From Savor® we added French Fried Onions: Your new secret ingredient for elevating any dish to culinary perfection. Crispy, flavorful, and versatile, these golden gems add a delightful crunch to your favorite recipes. Whether sprinkled atop casserole, mixed into rice dishes, or enhancing soups and salads, Savor Imports French Fried Onions are the must-have ingredient for every kitchen.

From Cavendish Farms® we added Golden Ovenable Hash Brown Nuggets. Satisfy your craving for a profitable side dish with these nuggets that boast a superior flavor that keeps customers coming back for more. Ideal for delivery and takeout menus, these crowd-pleasing nuggets are a must-have addition to your culinary offerings. Whether served alongside breakfast favorites or as a savory snack, they elevate any menu to new heights of satisfaction.

And from Valay® we added Hardwound Roll Towels, the pinnacle of premium towel systems that consistently surpass customer expectations. Engineered to deliver unparalleled performance, these 800-foot Kraft towels are meticulously crafted for optimal strength and absorbency, making them the ultimate solution for high-traffic washrooms in educational institutions and office buildings. Designed specifically for use with the VT1008 Hardwound Towel Dispenser (Item #23138), these towels offer seamless compatibility and hassle-free dispensing. The superior quality ensures they withstand rigorous use, providing a reliable and efficient hand-drying solution for your patrons. Committed to sustainability, the Valay® Hardwound Roll Towels are crafted from 100% recycled materials, meeting EPA guidelines for post-consumer content. Upgrade your washroom with Valay® Hardwound Roll Towels and experience quality, performance, and environmental responsibility.

New Item Details:

Dennis Food Service delivers thousands of foodservice products and supplies to restaurants and food operations in Maine and New Hampshire. If you have a question or are interested in becoming a customer contact us or call 1-800-439-2727

Turkey Delight in Every Bite

Topped with the delightful crunch of dill pickles and the richness of Swiss cheese, each turkey sandwich promises a satisfying and easy-to-prepare feast for your gathering.

Serves 6

Ingredients 

Introducing an east way to a consistent Korean-inspired chicken sandwich; featuring a harmonious blend of tender fried chicken and vibrant traditional Korean flavors.

INGREDIENTS

• FLASH 180 Chicken Breast (Item #28555)
• Pretzel Buns
• Kimchi
• Gochujang paste
• Kewpie Mayonnaise
• Sesame Oil
• Sliced Mini Cucumbers

DIRECTIONS

Flash180 Chicken Fillets    FIND MORE RECIPES

We’ve got a recipe that’s not just delicious but also easy to prepare in advance! This Crab Cake Sandwich with Dill Pickle Aioli is a must-try for your menu–a simple seafood masterpiece that’s worthy of a 4-star review.

What makes this crab cake sandwich perfect for foodservice?

Crab meat is a winner: Delicious and popular, lump crab meat’s natural sweet and succulent flavors shine through in this recipe, enhanced with just a hint of Old Bay Seasoning.

Effortless Prep: These crab cakes have a short prep time, and they hold together well so you can prepare them in advance – time-saving that maximizes efficiency during service.

Aioli Elevation: It’s not just the flavor that gets elevated here. Elevate appeal (and charge accordingly) on your menu with Dill Pickle Aioli. This signature sauce from Ken’s combines the tang of chopped dill pickles and pickle juice with the creamy richness of aioli. It’s a simple addition that transforms your sandwich into a standout item, and boosts profitability.

Zero Waste, More Profit: No need to worry about leftovers; we’ve streamlined this recipe to allow you to create four, 5-7oz crab cakes (by weight) from 2 pre-portioned 8oz containers of crab meat. This eliminates waste and ensures more profit for your restaurant. It’s a no-brainer for your bottom line.

Yield 4 servings:

Ingredients:

• 16 oz crab meat (2 containers) (#115083)
• 1/2 cup bread crumbs (#24753)
• 1 Egg (#4673)
• 1 tablespoon fresh parsley, chopped (#26274)
• 1 teaspoon Old Bay Seasoning (#6640)
• 1/4 cup mayonnaise (#27310)
• 1 tablespoon Worcestershire sauce (#70717)
• 1/2 teaspoon salt (#70100)
• 1/4 teaspoon black pepper (#22101)
• Zest from 1 lemon (#26031)
• 1 teaspoon ground mustard (#22149)
• 4 Brioche buns (#27487)
• 8 slices ripe tomato, thick-sliced (#26130)
• Leaf lettuce (#10080)
• 8 oz Ken’s Dill Pickle Aioli (#28294)

