Latest / Chef's PSA Podcast / Menu Change 101: Critical Path to Menu Success Ep. 82

Transcript

Menu Change 101: Critical Path to Menu Success Ep. 82 · Chef's PSA Podcast

• 0:00
  Hello Chefs, This is Chefs PSA Podcast.
• 0:02
  I'm your host, Andre Natera. On today's episode, we're going
• 0:04
  to talk about the critical path to changing your menu.
• 0:07
  Stay tuned. This episode of Chef's PSA is
• 0:21
  sponsored by J&R Grills and Smokers.
• 0:23
  Many of you have heard of J&R smokers and grills that
• 0:26
  typically last for decades. I've had the pleasure of using
• 0:28
  them for over 5 years at one of the top restaurants in Austin.
• 0:31
  They're beautiful. They gave me the control over
• 0:33
  technique and the smoke infused flavors I wanted.
• 0:36
  I'm thrilled to have J&R as a sponsor.
• 0:38
  Their commitment over the past 50 years speaks for itself.
• 0:41
  They understand your passion because it fuels them too.
• 0:43
  BBQ or upscale cuisine they always help you deliver.
• 0:46
  They build everything in Texas and ship to all 50 states in
• 0:49
  over 50 countries. J&R, they'll stand with you.
• 0:51
  They've always stood with me. Go to jrmanufacturing.com to
• 0:54
  learn more before we get into it.
• 0:56
  If you haven't already, go get The 50 Most Important Chef's
• 1:00
  PSAS. It's a free ebook.
• 1:02
  It's available on chefspsa.com along with the other free
• 1:06
  ebooks. Think of it as your training
• 1:08
  manual. It's a companion to another
• 1:11
  podcast. I did the 50 Most Important
• 1:13
  Chef's PSAS. It's basically what I think
• 1:15
  every cook should know when they go into a new kitchen.
• 1:17
  It's the basics. If you don't have an employee
• 1:19
  training manual, you're welcome. The next thing I'm working on
• 1:23
  immediately is I'm going to turn that into an audiobook.
• 1:26
  So for those of you that don't like to read with your eyes and
• 1:29
  you prefer to read with your ears, I'll have that done in the
• 1:32
  next few weeks. I just need to sit down and
• 1:34
  record it, But I'm busy recording this podcast, so I'll
• 1:37
  get that out pretty quick. One other announcement for those
• 1:41
  of you that use Open AI or fans of AII, recently created my
• 1:46
  first app on Open AI ChatGPT. You could find it.
• 1:50
  It's called Food Cost Oracle, a little nod to the Matrix.
• 1:53
  I've loaded it with information on managing food cost, how I
• 1:59
  think about food cost mitigation strategies.
• 2:01
  It has the information from the books that I've written, the
• 2:03
  Food Cost Mastery guide, along with that three podcast series,
• 2:07
  as well as things that I have that are boring, that I wouldn't
• 2:11
  publish from when I was a chef, and things that I used to manage
• 2:14
  food cost so you could talk to it if you need food cost
• 2:18
  information. If you need spreadsheets, it
• 2:19
  could create spreadsheets and you could download to them and
• 2:22
  turn them into Excel files directly from the app.
• 2:26
  So it's worth checking out if you don't know where to begin to
• 2:29
  manage your food cost. The Food Cost Oracle is there to
• 2:31
  be your guide. It's a it's a smarter version of
• 2:34
  me because it's me plus AI. Anyway, we digress.
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  Let's get into the show today. I want to talk about menu
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  changes and the critical path which you have to take when
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  you're changing menus. So I think I'm, I think first
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  and foremost we just probably explain what a critical path is
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  because maybe you've never heard that term.
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  So if you haven't heard that term, a critical path is
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  basically the steps in order which you take to make something
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  happen. So a critical path to opening up
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  a restaurant would be the steps from 1:00 to 10:00 to open up
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  the restaurant. The steps in a critical path to
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  changing a menu is all the important things that need to be
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  done from beginning to end to make sure you have a successful
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  menu change. That's what a critical path is.
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  So we're talking about a critical path.
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  That's what it is. If you're not familiar with that
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  term, boom, now you are, you're welcome.
