Richard Hofmeier saw the sign a little over a year ago when he first visited the restaurant, then located in the Orian brothers’ home in Eugene’s funky Whiteaker neighborhood. Hofmeier wondered if the Orians would be interested in anything he had or could make.

Hofmeier, 28, was constantly bringing projects back to his Eugene gallery, Ink Thirsty, and the cast of characters who worked or hung out there. They’d done video games before – if there’s a hulking lump under a drop cloth at Hofmeier’s place, that’s probably an arcade cabinet. This time he had a wild idea for the guys.

‘Let’s make a video game and see if we can get free waffles for life.’

Did they succeed? Find out at Kotaku. Link -via Metafilter

And after you read the story, you’ll want this recipe. Link

Photo: Michael Christopher Brown/Newsweek

Ah, the irony. Guess who's profitting from doing something that would've gotten them "re-educated" in a farm back in the days of the Cultural Revolution?

Here's how some clever bourgeious restaurateurs are capitalizing on the boom of nostalgia in China:

To many, the idea of a Cultural Revolution–themed dining establishment is paradoxical, since tasty cuisine was certainly not that era’s strong suit. The first “Red restaurants” sprouted in Beijing in the ’90s, offering little more than a few socialist-realist posters and food that was minimalist in the literal sense of the word. One served dandelion-leaf salad and raw cucumbers to symbolize the grass and bark that some poor Chinese ate during the hardscrabble ’60s and ’70s. Now Red-restaurant cuisine is more in line with middle-class tastes. In Mao’s hometown, “the Chairman’s Favorite”—roast fatty pork—is a must, while Red Scene offers a pricey shrimp dish for $27 alongside less-expensive cornmeal cakes and country-style bean curd.

Melinda Liu of The Daily Beast reports: Link

Mr. Schrom has the eyeglasses of an architect and the relaxed, contented air of a man highly entertained by his job. On this day, he is filming for a national chain — one that also requested anonymity — capturing what he calls “flavor cues.” In one shot, a stagehand pours chocolate syrup over a sheet of caramel. (You can almost hear a voiceover purring, “Chocolate.”) In another, cream bubbles up in a cup of coffee. In real time, these moments barely register. In slow-motion playbacks, with a digital camera that shoots up to 1,600 frames a second, the images are almost erotic. Which is no accident.

“You’re using the same part of your brain — porn, food,” Mr. Schrom says during a break. “It’s going in the same section; it’s that visual cortex that connects to your most basic senses. What we’re trying to do is be the modern-day Pavlovs and ring your bell with these images.”

He has several food stylists who work in a huge kitchen next to his set. They start with the very same food and recipes used in the restaurants and stores.

In part, this is a truth-in-advertising issue. Everyone knows that in 1970, the Federal Trade Commission settled a complaint against the Campbell Soup Company after its ad agency slipped marbles into a bowl in ads featuring its vegetable soup, apparently to force more veggies to the surface. That put a scare into the industry that endures to this day.

Anything that flatters the food, of course, is fair game, and that includes gimmicks you’re unlikely to find in a fridge. Glue is used to keep spaghetti on forks and pizzas in place. The ice in a beverage might be made of acrylic and cost $500 a cube. The frost coming off a beer could be a silicone gel, mixed with powder and water.

The New York Times look at some of those techniques, and the people who make a living using them. Link -via Metafilter

Poor Groupon. First, it had to restate its earnings from a "gross profit" of $270 million to an actual loss of $413 million, then the wheels of its IPO wagon started falling off. Now this bad news: a study by computer scientists at Cornell found that partnering with Groupon actually hurt a restaurant's reputation.

These guys have studied over 16,000 Groupon deals in 20 US cities between January and July this year. They monitored each deal every ten minutes or so to determine how sales varied over time and also counted the number of Facebook likes that each deal generated.

At the same time, they collected Yelp reviews--some 56,000 of them for 2,332 merchants who ran 2,496 deals--examining how merchant reputations changed before and after a Groupon deal. [...]

But their most controversial finding is that a Groupon deal seems to have an adverse impact on reputation as measured by Yelp ratings. Their analysis shows that while the number of reviews increases signifificantly due to daily deals, average rating scores from reviewers who mention daily deals are about 10% lower than scores of their peers.

So these Grouponers (or are they Grouponies?) are unhappy with the service even with 50% off coupon? Sounds like a case for this Tumblr blog!

Link - via bon appétit

For today’s Lunchtime Quiz, the folks at mental_floss took a dozen restaurant names from a list of the top 100 US chains. The question is: does the name have an apostrophe or not? It’s harder than you think! I only got half of them right -apparently I haven’t paid enough attention. And I don’t eat out. Link

The Oinkster Restaurant in Eagle Rock, California recently implemented an interesting marketing ploy. Instead of traditional paper coupons, they commissioned 2nd Wind to cut wooden burger nickles out of red oak using their laser cutters. They wil get you half off a regular priced burger and can be used again and again in what’s probably the greenest coupon ever.

