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Menu Tracker: New items from IHOP, Jack in the Box and PaneraMenu Tracker: New items from IHOP, Jack in the Box and Panera

Plus innovation from Applebee’s Neighborhood Grill & Bar, Carrabba’s Italian Grill, Cicis, Einstein Bros Bagels, Fatburger, Freddy’s Frozen Custard & Steakburgers, Grimaldi’s Pizzeria, Krispy Kreme, Little Caesars, Mendocino Farms, Panda Express, Tacodeli, Taco John’s, Velvet Taco, Wing Boss and Ziggi’s Coffee

Bret Thorn, Senior Food Editor

September 16, 2021

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There are a bunch of new cheese-oriented items this week, including Panera’s new Grilled Mac & Cheese Sandwich, new queso sauce from Einstein Bros Bagels and Taco John’s, pizza options from Cicis and Grimaldi’s Pizzeria, a seasonal taco with local goat milk cheese from Tacodeli and four-cheese-stuffed mushrooms from Carrabba’s Italian Grill.

Applebee’s Neighborhood Grill & Bar is the latest chain to team up with PepsiCo to introduce a proprietary MTN Dew Drink and Freddy’s Frozen Custard & Steakburgers is the latest chain to add a whole slice of pumpkin pie to milkshake.

Jack in the Box is expanding its fried chicken sandwich line with two items dressed in barbecue sauce and Wing Boss, a virtual concept by Dickey’s Barbecue Pit, is offering Buffalo chicken items. Fatburger, meanwhile is going the non-chicken route with Impossible Foods’ new nuggets made with plant-based chicken analog.

Panda Express is sort of going into the chicken sandwich game, but not really: It’s offering a sandwich version of its signature Orange Chicken, but only at its Innovation Kitchen in Pasadena, Calif.

Mendocino Farms has legitimately entered an entirely new menu segment with the introduction of grain bowls, while Krispy Kreme has stuck to its seasonal doughnut path with a line of maple items.

Little Caesars has new brownies, Ziggi’s Coffee has pumpkin treats and Velvet Taco’s Weekly Taco Feature has fried chicken thighs.

Contact Bret Thorn at [email protected] 

Follow him on Twitter: @foodwriterdiar

About the Author

Bret Thorn

Senior Food Editor, Nation's Restaurant News

Senior Food & Beverage Editor

Bret Thorn is senior food & beverage editor for Nation’s Restaurant News and Restaurant Hospitality for Informa’s Restaurants and Food Group, with responsibility for spotting and reporting on food and beverage trends across the country for both publications as well as guiding overall F&B coverage. 

He is the host of a podcast, In the Kitchen with Bret Thorn, which features interviews with chefs, food & beverage authorities and other experts in foodservice operations.

From 2005 to 2008 he also wrote the Kitchen Dish column for The New York Sun, covering restaurant openings and chefs’ career moves in New York City.

He joined Nation’s Restaurant News in 1999 after spending about five years in Thailand, where he wrote articles about business, banking and finance as well as restaurant reviews and food columns for Manager magazine and Asia Times newspaper. He joined Restaurant Hospitality’s staff in 2016 while retaining his position at NRN. 

A magna cum laude graduate of Tufts University in Medford, Mass., with a bachelor’s degree in history, and a member of Phi Beta Kappa, Thorn also studied traditional French cooking at Le Cordon Bleu Ecole de Cuisine in Paris. He spent his junior year of college in China, studying Chinese language, history and culture for a semester each at Nanjing University and Beijing University. While in Beijing, he also worked for ABC News during the protests and ultimate crackdown in and around Tiananmen Square in 1989.

Thorn’s monthly column in Nation’s Restaurant News won the 2006 Jesse H. Neal National Business Journalism Award for best staff-written editorial or opinion column.

He served as president of the International Foodservice Editorial Council, or IFEC, in 2005.

Thorn wrote the entry on comfort food in the Oxford Encyclopedia of Food and Drink in America, 2nd edition, published in 2012. He also wrote a history of plated desserts for the Oxford Companion to Sugar and Sweets, published in 2015.

He was inducted into the Disciples d’Escoffier in 2014.

A Colorado native originally from Denver, Thorn lives in Brooklyn, N.Y.

Bret Thorn’s areas of expertise include food and beverage trends in restaurants, French cuisine, the cuisines of Asia in general and Thailand in particular, restaurant operations and service trends. 

Bret Thorn’s Experience: 

Nation’s Restaurant News, food & beverage editor, 1999-Present
New York Sun, columnist, 2005-2008 
Asia Times, sub editor, 1995-1997
Manager magazine, senior editor and restaurant critic, 1992-1997
ABC News, runner, May-July, 1989

Education:
Tufts University, BA in history, 1990
Peking University, studied Chinese language, spring, 1989
Nanjing University, studied Chinese language and culture, fall, 1988 
Le Cordon Bleu Ecole de Cuisine, Cértificat Elémentaire, 1986

Email: [email protected]

Social Media:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/bret-thorn-468b663/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/bret.thorn.52
Twitter: @foodwriterdiary
Instagram: @foodwriterdiary

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