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  Add it to the lexicon of culinary jargon that you already
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  use and I should say you don't need a critical path to change a
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  menu. There's a lot of restaurants out
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  there with different styles and it's not a one-size-fits-all.
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  What I'm going to give you is what I deem the important steps
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  to change a menu for most restaurants.
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  It's not going to work in every restaurant.
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  You may work in the type of restaurant where you change the
• 3:46
  menu every day. You go to the farm, you go to
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  the farmers market, you come back with a basket and you say
• 3:50
  this is what it is. You may work in the type of
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  restaurant where the menu never changes and everything in
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  between. Some places are just change the
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  menu because you feel like it with no critical path needed.
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  Other places are. You better not ever change the
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  menu, no matter how good you think your dishes.
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  This episode is to give you a critical path if you need one,
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  and what the process may look like in order to be successful,
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  and to think about all the variables that may come up when
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  changing a menu and to make sure that you're making good,
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  educated decisions first and foremost.
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  And I'm not going to cover this in the entire episode, but I
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  think there should be foundational groundwork as to
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  what type of restaurant you're running.
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  You should have guardrails or parameters that describe the
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  type of restaurant. So for example, maybe it's time
• 4:36
  and place seasonality and modern American or modern Mexican,
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  whatever the case may be. Maybe it's a specific town in
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  Mexico. Let's say you're cooking food
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  from Oaxaca or the Yucatan. Well then it makes sense that
• 4:48
  the dishes that you're creating are inspired by that.
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  So putting up the guardrails is first and foremost, those
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  guardrails are important. To use an extreme example, you
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  have this Yucatan restaurant. You're not going to say, hey, I
• 5:00
  got this really good idea for this Thai Curry.
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  It wouldn't make sense, and I know that's a stupid example,
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  but you'd be surprised how many menu meetings I've been in for
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  very specific types of restaurant and the chefs that
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  are contributing ideas. Like, hey, I got this really
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  good idea for the Italian restaurant.
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  What do you think about enchiladas and like, enchiladas?
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  Like an enchilada pizza? What are you thinking?
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  Get it together, chefs. Don't make me have to say what
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  everyone's thinking. Anyway, we digress.
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  Put up the guardrails first. When you're designing the menu,
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  understand what it is that your concept in your brand is.
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  Also, understand what your limits are.
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  Is there food cost restrictions? Do you need to increase sales?
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  Do you need to have items on the menu that are less expensive?
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  Do you need to have items on the menu that are more expensive
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  because you need to raise revenues or you need to cut
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  cost? You need to understand that.
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  Can your team execute it? You shouldn't put dishes on the
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  menu that you're the only one that could pull it off.
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  Because if you're the only one that could pull it off, but you
• 6:00
  do none of the cooking, then why is it on the menu?
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  It doesn't matter that you're a great chef.
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  Everyone on the team has to be able to do it.
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  So also have to think about that.
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  Don't let your ego get too wrapped up in the food.
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  This is the downfall of a lot of chefs, because they want to do
• 6:13
  something that they could do, but no one else on the team can
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  pull off. I've talked about this at
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  length. You're setting yourself up for a
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  failure around the corner. It's funny.
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  Chefs are artists. They want to create, they want
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  to express themselves, they want to show what they can do.
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  And sometimes their first instinct as a chef is to be
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  creative and flex and show what you can do and create these
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  wonderful, beautiful dishes. But on the opposite end, you
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  work for an owner who's a capitalist.
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  It's capitalists hiring artists. And then they wonder why the
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  relationship between chef and owner doesn't work out.
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  Because you have one person who owns the restaurant that wants
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  to make money, and they're not in it for the art.
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  They're in it to be a restaurant owner.
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  And then you have another person who's not in it to make the
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  restaurant money. They're in it for the art.
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  It's not always the case, but it happens a lot more frequently
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  than you realize. People sometimes comment on my
• 7:06
  chef's PSA page. I'm not in it to make money.
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  Who's in it To make money was like, well, it's a business.
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  Someone's in it to make money. Otherwise the restaurant
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  wouldn't be open because if it was just in it for the craft,
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  you would just be cooking at home or with your friends.
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  So somewhere along the line, someone said they can make money
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  doing this because it's doubtful that someone just feels like
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  creating a playground for chefs. Maybe it happens.
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  I don't think it does. Back to the critical path.