Link

You see, McDonald’s lawyers are arguing that the fast food chain should be classified as supermarkets rather than restaurants to avoid a huge tax bill:

In a legal battle that is likely to see dozens of other fast food chains in the world’s largest country following suit, McDonald’s successfully argued that it should be classified as a food retailer for tax purposes rather than as a restaurant since many of its products are pre-packaged and sold to customers in the style of a supermarket rather than a restaurant.

It is a decision that will allow McDonald’s in Russia to continue paying ten per cent tax on its profits rather than the eighteen per cent tax levied on restaurants.

Link

The last time I had an actual meal on an airplane, it was almost certainly a frozen Banquet turkey and dressing dinner in a different package. That doesn’t mean the novelty of eating inside an airplane has worn off, though. I’m currently planning a trip to Zurich just to eat an “in-flight” meal at Runway 34, a restaurant inside an a 1950s-era Soviet Ilyushin IL-14 airliner! See more pictures at Dvice.

Link – via Born Rich | Image: Runway 34

“My recipes are all based on the scientific study of plant physiology, applied to the fine art of cuisine,” Keats told Wired.com. “I’m publishing the recipe book so gardeners everywhere can prepare gourmet sunlight for their plants at home. For people who are lazier, or keep only a few plants indoors, I packaged my signature recipes for easy consumption by videotaping select wavelengths of natural sunlight and editing them into a quick and convenient TV dinner.

“I tried it out on my plants at home, and as far as I can tell, they responded well to my delectable mixtures of orange, violet and yellow, although I can’t be certain,” he added. “Cuisine is a form of communication, and mine won’t be complete until plants evolve a mechanism for food criticism.”

It’s what they call concept art. The Photosynthetic Restaurant will be open April 16-July 17 at the Crocker Art Museum. Read all about it at Underwire. Link

(Image credit: Crocker Art Museum)

If you have a big appetite and a big stomach, you might use this list of food challenges as a vacation guide. But beware: these offers have rules, like you have to eat everything on your plate in a certain time period to get the meal free. Eateries may have additional rules. LW Pizza in Long Beach, California, dares you to eat the 28-inch pizza shown in less than an hour with no bathroom breaks! If you do, the pizza is free plus you win cash and future pizzas. Link -via The Daily What

Michael Powell and Juergen Horn are continuing their living experiment in moving to a new city every three months, and writing about them on their blog 91 Days. Currently in Savannah, Georgia, USA, they visited The Old School Diner and got a lesson in Southern hospitality.

The evening really got going when Chef Jerome came out of the kitchen to greet us. He does all the cooking, and clearly enjoys meeting the people who’ve discovered his little place. The first thing he did was give us all big bear hugs. “You’re family here”. And he meant it! He took us on a tour around the restaurant, telling us about his life and work. We saw pictures of famous people who’ve eaten there, including Ben Affleck and Michael Oher (from the Blind Side). He showed us love letters he’s written to his wife over the years (complete with drawings) and into his kitchen and its wall-to-wall deep fryers. The staff clearly love him, and were just as friendly and welcoming as their boss.

I think we spent about an hour talking to Chef Jerome, and he even walked us out onto the carpeted driveway to say goodbye. “Don’t forget now! This is your home, and you are family when you’re here!” And as I gave him a final farewell hug, I didn’t doubt it. It was an incredible night, and the Old School Diner is truly a special place.

There are more photographs of the restaurant’s eccentric decor at 91 Days. Link

Located in Jiang, China’s Shandong Province, the Dalu Rebot Restaurant opened on the 5th of December and can cater to about 100 customers, featuring two robot receptionists and a “staff” of six robot-waitresses. Two of them serve drinks, two serve small tables and another two tend to the big one. It seems that more “hiring” well be made in the near future as owners expect the restaurant will become quite a hit.

As all the waiting is done by robots, the tables were set in a circular pattern so that the robots can follow an exact route. Not all the work in the restaurant is done by them though, there are also people working there, especially in the kitchen, but some were also hired to welcome customers into the restaurant.

See more pictures at Oddity Central. Link

He said it happens about every five minutes.

“We do a lot of repairs on the fly and overnight. We try to keep people off as much as we can, but it’s part of the fun. I mean, it is a totally edible structure.”

Once the house is finished in early December, it will accept reservations for one table of six. Families will be able to order off the same menus offered in other restaurants inside the lodge, including breakfast, lunch and dinner buffets. And of course, there’s a dessert menu — separate from what’s seen on the surrounding walls.

The gingerbread house will remain up until January. Link

”They are picky eaters. I do not want to make food for these people,” said Ichikawa, 42, who turns away customers not in tune with her homespun philosophy of eating, which partly derives from her horror about a world where people die from hunger.

Six weeks ago, at Wafu, her 30-seat restaurant in Surry Hills, she began offering a 30 per cent discount to patrons who ate all the food they had ordered.

She and her staff tell diners that if they do not leave clean plates, they will not be welcome back. ”Finishing your meal requires that everything is eaten except lemon slices, gari (sushi ginger) and wasabi,” says the menu, which is tagged ”guilty-free Japanese food”.

”Please also note that vegetables and salad on the side are NOT decorations; they are part of the meal too,” it says.

