There are few culinary techniques more evocative than smoking. It can conjure images of backyard barbecues, slowly sizzling Southern smoke pits and succulent protein falling off the bone. While smoking is a common means of meat preservation found in most cultures, Americans have made it their own, as every summer they fearlessly fire up their grills. Chain menus follow suit, and there’s a marked upturn in the number of barbecue promotions offered during the warm-weather months. But smoking is much more than a single-season phenomenon; it is a sophisticated cooking method that allows corporate chefs plenty of room for creativity all year-round.
They’re all fired up. According to Menu Mine from the Foodservice Research Institute, the incidence of terms “smoke,” “smoked” or “smoking” on menus at top 200 chain restaurants jumped an aggregate of 32 percent over the past decade with particularly strong increases in operations that offer breakfast, such as Friendly’s, which features smoked ham on its breakfast platter. Additionally, Hardee’s stuffs biscuits with smoked sausage, and Corner Bakery pairs smoked bacon with eggs and French toast. Smoked meats have become staples of morning menus, but the earthy appeal of the smoke flavor and its compatibility with a range of ingredients make it attractive throughout the day.
KFC recently introduced just its third fried-chicken flavor in 65 years, Smoky Chipotle Crispy Chicken. LongHorn Steakhouse glazes the new Red Rock Grilled Shrimp with smoky tomato butter.
Cheese’s creamy, fatty nature makes it an ideal foil for smoke. Panera Bread offers smoked Gouda and cheddar as sandwich toppers, while Houlihan’s finishes enchiladas with spicy, chipotle-smoked mozzarella sauce.
Smoke also provides a platform for unique taste combinations. El Torito Grill goes for a flavor trifecta with its smoky-sweet chipotle-raspberry-tamarind barbecue sauce. Bennigan’s uses a smoky honey-Dijon sauce on its Chicken Minis, then repurposes the sauce as a dressing for its entrée salads. Some menus use smoke to suggest ethnicity or authenticity, such as with Quizno’s smoky Baja sauce or Tony Roma’s trademark Blue Ridge Smokies sauce.
They knock on wood. While charcoal is the familiar and preferred medium for most home grillers, lots of restaurateurs and most barbecue purists insist upon smoking with hardwood. Charcoal has its advantages: It’s a wood product that’s easy to obtain and efficient to use. Its drawback is a singular lack of flavor. Corporate chefs tend to match wood with protein. Red meats stand up well to assertively flavored woods like hickory, so Hard Rock Cafe’s beef brisket is hickory-smoked. Rock Bottom Brewery’s signature salmon is smoked with alder, a wood native to the Pacific Northwest that marries well with a seafood species common to that area. T.G.I. Friday’s turkey breast is mesquite-smoked, and the honey-pecan salmon is cedar-smoke seasoned. Milder, sweeter fruitwoods are especially versatile, as in Houston’s cherry-smoked trout appetizer.
They’re in the pits. Or at least some of them are. True smoking is a painstakingly slow process that requires real expertise. Barbecue specialist Corky’s, based in Memphis, Tenn., advertises both the talent of its pit master and the time required, which is 22 hours for pork shoulder and seven hours for ribs, to create what’s promoted as the best Southern barbecue in the world.
Other chains, while more humble in their claims, also tout technique. Claim Jumper promises its salmon is smoked over open flames on cedar plank, and Hard Rock Cafe publicizes its in-house smoker.
Other chains also invoke the image, as with Papa John’s Smokehouse Bacon and Ham Pizza or Chili’s new Jalapeño Smokehouse Bacon Big Mouth Burger.
Looking ahead, interest will grow around smoking’s ability to deliver flavor, and more restaurants will explore its intrinsic connection to American comfort foods. Corporate chefs will have the opportunity to learn more about it firsthand at NRN’s Seventh Annual Culinary R&D Conference, to be held Oct. 2-5 at Johnson & Wales University in Charlotte, N.C., where they’ll hear from some of the best practitioners of Southern food and barbecue in the business.