his individual stores became less profitable and there was often no territorial guarantee that the existing franchisee would own the new store that was taking sales from his existing store. Also bad for McDonald's because the stock market looks at both total sales and average store sales. A good way to balance canabalization was through introducing new products. A good new product could increase a store's sales by ten percent or more. New products induced existing customers to spend more per visit and to come back more often. They also attacted new customers. The problem with the vast array of menu items now offered by the fast food giants is that the operation becomes more complicated. More things have to be ordered, inventoried, cooked and kept fresh once cooked. Something has to give and what has given is the freshness of the food - the quality of McDonald's "Quality, Service and Cleanliness" motto. Food gets held longer. Food is precooked. Food quality is compromised. Service and Cleanliness also suffer. Service because the bigger the menu the slower moving the lines and the greater the chance that an order item will be temporarily out. Cleanliness because McDonald's stores have to run at a set labor cost and if more time is spent serving and cooking, less time is available for cleaning. You're probably right. But In/Out Burger (it's been a while so I'm not sure how limited there menu is nowadays) is extremely successful in the LA market. The demand is there despite the high concentration of competition. If they can make it there, can they make it anywhere? They've proven they have the structure to run a reasonably large regional chain? With strong management can they expand that structure to other markets, and then to other markets beyond that? But such expansion will eventually bring the same canabalization problems faced by the big chains. And probably the same solutions. Hence the Wheel of Retailing and the always recurring opportunity to break into a mature market with a simple, no frills execution.

Not even a friggin' clown.

I was there a couple of years ago. Yes it is touristified. But I still had a great meal (by Prague standards) and a great time. As I recall there's a tuba and accordian duo dressed in soldier garb that emerges from the kitchen and strolls the aisles between tables.

Bologna?

Soon

49 cent hamburgers. fresh cut fries, sodas, shakes and maybe a fish sandwich. No salads. No chicken nuggets or broiled chicken breasts. Nothing but McD's menu in 1968. The Wheel of Retailing. The elder fast food chains have embellished, embellished and emblished some more. They are at maturity. Bogged down. Evolved into family restaurants. Left a gaping void at the bottom of the wheel for a no-nonsense hamburger stand, low prices, and quality, service and cleanliness.

Understand what you're saying, but someone, in theory, poured 3 million or so into the place. What's the story on the money guy? What's his track record? Jeffery Chodorow has multiple places - Asia de Cuba, The resto at the Hudson, The resto at Clift in SF, China Grills, Mix (co owned with Alain Ducasse), Red Square in Miami, Vegas, (NY?)etc More about Jeffery Chodorow - What's his batting average - any flops, any restaurants open less than a year? He doesn't strike me as the sort of person who would squander 3 million for some face time on NBC. He must be looking for a return on his money. Anyone have insight as to what his deal is with the producers, with NBC?

He didn't open a restaurant. He stared on a "reality TV" show. The restaurant was a by product of the show. The dog wagged the tail. Understand what you're saying, but someone, in theory, poured 3 million or so into the place. What's the story on the money guy? What's his track record?

A few thoughts: I'm curious how many seats Rocco's has? I'm guessing it's fairly large. Maybe that's a "duh." I've been involved in the opening of a bunch of fast food restaurants and a few table service restaurants including one of my own. The table service restaurants were all relatively small. 45-75 seats. I think this size is more typical for the average restaurant. What we're seeing with Rocco's is the opening of a much larger restaurant. I know how difficult it is to control and manage at the small restaurant level. This seems much larger. It is inconceivable to me, based on my experience, as to how a restaurant that size can function, smoothly, at a high quality level. I don't think I ever really appreciated the complexity of a large restaurant. Maybe it's just the camera angles and the director's P.O.V., but I'm intimidated. I'm still upset with Rocco - that he was willing to open a restaurant that shouldn't have opened for at least another week. He's putting his name on this place. The kitchen staff may have been ready. But the floor staff sure as hell wasn't. How many guests from the travesty of the opening night will return? What will be the word-of-mouth from the trendsetting early triers? In real life, open a restaurant as amateurly as Rocco did, give that bad a first impression, and you're not going to be the one in ten that makes it past year one. Maybe it's that it's a chef owned restaurant. Maybe Rocco doesn't appreciate the importance of the front of the house. A server disappearing for an hour or more, walking the streets searching for wine, without telling a supervisor. I'm amazed he was allowed to finish his shift. All in all though, I'm liking "The Restaurant." A lot of fun to watch so far.

