Christmas inspiration 2021 | Examples of other restaurants, fast food chains and hotels
23-11-2021
We have been sharing inspiration on our website since 2007, inspiration that we find in the hospitality industry or by online spotting of what our colleague hospitality entrepreneurs all over the world are doing. If you search our website for ‘Christmas’, you will get pages full with examples like glitter gravy, the Christmas afternoon in Hengelo to storytelling by the Rocco Forte hotel chain under the name of #RFWinterTale.
Our last real Christmas publication was ‘Christmas Gestures’ back in 2013, containing examples of ‘golden cutlery’ or ‘golden Japanese sticks’, ‘golden fortune cookies’ but also pizza slices and pizza boxes in the Christmas tree. For our 2021 publication we went to find inspiration for decorating a Christmas tree for in restaurants, fast food chains, bars or hotels at FAAS Est in Leiden. A great shop that sells all kinds of food ornaments. Check out their photos on the front page of this years publication. In ‘Christmas inspiration 2021’ we particularly mention inspiration to celebrate Christmas outdoor, a safe way to have fun with your guests this Holiday Season.
Reading time: Scrolling 4 minutes
Trends we spotted | Week 46
22-11-2021
At horecatrends.com we spot many national and international trends on a daily basis. We pick the most interesting ones to write about, the other trends we use in our weekly column ‘Trends we spotted this week’.
With this week links to articles about the Icelandverse, a great example of an ad for tourism and Redefine Meat. This Israeli start-up expands operations into Europe, they are going to 3D-print beef substitute in the Netherlands.
This Holiday Season you can play curling at the garden of the Langham hotel in London and the Alexandra pub in Wimbledon is hosting ‘don’t be on your own day’ as a lovely gesture to combat loneliness on Christmas Day.
In Hamburg you can enjoy raclette, glühwein and other Swiss winter season food in old ski gondolas at the 25Hours Hotel. And an initiative to tackle the shortage of hospitality staff from Amsterdam: The ‘Leidseplein’ class.
Korean Childhood snacks are an overnight hit because of Squid Game especially among Korean-American restaurant owners! And also in New York: the Antony Bourdain hawker centre is set to open in the beginning of 2022.
Arby’s in the US sells meat with curly and crinkle fries and now they announced the upcoming launch of its limited edition Curly Fry and Crinkle Fry Vodka. And check out the sky at Bercy Village in Paris, we love what they did!
The We’re Smart Future Awards 2021
22-11-2021
Celebrating their culinary contributions for nutritious, planet-friendly – and delicious – innovations, the winners of the We’re Smart Future Awards 2021 have been revealed at the Horeca Expo in Ghent on Sunday, November 21, 2021.
Winners of the Future Awards 2021 are Rob Baan, The Green Bean, VOL5, HomeForest, Plant-T, Eleven Madison Park, Gambero Rosso and Michelin Green Star.
Reading time: 2 minutes
New store concept in New York by Starbucks Pickup and Amazon Go
22-11-2021
The new store integrates the digital and physical retail experience, bringing together the connection and comfort of a Starbucks café and convenience of ‘Amazon Go’s Just Walk Out’-shopping experience. The new store concept by Starbucks Pickup and Amazon Go in New York City at 59th between Park & Lexington, opened on November 18 2021.
Reading time: 4 minutes
Pulitzer Amsterdam X Claes Iversen | Design Christmas tree
19-11-2021
This December Pulitzer Amsterdam – the hotel located in 25 connected canal houses – collaborated with the famous Danish fashion designer Claes Iversen to decorate one of the largest Christmas trees of Amsterdam. The designs of Claes Iversen are worn by Queen Máxima, the crown princess Mary of Denmark and Dutch celebrities Lieke van Lexmond and Chantal Janzen. The Pulitzer Amsterdam X Claes Iversen.
