The best thing since sliced bread? Even more bread, it seems. Despite such challenges as the low-carb craze and fluctuating commodity costs, the American staple remains a favorite in all dayparts and restaurant segments.In fact, restaurants...

Advertising characters and icons are so prevalent in American culture that they sometimes transcend the companies they were created to represent. For instance, last fall ABC debuted “Cavemen,” a sitcom based on the Neanderthal-like ad characters...

It goes without saying that consistently delicious food is imperative to the success of a restaurant. But sometimes even a perfectly cooked steak or impeccable service is not enough to guarantee that a dining experience will stand out in customers...

Afew decades ago, flying was a whole lot simpler. There was less congestion, for one thing. Fewer people flew because plane travel was too expensive to do on a regular basis. Security issues were not as strict and complicated as they became after...

It was in 1955, midway through the Eisenhower Years, when the notion took hold of Skippy Sack. By that time he’d spent several years at a Howard Johnson family restaurant, busing dishes, scraping gum off the undersides of tables, catching his...

Awhite-bearded man sporting a snow-white suit and a black string tie sells pressure cookers and a secret spice blend from the trunk of his car. He calls himself “the Colonel,” says he’s from Corbin, Ky., and tells restaurateurs he can teach them...

Scurrying behind storage containers and around walk-in freezers, the cockroach is a loathsome sight in any kitchen. Restaurant owners have been battling them for decades, and yet the bugs persist as their ancestors have for millions of years...

Columbia Restaurant, founded by the Gonz-mart family in Tampa, Fla., in 1905, has survived challenging times that included two world wars, Prohibition and the Great Depression. But today, the ability to thrive as an independent restaurant in an...

Of all the school memories that alumni later recount with a nostalgic fondness, their dining experiences in the cafeteria traditionally haven’t ranked high among them. Anecdotes of mystery-meat casseroles, ossified sandwiches, mushy vegetables and...