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  Once you've identified what the guardrails are, there has to be
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  steps in place to create the menu.
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  The first thing I do is I look at menu abstracts, P mix,
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  product mix, basically knowing what's selling, what's not
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  selling. You don't want to take something
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  off the menu that's a money maker and replace it with
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  something that's not. What are the margins like?
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  What are your workhorses? This is called menu engineering
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  and there's a lot of applications that could do this
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  for you. You could download menu
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  engineering tools. You can make your own on an
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  Excel spreadsheet If you're good at making spreadsheets.
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  Maybe the food cost Oracle could do that.
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  I'm not even sure if I've pushed it to that limit where it could
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  create menu engineering. It might not be, it might be
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  beyond its AI capabilities. But anyway, you want to look at
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  the menu abstracts and understand what your movers are
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  and what's not moving. The best thing to do is look at
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  the items that are not performing and either get them
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  to perform by making them more attractive or replace them with
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  something that will perform. The items that are selling, you
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  want to make sure that they're profitable, and if they're not,
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  make them more profitable because they are selling or
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  don't touch them. Don't fuck it up.
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  It's making money, People like it.
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  Everyone comes back for this one dish regardless if you like it
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  or not. Back to the business aspect of
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  it. You have to be a good steward of
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  the business and sometimes we lose sight of the stewardship
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  which we are given to maintain a profitable business.
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  As chefs, we get too caught up in the creative.
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  Not that that's not important because it is, but it's a
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  balance. If you go to 1 Extreme or the
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  other, something suffers. You can't be so creative that
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  the business suffers and you can't be so much about the
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  bottom line and profitability that the food suffers.
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  It's about finding the balance and every restaurant is
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  different, so it's important to know where you're at.
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  It's not a one-size-fits-all. Once you've reviewed your P mix,
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  next thing you want to do is get some ideas on paper.
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  Draft up your menu, write things down, brainstorm, meet with the
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  chefs, have your menu meetings, maybe run some items as specials
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  to test them out and get feedback from the staff to see
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  how difficult it is to execute the dish on the line to see if
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  it moves or not. One of the things that I've done
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  recently, I'm consulting with someone and I'm helping them
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  write their menu. And once the menu was written,
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  actually yesterday on Chef's PSA Instagram page, I put up photos
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  and people had to guess whether they were AI or not.
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  And I would say it was about 5050.
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  Most people couldn't get them, or at least they couldn't get
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  all of them. What I do right now is I I use
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  AI, I use it as a tool because it is a tool.
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  And I'm, you know, I'm waving the AI flag.
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  I got an app on Open AI, and I think chefs need to embrace
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  this. And here's what I did.
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  So once the menu was written, I went into Mid Journey which is
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  an AI image generating program and I would type in the menu
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  item and I would say maybe plated by a very artistic chef
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  and it would give me an image of what that dish may look like and
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  it give in Mid Journey for example, it gives you 4 images.
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  So I'd say OK, let's scale this one up.
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  Now I could use that as plating inspiration, or I could use it
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  as something I could give to the chef and say, hey, here's an
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  idea. This is what it looks like for
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  those people that are visual learners versus people who just
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  like to read the menu where some people want to see what it may
• 10:51
  look like. So it's also a good idea.
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  Now with your AI tools, you could take your menu ideas, pop
• 10:57
  those into mid journey, print it out.
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  Now you have a starting point. Now that you've written your
• 11:03
  menu and you've tested it and everyone's done their tastings
• 11:07
  and you've critiqued it, and it's really important when
• 11:09
  you're critiquing food, and I've critiqued tons of dishes, is to
• 11:13
  remove your ego from it and taste it.
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  Ultimately, does it taste good? That's all that matters.
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  Is it pretty? Yeah, who cares?
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  Does it taste good? You could make it pretty.
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  You can make it pretty. After it tastes good versus
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  before it tastes good. One of the things that I do is I
• 11:27
  taste something and I think of it like the volume dial when
• 11:31
  you're listening to music. If if it's too loud, you can't
• 11:34
  appreciate the music and if it's too low, you can't hear it,
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  Well, you're looking for that sweet spot.
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  So the music just sounds good to you.
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  And that's what I think about when I'm tasting the salt and
• 11:45
  the acidity and the sweetness and the balance and the heat.