Instructions:

1. In a mixing bowl, combine crab meat, bread crumbs, chopped parsley, and Old Bay Seasoning. Gently mix until well incorporated, making sure not to over-mix. The crab meat should remain lumpy and intact.
2. In a separate bowl, whisk together mayonnaise, ground mustard, salt, pepper, lemon zest, and the egg until well combined.
3. Gently fold the egg mixture into the crab meat mixture until thoroughly combined. Be careful not to break up the crab meat lumps.
4. Form the mixture into 4 patties (each serving includes 2 patties). Place the patties on a plate and refrigerate them for about 30 minutes. This chilling time helps the crab cakes firm up and prevents them from falling apart during cooking.
5. Fry the crab cakes for approx. 5 minutes or until they are lightly browned and heated through. (3-5 minutes per side if coking in a pan with 1/4 cup vegetable oil.)
6. While the crab cakes are cooking, toast the brioche buns until they are crispy. Spread a generous amount of Ken’s Dill Pickle Aioli on the inside top and bottom of each bun.
7. To assemble the sandwiches, place a sautéed crab cake on the bottom half of each bun. Top with lettuce and tomato slices. Sprinkle fresh chopped parsley over the crab cake.
8. Serve your delicious Crab Cake Sandwiches with Dill Pickle Aioli!

Note: You can also customize your sandwich with additional toppings like avocado, red onion, or coleslaw if desired.

Ingredients for 16 servings:

• 64 oz crab meat (#115083 – 8, 8oz containers)
• 2 cups bread crumbs (#24753)
• 4 eggs
• 4 tablespoons fresh parsley, chopped
• 4 teaspoons Old Bay Seasoning (#6640)
• 1 cup mayonnaise (#27310)
• 4 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce (#70717)
• 4 teaspoons salt
• 1 teaspoon black pepper
• Zest from 4 lemons (#26031)
• 4 teaspoons ground mustard (#22149)
• 16 Brioche buns (#27487)
• 32 slices ripe tomato, thick-sliced (#26130)
• Leaf lettuce (#10080)
• 32 oz Ken’s Dill Pickle Aioli (#28294)

Ingredients for 48 servings:

• 192 oz crab meat (#115083 – 24, 8oz containers)
• 6 cups bread crumbs (#24753)
• 12 eggs
• 12 tablespoons fresh parsley, chopped
• 12 teaspoons Old Bay Seasoning (#6640)
• 3 cups mayonnaise (#27310)
• 12 tablespoons Worcestershire sauce (#70717)
• 12 teaspoons salt
• 3 teaspoons black pepper
• Zest from 12 lemons (#26031)
• 12 teaspoons ground mustard (#22149)
• 48 Brioche buns (#27487)
• 96 slices ripe tomato, thick-sliced (#26130)
• Leaf lettuce (#10080)
• 96 oz Ken’s Dill Pickle Aioli (#28294)

Introducing this Peanut Butter Banana French Toast to your K-12 school food program offers a delightful blend of flavors and provides essential nutrients that are vital for students’ growth and development. The combination of whole grains, protein, healthy fats, and fruit makes this dish both satisfying and health conscious. Give it a try, and watch as students eagerly enjoy this scrumptious creation. It’s a win-win for everyone involved – happy, healthy students and a successful school food program.

Serves: 20

INGREDIENTS

• 40 pieces Sunny Fresh® Whole Grain Cinnamon Glazed French Toast (Item #27788)
• 2 lbs. Peanut Butter (Item #24677) / Alternative (Item #9007)
• 10 Ripe Bananas (Item #26102/26105)

DIRECTIONS

1. Place 20 pieces of thawed French toast on a lined sheet pan
2. Spread approximately 2 Tbsp of nut butter (or alternative) on one French toast
3. Slice bananas and place on top of nut butter
4. Top each slice with one of the remaining slices of French toast
5. Heat gently, covered in a 200˚F oven for 5 minutes, being careful not to melt the nut butter too much.

Add some southwestern flair to your lunch or dinner menu with this mouthwatering Southwestern Chicken Torta.