Reading time: 2 minutes
La Trappe and BrewDog launch a craft beer ‘Practice What You Preach’
16-11-2021
La Trappe, in collaboration with the Scottish brewery BrewDog, has developed a limited edition craft beer: ‘Practice What You Preach’. By means of this limited edition they support the Made Blue Foundation. This foundation provides clean drinking water for everyone in the world. The earnings from ‘Practice What You Preach’ benefit Made Blue. For every glass of ‘Practice What You Preach’, La Trappe and BrewDog will jointly donate 1000 glasses of clean drinking water to developing countries.
Reading time: 2 minutes
Top of the Dutch creatives designed Capital Kitchen
15-11-2021
Opening – The newest addition to Amsterdam is Capital Kitchen. A bar restaurant located in Capital C, the monumental building on Weesperplein where the Diamond Exchange was once located. Capital C literally stands for creativity with a capital C. Capital C is a hub and community for the capital’s creative sector. A work and meeting place for creatives with flexible workplaces, office and meeting rooms and special event spaces. And now also with a unique and innovative bar-restaurant concept. The design of Capital Kitchen has been created together with the top of the Dutch creative industry.
Reading time: 2 minutes
The Teleportel Telework D.I.Y. Reception eliminates infections
15-11-2021
During one of the worst surges in coronavirus infections, companies are facing a need to implement remote measures such as teleworking. Teleportel, a company located in Belgium, has come with a ‘Do-It-Yourself’ Reception. Teleportel (since 2001) is global market leader in Live Video Receptions over Distance.
Reading time: 1 minute
1 million funded for scaling up sustainable restaurant chain
15-11-2021
Sustainable restaurant chain Jack Bean has raised 1 million euros growth funding. With this money, the start-up from Rotterdam will expand to Amsterdam and the sustainable restaurant chain will prepare for further national upscaling.
Reading time: 2 minutes
Bucuti & Tara Beach Resort | The Glasgow Declaration on Climate Action in Tourism
12-11-2021
Last Friday, November 5th, Ewald Biemans, owner/CEO of Bucuti & Tara Beach Resort in Aruba, signed the Glasgow Declaration on Climate Action in Tourism together with secretary-general of the UNWTO & WTCC Pololikashvili. He also gave a presentation on November 9th at the 26th annual UN climate conference – the Conference of the Parties or COP26. He was invited to speak because Bucuti & Tara Beach Resort is a CO2-neutral hotel since 2018 which eventually led to an award from the United Nations in 2020: the prestigious Global UN 2020 Climate Action Award for Climate Neutral Now.
Last month we also wrote an article about “the Bucuti & Tara Beach Resort, the only CO2-neutral hotel in the Caribbean shares framework for debt-free and sustainable holidays at the summit in Glasgow’’. In this article a link to the speech of Ewald Biemans and his view on where to start with sustainability as an hospitality entity. Check out The Glasgow Declaration on Climate Action in Tourism for more information and opportunities to become a signatory.
Reading time: 3 minutes
The Lights of Christmas presents | A drive-thru Christmas
12-11-2021
There is something special about The Lights of Christmas! More than dazzling lights, The Lights of Christmas brings both nostalgia and innovation together for a Christmas experience to lift the spirit and uncover the hope of the holidays. This year The Lights of Christmas presents… A Drive-Thru Christmas, Located in Stanwood, Washington State. This drive-thru event lavishly celebrates the meaning of Christmas through new and classic displays alike.
This is just one of the many Christmas drive-thru’s we have spotted in the last couple of years. As long as we are facing another winter with COVID-19 amongst us, it’s a great way to bring the joy of the Holiday Season to people when they are collecting ordered presents or food boxes. As most streets in shopping areas are decorated this December anyway, why not create a ‘Christmas Wonderland’ and have your clients pick up their orders in a fun and save way! Organise it together with other entrepreneurs, like these restaurants last year. The drive-thru Christmas by The Lights of Christmas is great inspiration.
Reading time: 1 minute
The Mariah Menu at McDonald’s USA
11-11-2021
The twelve days of Christmas – what will McDonald’s US sent to their customers? Each day from Dec.13 through Dec.24, U.S. customers can get a different menu item for free from the Mariah Menu on the McDonald’s app with a $1 minimum purchase.