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  And I'll communicate with chefs is like, OK, turn the salt up a
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  little bit, turn the acid down a little bit or turn the acid up a
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  little bit, turn the heat up by two, etcetera.
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  Because what I'm looking for when I taste something is
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  balance. You want a well balanced dish.
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  Is there enough texture? And so on.
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  Then you want to make sure it's visually appealing.
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  You want to make sure that the cooks can execute it and
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  everyone could pull it off during a busy service.
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  If you have limited space on the stove for pots and pans, you
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  don't want a dish that has five saute pans.
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  You maybe only want one. If you don't have a lot of time
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  to plate the dish, then you don't want a lot of touch
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  points. Again, these are all the things
• 12:29
  that you need to think about. Once the menu is written and
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  you've tested the dishes, you want to get all the final
• 12:33
  approvals by all the stakeholders.
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  That might be restaurant owners, GMs, whoever you need to get it
• 12:39
  approved by, get it approved by them.
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  Make sure they're all on the same page.
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  You may have to do a tasting for them, but you want to make sure
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  you have everyone's blessing and we all agree that this is the
• 12:48
  menu that we're going with. Moving forward.
• 12:50
  Then you're going to decide on the start date, the launch date.
• 12:54
  I always recommend launching your menu early in the week when
• 12:57
  it's slow, so you have a few days to build up some reps
• 13:00
  versus launching it on like prime Friday or Saturday
• 13:03
  service, which I've done before because sometimes I've had to
• 13:05
  and it's not fun. The best case scenario is you're
• 13:08
  closed for a few days and you open.
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  So let's just say you're the type of restaurant that closes
• 13:11
  on Sunday. New menu starts on Monday.
• 13:14
  That would be ideal. It gives everyone the
• 13:16
  opportunity to get comfortable with it.
• 13:18
  You want to make sure that your cooks have all the tools that
• 13:21
  they need to execute the menu. That means the costing is done,
• 13:24
  the recipes are done, there's Photographs, menu, Syllabus.
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  The service team has the markings, the pairings.
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  You've done training. They've tasted it, they know how
• 13:33
  to sell it. There's a story behind each dish
• 13:36
  that they could speak to intelligently.
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  You've quiz them, you've given them menu quizzes.
• 13:41
  So not only is the culinary team trained on how to execute it,
• 13:44
  but the service team is also trained on how to sell it and
• 13:48
  serve it. Are there finishing table
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  touches? Do you have to fillet the Dover
• 13:53
  sole at the table? Well, they probably need to know
• 13:55
  how to do that. Are you serving a souffle?
• 13:56
  Well, then they probably know how to pour the on glaze or the
• 13:59
  ice cream with it. Are they doing some salt Bay
• 14:02
  action and carving the steak and sprinkling a little salt?
• 14:06
  I don't know. But whatever it is that they
• 14:07
  have to do, they need to make sure that they know how to do
• 14:09
  it, and you've given them the tools to do it.
• 14:11
  Do you have all the equipment? Is it ordered?
• 14:13
  For example, you have a new presentation that requires a
• 14:17
  specific plate. Are the plates here?
• 14:19
  Well, this is something that you have to think about.
• 14:22
  Once you have the start date, you need to make sure that you
• 14:24
  have all your menus printed. Someone's vetted them.
• 14:27
  You've read them, you've checked the spelling, you've checked the
• 14:29
  pricing. You make sure everything is
• 14:31
  correct. Again, I would copy and paste a
• 14:34
  menu and have Open AI read it just to make sure there's no
• 14:38
  spelling or grammar errors and to pick it apart.
• 14:40
  Make sure all your digital collateral is updated.
• 14:44
  Make sure you have photos ready to go to social media when it's
• 14:47
  time to start promoting it or doing a little teaser as you're
• 14:51
  getting close to menu launch. Are all your menus updated in
• 14:54
  the point of sale system? The pricing is correct.
• 14:57
  You'd be surprised how many restaurants change their menu
• 14:59
  and forget to change the pricing and the POS.
• 15:02
  And it goes months before anyone catches that.
• 15:04
  You've been giving away your steak for $5 less than you
• 15:08
  should have because you forgot to change it when you change the
• 15:10
  menu. Have you updated all your online
• 15:12
  systems, OpenTable or wherever else you're taking reservations,
• 15:16
  Talk or Rezi? Whatever?