Yield: 4 Servings

INGREDIENTS

Tyson Red Label NAE FC Fajita Seasoned Breast Strips	16 oz/1 lb
Roasted Red Bell Peppers, drained	1/4 cup
Mayonnaise	1/2 cup
French Rolls	4
Italian Mix Giardiniera, drained and chopped	1 cup
Wright® Brand Naturally Hickory Smoked Extra Thick Sliced Steak Cut Bacon	8 slices
Tomato	8 slices
Provolone or Monterey Jack Cheese	8 slices
Deli-Sliced Jalapeño Peppers	1/2 cup
Cilantro Leaves, cleaned and chopped	1/2 bunch
Extra Virgin Italian Olive Oil	2 Tbsp

Directions:

Yield: Makes 4 sandwiches

INGREDIENTS

• 8 slices sourdough bread
• 4 oz. basil pesto
• 8 oz. sliced Gruyere cheese
• 8 oz. sliced white cheddar cheese
• 1 lb. Dan’s Prize All Natural* Pulled Corned Beef, thawed
• 4 oz. butter, softened

DIRECTIONS

1. On 8 slices bread, evenly divide pesto.
2. Top 4 slices bread with Gruyere cheese and 4 slices bread with white cheddar cheese.
3. Top with shredded/pulled corned beef; sandwich together.
4. Spread butter on both sides of each sandwich.
5. On griddle or in large nonstick skillet, cook sandwiches over medium heat, turning once, 5 to 6 minutes or until golden brown on both sides and cheese is melted.

Pulled pork and mac and cheese unite on a Pillsbury Cornbread Biscuit for those seeking another level of flavor!

Yield: 12 Serving

INGREDIENTS

Pillbury Freezer to Oven Cornbread Biscuit Dough	12
BBQ Pulled Pork, prepared, held warm	1 lb 14 oz or 3 3/4 cups
Macaroni and Cheese, prepared, held warm	1 lb 2 oz or 3 cups

Directions:

In the important world of portability, sandwiches are the quintessential ever-evolving handheld…

Industry-leading menus show that everything from the flavor and menu placement to the ingredients and bread is up for innovation. To capture a larger piece of this delivery-friendly market, simply select a focus and explore the novelty your operation can bring to the dine-in or to-go plate.

Global flavors

An international focus opens the door to a different palate of ingredient combinations, spices, and bread types. Chefs rank global fare and flavors in the top five hottest culinary trends for 2022, according to the National Restaurant Association’s What’s Hot 2022 Culinary Forecast survey.¹

A scan of U.S. menus shows that among chicken sandwiches alone, Tuscan, tandoori, curry, banh mi, and jerk chicken variations are appearing on trendy restaurant menus.² This demonstrates that others have done the R&D and found that these sandwich types with their traditional ingredients and flavors have legs.

For example, the Champion’s Curry menu in Los Angeles and Irvine, California, features Champion’s Curry Katsu sandwich on brioche bread, served with a cup of curry as a sandwich dip.

A glance at the bread type for the Jerk Chicken Sandwich on offer at Bahama Breeze demonstrates a well-coordinated theme. The Darden-owned chain describes the sandwich as hand-pulled jerk chicken and melted pepper jack cheese on hot-pressed Cuban bread.

The Southern Seoul sandwich at Char’d Restaurant in Tempe, Arizona, calls on flavor-forward chicken thigh meat, which it double-batter fries, then covers it in gochugaru garlic paste mixed with sesame emulsion and tops it with kimchi slaw — served on a toasted potato bun.³

Breakfast daypart

Breakfast is beloved by consumers, with breakfast restaurant meals ranking considerably higher than other dayparts across Yelp, Google, and TripAdvisor customer reviews.⁴ Popular as it is, morning sandwich innovation can easily go stale with only bacon and sausage proteins.

Breakfast, in fact, opens a lane to continue the crispy chicken sandwich wars that began in 2019 when Popeyes launched its vastly popular and widely acclaimed fried chicken sandwich.⁵

But how about a crispy chicken sandwich on the breakfast menu? It’s a playground with a lot of potential. As recently as March 2022, McDonald’s began testing a new Crispy Chicken Breakfast sandwich in select markets.⁶ The all-white-meat chicken is fried and served on a choice of biscuit or toasted English muffin.