Another example of marketing with a celebrity, in this case Mariah Carey who takes the Holidays up an octave with 12 Days of McDonald’s® deals. Inspiration for more local deals with celebrities? We only sorry that she doesn’t sing in their commercial! And of course that the Mariah Meal isn’t available in Europe.
Reading time: 2 minutes
A Finger Lickin’ Chicken Mitten Bucket Hugger by KFC
11-11-2021
To celebrate the upcoming holiday season, Kentucky Fried Chicken® is unveiling winter’s hottest dining accessory – a limited-edition and original Finger Lickin’ Chicken Mitten Bucket Hugger, to turn your bucket of KFC’s world-famous fried chicken into the ultimate holiday must-have, according to their press release.
A combination of a new Holiday Bucket and a sweater for this bucket to keep the bucket and the hands of their fans warm! No longer available in the US but we loved the idea, a combination of a ‘ugly Christmas sweater’ with a big plus for fans of your brand. It’s great inspiration for upgrading the ugly Christmas sweaters from the past, a ‘sweater + mitten’ for warm drinks or buckets of food.
Reading time: 1 minute
‘Lecker Chess Tournament’ in Utrecht
9-11-2021
Yesterday the ‘Lecker Schaken Schaaktoernooi’ (Lecker Chess Tournament) started in Utrecht (The Netherlands). The ‘Lecker Chess Tournament’ lasts four weeks and has been organized by the ‘De Leckere Brewery’ in collaboration with local cafes and restaurants.
Great idea to organize at a local level, we also happen to know people who started playing chess again after seeing the Netflix series The Queen’s Gambit. And great that after a lot of online quizzes we can finally play a board game with each other again! By organizing it on the first days of the week, the De Leckere brewery creates an extra source of income for the catering industry. Inspiration for other cities? Or some bars?
Reading time: 1 minute
NL Delivery Game | Meal deliverers safer and more aware on the road
9-11-2021
Since the corona pandemic, the number of meal deliveries in the Netherlands has increased excessively. According to the Food Service Institute Netherlands (FSIN), this market grew by 37% compared to 2019. This development is leading to an increasing number of meal delivery in the industry, especially the 16 to 24 year old age group. According to Veilig Verkeer Nederland (the Safe Traffic Association Netherlands (VVN), this age group takes more risks in traffic, which means that they are more likely to be involved in accidents. To prevent this, the Dutch Association of Meal Delivery Services (NLVVM) has created the NL Delivery Game. The initiators – consisting of ten large delivery chains – join forces and launched this training game for the more than 20,000 meal deliverers they employ. In the game, the traffic and behavioral rules of the Safe Traffic Association Netherlands are tested. Resulting in more meal deliverers safer on the road and more aware in traffic.
Reading time: 2 minutes
New Amarula cream liqueurs | Liqueur with a story
9-11-2021
The range of South African Amarula cream liqueurs has expanded with the arrival of two new flavors. The first Amarula vegan cream liqueur has the recognizable taste of the rare marula fruit, combined with coconut, caramel and vanilla. Unlike the other variants of the liqueur, the vegan Amarula contains no dairy. Another new flavor will be launched at the end of this year: Ethiopian Coffee, a deliciously creamy liqueur with a coffee flavour.
Last week I went to Rotterdam for Horecatrends to taste the new Amarula flavors. I had never tasted Amarula before, but I had heard of the brand. Normally I’m not a cream liqueur lover, but the Amarula liqueurs have now become the exception for me! My favourite? The new flavor: Ethiopian Coffee. ^Sifra Holtslag
Reading time: 2 minutes
Trends we spotted | Week 45
8-11-2021
At horecatrends.com or hospitalitytrends.eu we spot many national and international trends on a daily basis. We pick the most interesting ones to write about, the other trends we use in our weekly column ‘Trends we spotted this week’.
