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Bruegger's offers new sandwich, reprises value menu

Bret Thorn, Senior Food Editor

September 23, 2011

1 Min Read
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Bret Thorn

Bruegger’s has added a turkey sandwich to its ciabatta panini line for the fall and is bringing back its value menu.

The Harvest Turkey Ciabatta Panini is made with roasted turkey, Cheddar cheese, sliced green apples, pickled red onions and cranberry mayonnaise. It is paired with butternut squash soup for $6.99 until January 2012.

Burlington, Vt.-based Bruegger’s also is bringing back its “4 under $4” menu, which includes Western Egg; Egg and Cheddar; Egg, Cheddar and Bacon; and Egg White and Sundried Tomato sandwiches, each for less than $4. The sandwiches, whose prices may vary among locations, are available all day.

In addition, Bruegger’s is promoting its latest “Baker’s Choice” pairing. Selected by the chain’s executive chef, Philip Smith, the special is a baked apple bagel with honey walnut cream cheese and pumpkin spice coffee, available through Nov. 22. It replaces the honey grain bagel with plain yogurt cream cheese spread and Perfect Peach iced coffee that was offered during the summer.

Bruegger’s began testing its ciabatta panini line this summer as a limited-time offer. It also recently gave them away during a social media-based test in the Minneapolis-St. Paul area.

Bruegger’s has 298 units.

Contact Bret Thorn at bret.thorn@penton.com.
Follow him on Twitter: @foodwriterdiary

About the Author

Bret Thorn

Senior Food Editor, Nation's Restaurant News

Senior Food & Beverage Editor

Bret Thorn is senior food & beverage editor of Nation’s Restaurant News and Restaurant Hospitality.

Hi is responsible for spotting and reporting on F&B trends across the country for both publications. 

He is the co-host of a podcast, Menu Talk with Pat and Bret, 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: bret.thorn@informa.com

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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