While chicken biscuit sandwiches are widespread on menus, there’s room for incorporating new flavors and sauces in this familiar format. In February 2022, Wendy’s spiced up their breakfast lineup by introducing the Hot Honey Chicken Biscuit, featuring chicken breast topped with hot honey served on a buttermilk biscuit.⁷

There’s also plenty of opportunity for turkey on the breakfast sandwich menu. Muffin Can Stop Us, a breakfast concept in Glendale, California, features an English muffin sandwich section that includes the Madame Muff Muffin with turkey, egg, cheddar, spinach, and aioli as well as the Muffia Club Muffin with turkey, bacon, Swiss cheese, tomato, spinach, and aioli.

Replacing the bread with other breakfast ingredients, from French toast to waffles, is another way to innovate the breakfast sandwich. Savory waffle sandwiches are an emerging contender, according to Datassential.² Sheetz, a prepared food-forward convenience store chain based in Altoona, Pennsylvania, recently added a Waffle Crispy Chicken Sandwich to its menu, leveraging several trends at once.

Healthy options

Remember your mindful eaters looking for options they can feel good about now and in the future. For example, currently 9% of those on a diet are practicing the low-carb keto diet while an additional 24% indicate that the keto diet is one they are interested in practicing.⁸ This suggests that the trend will likely continue.

Growing interest in low-carb diets begs for a revisit of the sandwich carrier — like Jimmy John’s Sandwiches has done with its Unwich® which it describes as a healthy lettuce wrap sandwich. It comes tightly wrapped in lettuce leaves and paper. The menu touts, “Any sandwich as an unwich® contains 10g or less total carbs.” This includes its Turkey Tom with turkey, lettuce, tomato, and mayo as one of the lowest-calorie sandwiches on the menu.

If you choose to go with turkey or chicken as lean-meat sandwich protein choices, give them power on the menu by sourcing and marketing the poultry as free-range, no antibiotics ever, fed an all-vegetarian diet, and the like.

Whatever your choice of protein or carrier, ratchet up the flavor with your thoughtful ingredients. Spices being adopted on trendy restaurant sandwiches, according to Datassential, are poblano, wasabi, and pepperoncini peppers. Global ingredients showing up between the slices are falafel, harissa, tzatziki, and tahini. As for cheese, goat, brie, pimento cheese, and beer cheese are appearing more often.⁹

For any sandwich build that fits within your operational focus, be sure to choose themes with palate-pleasing flavor-first variety. Your guests will find your innovation refreshing.

Content courtesy of Perdue Foodservice

Sources:

¹What’s Hot 2022 Culinary Forecast, National Restaurant Association, Nov. 16, 2021, https://go.restaurant.org/rs/078-ZLA-461/images/2022_What%27s_Hot_Report.pdf

²Datassential SNAP! Chicken Sandwich Menu Adoption Chart, March 2022

³Jennings, Lisa, “Sandwich Porn: This Year’s Top Trends,” Restaurant Hospitality, Aug. 11, 2021, https://www.restaurant-hospitality.com/best-sandwiches/sandwich-porn-year-s-top-trends

⁴Thorne, Bret, “Breakfast Returns to Restaurants with Healthy, Spicy and Indulgent Options,” Nation’s Restaurant News, April 7, 2022, https://www.nrn.com/food-trends/breakfast-returns-restaurants-healthy-spicy-and-indulgent-options

⁵Wheeler, Kevin, “Popeyes Started a Chicken Sandwich War in 2019,” USA Today, Dec. 31, 2019, https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/food/2019/12/31/popeyes-chicken-sandwich-food-fight-2019-2020/2785127001/

⁶Lake, Amber, “McDonald’s is Offering This New Breakfast Sandwich,” eatthis.com, March 24, 2022, https://www.eatthis.com/news-mcdonalds-testing-new-breakfast-sandwich/

⁷Maze, Jonathan. “Wendy’s is Introducing a Hot New Breakfast Sandwich,” Restaurant Business, February 2, 2022, https://www.restaurantbusinessonline.com/food/wendys-introducing-hot-new-breakfast-sandwich

⁸Foodbytes, “Health: What Does it Mean Today” report (Datassential), November 2021

⁹Datassential SNAP Sandwich Ingredients Menu Adoption Chart, March 2022

There are quite possibly a million ways to season, cook and serve a slider. But have you tried sliders inspired by the big, bold flavors of Mexico? Possibly so, but not like these little avocado-kissed gems.

Let’s take a drive south of the border and explore some flavors that are perfect fit for sliders. Serve them up in a warm tortilla “slider roll” and you have yourselves yet another creative way to present sliders… let’s call this slider idea number one million and one.

For another Cinco de Mayo recipe see…
Mexican Style Street Corn Dip