• 15:18
  Have you trained all your partners?
• 15:20
  Do you partner with hotel concierge?
• 15:22
  Do you need to get them in to come try your menu so that they
• 15:25
  could sell it to the hotel guests that are asking for
• 15:27
  places to eat locally? You have an influencer campaign
• 15:30
  for a sneak peek or any media that you need to bring in.
• 15:34
  Maybe you need to invite me from Chef's PSA to come try your new
• 15:38
  snack menu. I like snacks.
• 15:41
  Did you update your private PDR menus to make sure that you're
• 15:44
  not serving the old menu? Have you called your clients to
• 15:48
  make sure they know you have a new menu and it's been updated?
• 15:51
  All that needs to be in place and you should have a point of
• 15:54
  contact who's responsible for it.
• 15:56
  What I do is I do create a critical path and I assign all
• 15:59
  these things to someone. So we know that the marketing
• 16:01
  team is doing this, our PR firm is doing that, our chefs are
• 16:04
  doing this, the restaurant GM is doing that.
• 16:06
  Everyone has a role to play in rolling out a new menu.
• 16:09
  Now granted, that is if you're using a critical path, like I
• 16:13
  said, some people just change it.
• 16:15
  It's not working today, change it tomorrow.
• 16:16
  And a lot of restaurants live and die daily by sale.
• 16:18
  So you might not have time to wait to change a menu based on
• 16:24
  a, you know, three-week critical path, because if you don't make
• 16:26
  a decision today, you might not have a restaurant tomorrow.
• 16:30
  It's not a one-size-fits-all. Make sure you use your chef
• 16:32
  intelligence on what is the right thing for you to do.
• 16:35
  One last thing I should I should mention again, not all
• 16:38
  restaurants are the same, but if you have a formula that's
• 16:40
  working for you. For example, you have a duck
• 16:42
  dish, you have a chicken dish, you have a beef dish and it
• 16:45
  works in your restaurant, but you are seasonal.
• 16:48
  You don't necessarily have to blow it up.
• 16:51
  You might just change the sets on those dishes.
• 16:53
  So for example, in the winter, you're doing your chicken with
• 16:59
  winter vegetables, maybe some brassicus or whatever, and it
• 17:02
  comes to spring. You just might be updating that
• 17:05
  with morels and peas and asparagus.
• 17:07
  But it's the same method in which you prepare the chicken,
• 17:10
  so you're just updating the set, but the chicken remains the
• 17:13
  same. So if someone comes in because
• 17:14
  they love the chicken and that was the star of the show, they
• 17:18
  could still find a very similar dish to when they came in last
• 17:21
  time. So you're just updating of the
• 17:23
  plating set seasonally. That's also good practice.
• 17:26
  Again, that might not apply to your restaurant, but it does
• 17:28
  apply to some. And you could plan this out for
• 17:30
  the entire year. I know that's something that I
• 17:32
  do, is I could write the entire menu for the entire year and
• 17:36
  then eight weeks out, I will review it and make sure that I
• 17:40
  still want to stick with those ideas.
• 17:41
  So for example, I might just have a full menu writing day and
• 17:45
  write my 4 seasonal menus because I know what's going to
• 17:48
  be in season. I might write my Valentine's,
• 17:50
  Christmas, New Year's, Thanksgiving menus for the
• 17:53
  entire year and just say, OK, 6 to 8 weeks out.
• 17:56
  We're going to review them and see if I want to change anything
• 17:59
  based on what I've learned. If not, we're going to stick
• 18:02
  with it. That way you're not dealing with
• 18:03
  the oh shit, I got to write a menu.
• 18:05
  It's already done. Anyway, that's it.
• 18:08
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• 18:10
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• 18:13
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• 18:17
  Comment below. Let me know what you think.
• 18:19
  Make sure you go to chefspsa.com.
• 18:22
  You get this Happy cook hat, this chef's PSA hoodie.
• 18:25
  You get all the books. If you're a new leader and you
• 18:28
  want to learn more about menu changes, I cover it in my
• 18:31
  Culinary Leadership Fundamentals book.
• 18:33
  Go get that one. See you all next week.
• 18:35
  Hit the porno music.