November 2008

Welcome Back

Here we are, just a few short months since the last issue and so much seems to have changed. In that time, the economy has become bigger-than-usual news, and everything else seems to have faded to background noise.

My efforts at hypermiling earlier in the year became lost in the daily search for gas. Compared to year to year, my monthly costs are still almost 70% higher. I can only wonder what it would have been if I hadn’t been trying so hard to ease up on the pedal.

We put the long days of summer to good use. I finally finished Animal, Miracle, Vegetable by Barbara Kingsolver, and ended up making my own mozzarella (it’s a long story)! I highly recommend it – it was fun and quite a learning experience. I also learned to like fried green tomatoes all over again (as long as my husband cooks them) and I have a lot of tomatoes chopped/pureed/peeled in my freezer for the off season.

In the excerpt from the November newsletter issue below we have an interview with Dana Sinkler, CEO of Just Fresh. The next issue will be out in January. Stay well and take care. – Kimberly



Just Fresh Is Just Right

G. Dana Sinkler, Jr. is all about the food. As the Chief Executive Officer of Just Fresh, the restaurant chain growing quickly throughout Charlotte, Sinkler can give you a run down on exactly why his fries taste so good (they’re made from Premium Yukon Gold Potatoes, for one thing). He can explain the difficulty of sourcing organic or local food for a chain while still keeping prices affordable, and why quality ingredients matter.

This is as it should be since he was, among many other things, an accomplished chef at some of New York’s finest restaurants. I, however, am about as close to being a chef as I am to being a neurosurgeon – which is to say not very close. Chatting with Sinkler was a bit like stepping into a foreign language immersion program in the middle of the semester. I got through by nodding and jotting down the occasional note at what I hoped were appropriate moments.

But no culinary degree is required to understand that the food is good at Just Fresh. It’s - well - fresh, and varied. Cedar Plank Salmon resides comfortably on the same menu as the kids’ Pizza Pie (which comes in cheese or pepperoni).

This pleases my husband, who loves going somewhere for dinner where the question of “what are we having” isn’t answered by me pointing to the cereal box. It pleases my son, because of the aforementioned pizza. But – with all due respect to those of you chomping at the bit to know more about the menu, you can look the rest up online or go grab a menu at one of the Charlotte locations.

What’s really interesting to me is that in addition to good food at decent prices, the building itself is green. The usual aesthetics are addressed: the restaurant is comfortable, clean and attractive. It manages to be kid-friendly yet casually sophisticated at the same time. It is, as Sinkler puts it, a combination of “quick service with the feel of full service.” You’d never know you’re making a greener dining choice unless you look a little closer. The ceiling tiles, for instance, contain 70% recycled content. Water based adhesives are used under the carpet tiles, which are produced from recycled fibers.

The list goes on. The most obvious eco-friendly fixture may be the Icestone counter top, which is made of 100% recycled glass. Eco friendly paint and wall coverings, water saving features and abundant natural light round out, but by no means complete, the list of “green” stuff going on underfoot and behind the scenes at the restaurant.

These building choices set Just Fresh apart from its competitors. The company has actively pursued the goal of bringing green to commercial interiors, and Sinkler has been a pioneer in many of these efforts. By combining great food with reasonable prices, Just Fresh has given us a place to go where we can grab a great meal at reasonable prices and hang on to our environmental convictions at the same time. That – and a coupon – gets me there!