With this week links to articles about Roboat, which is ready for self-driving pilots on the canals of Amsterdam and can you imagine a ‘candies whopper’ created by Burger King Puerto Rico? This is also the last inspiration for Halloween 2022 this year, we promise. 😉
We’re slowly getting in the Christmas mood, Starbucks introduced their seasonal drinks and seasonal red cups 2021 and we spotted Christmas ornaments made from sugar with a 3D printer by Sugar Lab.
A link to a press release by VTT Research about Cellular agriculture from Finland, they created lab-grown coffee! And here in Amsterdam the theater group ‘De Theatertroep’ recently created its own water brand: L’EAU POUR L’ART.
After Amsterdam, Rotterdam now has its own ‘Hotel Not Hotel’, a place where a room isn’t just a room, but a work of art!
Kitchen robot Flippy 2 | Increase efficiency in the QSR sector
4-11-2021
Miso Robotics, a start-up company that is transforming the foodservice industry with robotics, revealed their newest model of their Flippy: kitchen robot Flippy 2. With the help of all the learnings at one of the restaurants of the QSR brand White Castle of Flippy 1, the newer model takes over the work for an entire frying station and is able to perform twice as much food preparation tasks compared to the previous model.
An ideal employee for in your QSR kitchen! Do you want to read more on robots in the hospitality world, check out our articles on robots here.
Reading time: 2 minutes
Trends we spotted | Week 44
1-11-2021
At horecatrends.com or hospitalitytrends.eu we spot many national and international trends on a daily basis. We pick the most interesting ones to write about, the other trends we use in our weekly column ‘Trends we spotted this week’.
With this week links to articles about the pop-up ‘Vurger King’ in Madrid, this Burger King location will serve only meat-free items. And Ruby Hotels outlines their Asia expansion plans.
The Accor group will also be entering the house rental market, the accor-residences.com website shows the group’s selected collection of homes.
Last weekend was Halloween, which is also becoming more popular in Europe. Some Halloween inspiration for 2022: ‘Haunted House of Fryght’ by Wendy’s, ‘Haunted Restaurant with Fright Castle Takeover’ by White Castle and in Paris you could go to a Halloween party at ‘Le Manoir de Paris’.
You can enjoy the afternoon tea, ‘Prêt-à-Portea‘ autumn/winter 2021 collection, again in The Berkeley hotel! And recently the Chiaro restaurant opened in the Rocco Forte Hotel de Rome in Berlin. Here chef Tim Mälzer developed an Italian cuisine with Japanese elements.
Pop-up Petit Latour by Ruinart | Grand Hotel Huis ter Duin
29-10-2021
This week, Grand Hotel Huis ter Duin in Noordwijk opened a temporary champagne bar: Petit Latour by Ruinart. Located on the first floor of the iconic hotel, this stylish champagne bar is open til the end of February next year. At Petit Latour it is possible to order various special champagnes with matching French dishes, such as crostinis with salmon and Gillardeau oyster with champagne-mignonette. The bites are created by chef Marcel van Lier of big brother restaurant Latour, the restaurant of Huis ter Duin, which has been awarded a Michelin star. Grand Hotel Huis ter Duin is located at the coast of the Nord Sea, half a hour drive from Amsterdam.
Reading time: 1 minute
Opening of Brasserie Bruis in Haarlem
29-10-2021
Disclaimer: directed more towards Dutchies. But if you’re living in the vicinity of Haarlem this might be a brasserie you have to visit!
Opening – Chef-owner Jozua Jaring and maître Bas Averdijk of Michelin star restaurant Ratatouille Food & Wine in Haarlem will open their Brasserie Bruis in Haarlem on November 3, 2021. The brasserie is located at Lange Veerstraat 15, where the Petossi restaurant used to be. Bruis is an informal brasserie where guests can enjoy high-quality international brasserie dishes, a snack and a good glass of wine.