No sushi for you! Link (Photo: Marco Del Grande)

Travel writer Ed Perkins of Chicago Tribune wasn’t amused:

The rationale for this one is to cover the employers’ mandatory contribution to the City’s "Healthy San Francisco" health-coverage system. The charge actually is levied on employers, but at least some restaurants are adding a few dollars or percentage points to each customer’s bill to cover this charge.

The restaurants’ excuse for assessing this charge separately is to let customers know how much they’re paying for employees’ health coverage. That’s the same excuse hotels use when they add "resort" or "housekeeping" fees to unsuspecting guests’ room bills. It’s the same excuse airlines would use to exclude fuel surcharges from their advertised fares if the Department of Transportation would allow them. And it’s sheer nonsense. Employees’ health insurance is no less of a cost of doing business than rent, property taxes, food costs, security services and all the other inputs businesses require to operate. To single out health care for a separate surcharge is unwarranted.

Link

"The ninja is mysterious," said Ou Chia-wei, owner of the restaurant simply named Ninja, explaining why he chose that theme for the Japanese-style restaurant. "On that premise, we can do magic tricks and light up the food."

Waitresses working the barely lit dining room floor burn specialty menus, which vanish without a trace of ash, and send flames snaking across tables as customers watch.

Link

The French Laundry Restaurant in Yountville, California may have food to die for, but can you pay for it? Chef and proprietor Thomas Keller was named Best American Chef by TIME magazine in 2001. The restaurant gets consistently top ratings. Still, when you see the prices of the meals, you might want to start saving up now if you ever want to eat there! The bill shown here is not the only one you’ll see in this post, and you’ll also get a “taste” of the portion sizes as the food is presented.

Link

From the Upcoming ueue, submitted by rappin.

They had to find their own napkins and cutlery while their waitress caught a smoke, had to ask the bar for soda refills, and had to wait over an hour for salad and wings, they told NBC10.

The pub, which was very busy that night, took the $73, but then called the cops, who treated the matter as a theft.

The menu clearly states, “18 percent gratuity added to check of parties of 6 of more,” and a similar message is printed on receipts, a pub employee said this morning.

The students will be in court over the matter next month. What do you think? A mandatory tip for groups of six or more is common in the US restaurant industry in order to keep waiters from being stiffed when they can’t serve enough other tables to make up for it. However in this case, the policy seems to be a license to give poor service. Link -via reddit

(image credit: Flickr user me and the sysop)

(image credit: Flickr user lindaaslund)

Recession? What recession? Russian billionaire Roman Abramovich dropped $47,000 on food last Friday at Nello’s in New York City. Note that a lucky waiter/waitress got a $7000 tip: Link

10. Using Cabbage in Place of Seaweed

Says a former maître d’ at an expensive Chinese restaurant known for its celebrity clientele: "The owner figured his customers knew nothing about Chinese food (he was right) and was a genius at saving money. A specialty supplier used to provide edible seaweed for the popular seaweed appetizer, but when that got too expensive the boss began experimenting.

"The ‘seaweed’ on the menu ended up becoming thin strips of cabbage leaf, deep-fried, and then rolled in equal amounts of salt and sugar. It’s possible even cardboard would taste good if prepared like that, but the dish remained a bestseller."

7. Topping Pitchers of Beer with Seltzer Water

Don’t think the fiddling is restricted to top-shelf liquors, either. "In sports bars that sell pitchers of beers, the thing to do is to top the pitchers off with seltzer after the table has ordered like the third one," a source says. "The drunker the guys, the more seltzer they get." [...]

4. Serving Rotten Meat

A steakhouse employee in New York says that sometimes not all the meat is as fresh as it should be. "It’s an old trick to keep the steak that’s past its prime and wait until somebody orders it well done or medium-well," the insider says. "The more you cook the meat, the more you disguise its flavor. When I’m eating out I never order anything higher than medium rare, because I know how the kitchen gets rid of bad meat."

Link

Care to share your own food service experience?

I was sitting at a window seat next to the open door, and my food had just been brought out. I looked down to see this guy (or gal – I don’t know hawks) just standing in the doorway, looking back and forth. After surveying the place for a few seconds, it flapped its way in and up onto one of the empty tables. [...]

The hawk just sat there for a little while, getting jerk BBQ sauce all over its talons and looking all emo, until it was spooked by the restaurant’s delivery guy walking in, whereupon it shot past all of us into the kitchen.
The counter guy, the delivery guy and I heard a few pots clanging as we debated calling animal control versus just trying to shoo it back out the door, when one of the cooks who was back there caught the hawk with his bare hands, and walked it back outside.

“What restaurant was this?”

I am so glad that you asked.

The place is called, I kid you not… “BIRDIE’S”.

Link

Inamo, a Japanese-style restaurant located in the U.K., has a fascinating concept in self-service.

Located above each dining table is a projector and computer; diners in turn can use the touch screen to order food, change the table pattern, and play games. One can even watch their food being prepared via the kitchen cam!

Watch a video of how this fascinating system works.

Link

From the Upcoming ueue, submitted by Geekazoid.