California Pizza Kitchen: Portobello Pizza

Nation's Restaurant News, May 18, 1998 by Gary Beauregard

The annual program kicks off this year with applause for the following winners: Wendy's for its product rollout of Fresh Stuffed Pita; Cracker Barrel Old Country Store's limited-time offering of Campfire Chicken and Beef; California Pizza Kitchen for its line extension with Portobello Pizza; Legal Sea Foods for its children's menu; Marriott Domestic Hotels' promotion of Alaskan Salmon; and consultant Warren Leruth for his longtime dedication to research and development.

On Saturday, May 16, the honorees were presented with their awards at the annual MenuMasters Awards ceremony, which was held at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago during the industry's National Restaurant Association show.

Ventura Foods, LLC, is the sponsor of MenuMasters.

Cracker Barrel Old Country Store: Campfire Chicken and Campfire Beef

Imagine being in that Mount Juliet, Tenn., Cracker Barrel restaurant last year when the first customers peeled away the tinfoil on their Campfire Chickens.

Released after slow cooking in tightly wrapped foil, the aroma from mouth-watering natural juices of chicken, corn, tomatoes and potatoes began filling the dining area. A chain reaction set in, and orders soon poured into the kitchen.

"The store manager called, saying, "There's tinfoil all over the room, and everyone's eating Campfire Chicken,'" says Mark Tanzer, vice president of product development for the 337-unit Cracker Barrel Old Country Store.

Cracker Barrel's Campfire Chicken and the subsequent campfire Beef were among the most successful promotions ever generated by the Lebanon, Tenn.-based casual-dining chain -- earning the company the 1998 Nation's Restaurant News Menu-Masters Award for Best Limited Time Offer Promotion.

Heading the development team behind Campfire Chicken and Campfire Beef were 18-year Cracker Barrel research-and-development veterans Tanzer and Steve Lutz, project manager for product development.

The promotion sprang from a brainstorming session among Tanzer's four-person research-and-development team. We were looking for something that would be new and exciting for our guests, something out of the box," Tanzer says.

During the give-and-take, Tanzer recalled his days as a Boy Scout. "We would bunch ground beef, onions, peppers and carrots into tin foil and toss it on the fire," he said. 'That's pretty much what this concept is."

It took 18 months of experimentation and testing to capture those campfire smells in just the right way.

The first step was a conceptual day when Tanzer's group examined eight to 10 combinations of fish, chicken and beef with different vegetables and seasonings. They settled on chicken, which was an excellent fit with Cracker Barrel's menu of soothing, comfortable foods.

"Steve took it from there with seasoning and moisture profiles and experimenting with all types of foil," Tanzer says. Testing was constant for several months with continual feedback from the R&D staff, Cracker Barrel top management and various restaurant locations.

"We made adjustments almost daily for a month," Lutz says.