Reading time: 2 minutes
Exclusive 30yrs old Barrel Aged Genever | Filliers Distillery
28-10-2021
The French have their cognac, the Russians have their vodka and the Scots have their whisky. And Belgium? Gin(Jenever)! Jenever is therefore something typical for the ‘Low Countries’; the Netherlands and Belgium. Jenever comes across as ‘a popular trend’ to many and cannot match the premium image of cognac, gin or whiskey. But this is not right. The history of jenever or in English genever, goes back 500 years and reads like an exciting book. A history with many ‘up & downs’, in which the drink has fortunately always existed and in which the Belgian Filliers, a family distillery, has played an important role for 140 years. The Belgian distillery now markets the oldest and most exclusive grain genever, ‘Filliers Barrel Aged Genever’ 30 years old!
Reading time: 2 minutes
Bucuti & Tara Beach Resort | Caribbean’s only CO2-neutral hotel shares framework for sustainable holidays
28-10-2021
It’s been 29 years since the world-famous UN Earth Summit in Rio de Janeiro in 1992 and Ewald Biemans, owner/CEO of Bucuti & Tara Beach Resort in Aruba, is still as inspired as the day he heard the call to action made to the world at that conference. As an passionate news follower, Biemans read and watched all the coverage he could find about the summit in 1992 on the tiny island of Aruba. The conference, which he described as ‘a wake-up call’, accelerated his efforts to what has been awarded the Caribbean’s most ecologically and first CO2-neutral hotel since 2018 and eventually led to an award from the United Nations in 2020: the prestigious Global UN 2020 Climate Action Award for Climate Neutral Now.
This year, Ewald Biemans has been invited to be one of speakers at the 26th annual UN climate conference – the Conference of the Parties or COP26 – which will take place from 1 to 12 November 2021 in Glasgow, Scotland and is expected to attract 30,000 attendees. COP26 is considered the world’s most important climate change conference in the race to keep the temperature rise within 1.5°C as mentioned in the 2015 Paris agreement. The importance grows with just nine years to go before the ecological consequences would be catastrophic and irreversible.
Reading time: 2 minutes
Sagardi Amsterdam introduces | Esentzia Sagardi
26-10-2021
Sagardi Amsterdam is the place to be for the most beautiful products from the Basque Country, prepared on Sagardi’s own unique Basque grill. In the original style passed down from generation to generation. Pure, honest and prepared with a lot of love and fire. To honour the culinary treasures and rich traditions of their native soil, Sagardi has created a new tradition: Esentzia Sagardi. A recurring culinary event in which one product takes the central stage in a menu specially created for this purpose. The first edition, which will take place from the 2nd to the 28th of November, will focus on Galician beef.
Reading time: 2 minutes
Trends we spotted | Week 43
26-10-2021
At horecatrends.com or hospitalitytrends.eu we spot many national and international trends on a daily basis. We pick the most interesting ones to write about, the other trends we use in our weekly column ‘Trends we spotted this week’.
With this week links to articles about… ‘The Great Feast’ in The Old Selfridges Hotel in London and Dole suggest carving a pineapple instead of a pumpkin for Halloween. 😉 With a downloadable pineapple Jack-O’-Lantern carving template!
REEF has a great view on redesigning urban spaces in communities hubs and REEF Kitchens uses a unique real estate strategy to its advantage. They opened the first two ghosts kitchens of Wendy’s in the UK. Furthermore, they will open 700 ghost kitchens in the USA, Canada and the UK.
And some sustainable inspiration for sustainable building: the De Halo building in San Francisco made of Cross-Laminated Timber (CLT) and the HAUT building in Amsterdam. And a link to an sustainable fabric for carpets and flooring: Econyl. Just as strong as nylon and made of recycled waste.
A design graduate from the Eindhoven Design Academy in the Netherlands, has created a project to highlight how renewable energy derived from tomato vines could be used to run a cloud server. And a link to an article about artfully Cannabis-infused confections.
In the Netherlands, women’s average gross hourly earnings are 14% lower than men’s, which seemed entirely outdated to De Koffiejongens. So they ask men to voluntarily pay more… And the Franz Fisher ‘Alpenhütte’ in Austria is the first mountain restaurant to serve vegan-vegetarian dishes only.
We spotted a new chain in the USA: The Sweet Paris Creperie & Café with cafes in Houston and one in Mexico opens new locations in Miami.