Alas, they are closed Sundays in the summer.

In Chestnut Hill - 8634 Germantown Avenue across from Borders

Have been hearing about a variation upon the Cheese Steak at H & J McNally's. Finally got there today to give it a try. It's called a Schmitter and starts out as a basic cheese steak, but on a kaiser roll. Then it's topped with crisply grilled salami, sliced tomato, fried onions and a secret sauce - something like big mac sauce with a kick of horseradish. Good, gooey, greasy eating. I was feeling proud about my discovery until I asked the bartender why the sandwich is called a Schmitter. "Here read this." He slid a beer-soaked copy of the new "Best of Philly" issue of Philly Mag. Big half page picture of a waitress holding a Schmitter. Put a damper on my day. I did 5 minutes with the bartender, prostesting way too much that I was NOT there because I had seen the sandwich in Philadelphia Magazine. He assured me that he believed me as his copy had just arrived a couple of hours ago in the mail. Hope so. Would be horrible if I were taken as one of those who runs out to a place as soon as it is written up in a newspaper or magazine. Not that there's anything wrong with that. Back to the Schmitter - It got its name from the guy who conceived it. Guy's name wasn't Schmidt though. It's more Philadelphian than that. The guy was a regular at McNally's and every time he came in he only drank Schmidt's beer. Hence he was the Schmitter and the sandwich variation he always ate was the Schmitter.

Greetings jshufelt and welcome to eGullet. Glad you've ventured beyond lurking. Baum Vivant sounds great. Neat that it's in a run down neighborhood. Makes it all the better as far as I'm concerned. Is this a well know restaurant in Pittsburgh or a recent find? And what's the address.

Yes, but not intentionally

I don't add salt without tasting, but that is the difference between the top of the line products and the basic products. The basic products are more salty like boullion cubes. I don't find the sodium level objectionable with the RC top of the line stock bases.

Every company makes verious levels of stock base. You want the one where beef or chicken is the first ingredient. I'm partial to LeGout, but haven't seen it available retail. The Chef's Market on the 200 Block of South Street sells RC brand out of it's refrigerated dairy case. The beef base's first ingredient is "Roasted Beef," the chicken base's is "Chicken Meat." They also sell ham base which is great for split pea soup and, I believe, a fish base. Does to the stock pot what butter did to the butter churn.

I've got a couple of friends joining me for the Christening this weekend. Will report back after that.

Banana pudding with vanilla wafers. A bbq classic. But my first thought was cobbler and with peaches the way they are now, it's gotta be a peach cobbler.

I'd expand word-of-mouth to include Public Relations (PR). In my experience PR is what generates word of mouth - initiates the "buzz." Keep pushing the local and not-so-locate press to talk about you. Reviews, of course. But also special events and happenings. When I had my restaurant I once got a blurb in the Philadelphia Inquirer by telling a columnist that we had just added hamburgers to our lunch menu. First customer who ordered one asked for ketchup. I had to send the dishwasher to a nearby market to buy a bottle of ketchup because we never needed it before. Got me the opening spot in his column. You just need a feeling for what is news-worthy. That you're offering a free desert with a dinner isn't newsworthy, except perhaps for a shopper where you are already advertising. That your uncle in Florida sent you a case of key limes that you are making into pie may be.

Welcome to both of you. Why not start with "The Strip." I was there in May, my first visit. Wow! Though I've heard that it's getting upscaled a bit of late. What are the local secrets?

Thanks for the link. If I'm one of the diners when the cameras were there, and I didn't want to end up on the cutting room floor, I'd manage some sort of dramatic antic to insure my face time on the show. Suspect that will be the case with the diners there. Emoting, over-reacting. I'm thinking customers from hell.

If red snapper was on the menu, Rio Bravo has it's new menu up and running. Will have to stop by again and give it a try.

Guess what UPS brought me today? Picked up the rest of the ingredients this afternoon. Taste testing to follow shortly.