Everyone wants to know what the future holds, and the good folks at Nation’s Restaurant News have given us a peek at the future of restaurant trends. It is interesting to see what’s brewing on the front lines of the restaurant industry, although I bet a lot of those “hot trends” will burn out before they get anywhere — and even more won’t make their way here to Richmond at all.
Maybe Richmond will get one of these?
The one that they are most confident in is — pies. Not only sweet pies, but savory ones, too. From what the article says, the pie shop is the new cupcake shop. I guess it makes for a good headline (and no denying that pies are tasty!), but there are other predictions they make that I’ve already seen happening locally:
• The new mom and pop. Self-financed restaurants built on limited budgets are growing in number. “This is an economic decision,” he said. “There are a lot of people out there who still want to open up restaurants, and it’s a good opportunity to look at real estate in a down economy.” The restaurants are typically small and the owners are extremely involved. Some examples are eVe in Berkeley, Calif., and Sons & Daughters in San Francisco.
• One-ingredient restaurants. “Restaurateurs are taking one ingredient and building full restaurants around them,” Freeman said. Following on the several-year trend of gourmet burgers, the trend is extending to grilled cheese sandwiches, hot dogs and sliders. “We’re predicting perhaps a peanut butter restaurant next or a big biscuit restaurant,” he said.
Looks like City Dogs has been onto something — they’ve certainly done well, with two very busy locations now (Shockoe Slip & the Fan. I wonder what other concepts we’ll see that will play with this one-ingredient format.
What do you think the biggest trends for restaurants in Richmond will be for 2011? What are you hoping will be the new trends?
