Plant-forward menus are a top trend, but creating veggiecentric dishes in a fast casual can pose operational challenges, as Jose Andres’ ThinkFoodGroup discovered when it launched Beefsteak last year in Washington. “We had four minutes to prepare and plate a meal,” says Kimberly Grant, CEO of TFG. “But some vegetables took 10 minutes to cook.”
Refining the process sped throughput. A change from steamers to custom baskets for blanching was step one. Precise cutting was the second, allowing veggies to cook together perfectly in 90 seconds.
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