Posted on Mon, Dec. 01, 2003
Fattening the bottom line
Restaurants find Atkins menu items attract weight-conscious patrons
By BARRY SHLACHTER, Star-Telegram Staff Writer
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At Dale Simon's Dixie House Cafe, diners can order a 2/3-pound hamburger steak with a salad on the side as a low-carbohydrate, high-protein meal. Simon, above, took off 100 pounds in five months on the Atkins diet.
There were no PowerPoint-showing consultants, focus groups or consumer polls. When Dale Simon's customers -- who come for the chicken-fried steak and rolls and stay for the banana split pie -- saw him drop 100 pounds in five months on the Atkins diet, they urged the now-218-pound restaurateur to offer the same low-carb items at his Dixie House Cafe on East Lancaster Avenue in Fort Worth.
"They told me, 'You ought to put it on the menu,' " Simon recalls.
Now, 10 percent of Dixie House's lunch orders are $6.25 Atkins Plates -- 2/3-pound hamburger steak, pork chop or grilled chicken breast, each with two veggies or a salad with bacon and sliced boiled egg. The percentage is higher at Theresa's Dixie Cafe, a sister eatery run by Simon's wife on East Belknap.
Simon isn't the only restaurateur trying to plump up his bottom line, courtesy of the Atkins diet. The jury is still out on the diet's long-term health implications, but there's no denying its popularity. Restaurants locally and nationally are looking to cash in on the low-carbohydrate diet, offering hefty steak specials, deviled eggs and other high-protein fare.
And why not? asks restaurant consultant John Imbergamo of Denver, who cited a recent study by the Heinz Corp. that found that 30 percent of Americans are trying to curb their carb intake.
Local restaurants that offer conforming menu items include Don Pablo's, McDonald's, Chipotle, Jons Grille, 7th Street Grill, Colter's Bar B Q, Tommy's, Up in Smoke barbecue and Smoothie King.
"I don't think it's as much a fad as other diet sensations have been," Imbergamo said. "This one seems to have legs."
One chain that hasn't made a decisive move, the gourmet bread and sandwich chain Panera, cited the Atkins phenomenon for less-than-glowing sales figures.
Atkins Nutritional, a privately held New York company that markets Atkins-brand diet aids, declined to comment on the use of the name by eateries or whether it had ever threatened to take any legal action.
The Atkins people did react, angrily, to a recent news conference at which a pro-vegetarian doctors' group cited the fatal heart attacks of a teen-ager and a 41-year-old man who were on the low-carb diet. Another patient developed severe artery blockage, and a fourth developed recurring kidney stones while following the Atkins diet, said the nonprofit Physicians Committee for Responsible Medicine.
The Atkins statement said the group "appears to be exploiting the obesity and diabetes crisis in this country to further its own vegan political and philosophical agenda, regardless of the scientific evidence."
The physicians' committee responded by saying the Atkins diet supplement company was itself misrepresenting research on the diet's effects on health.
While the debate on the diet continues, American consumers are lining up to consume Atkins-friendly foods like the heaps of fatty red meat that many health professionals warn could harm their heart.
At Colter's barbecue on South Hulen Street in Fort Worth, a $5.99 plate -- a half-pound of meat with green beans or a side salad -- "has become one of our best sellers," said Robert Del Val, 30, the restaurant's general manager.
The Colter's franchise owner at the North Collins Street restaurant in Arlington came up with the Atkins plate six months ago, said Mitch Johnson, who owns franchises in Hurst and Grapevine and is purchasing manager at Colter's corporate headquarters. He introduced the special at his own restaurants two months later.
"We did it because it's a hot button," he said. "We've always been high protein, and that's what Atkins is about." Among 150 to 300 lunchtime diners at one location, "I'm selling about 30 to 60 Atkins a day.
"I have people come in four days a week, five days a week for that plate."
Sandy Potter, owner since May of the 7th Street Grill in downtown Fort Worth, formerly the 7th Street Hamburger Co., responded to customer requests by adding four Atkins lunch specials shortly after taking over.
They were an immediate success.
"I bet 40 percent of our orders are now Atkins dishes," she said. "It's incredible."
Diners have a choice of two half-pound beef patties, a beef sausage with half-pound patty, a no-bun half-pound cheeseburger with four deviled eggs, or a 6-ounce ribeye plus half-pound beef patty. That's not a misprint. The dishes range in price from $6 to $8.
"My meat man is very happy with us," Potter said. All dishes come with a side salad and iced tea.
"I thought it was a guy diet, but women are buying it big-time," Potter said. "Who would have thought?"
In Keller, Phil Dansby began offering low-carb diet plates at his Up in Smoke barbecue restaurant two years ago.
"Last year it was a fair seller, but with all this talk about the Atkins diet, it's become a lot more popular. Lately, it's been a great seller." The plates run from $4.75 to $5.25 with a salad.
Why did he do it?
"Because I was on the diet, and it worked for me. I lost 15 to 18 pounds in a year."
Like Simon and Dansby, Jan Meyerson of the TCU-area Jons Grille began offering an Atkins plate in January after trying out the diet. "I was never overweight," she emphasized. "I lost 8 pounds."
Her $5.95 Atkins diet special is a quarter-pound hamburger patty, two pieces of bacon, two pieces of Swiss cheese, grilled mushrooms, lettuce, tomato slices and avocado. (Tomatoes are verboten on the Atkins diet, but customers can remove them.)
The special has been popular, now representing 20 percent to 25 percent of the 150 meals served daily, she said.
Across the street, Sidney "Sid" Weigand, 38, a self-described recovering sweetaholic and the owner of the Smoothie King franchise, said that he began offering low-carb custom-blended beverages three weeks ago and that they are 20 percent of those ordered. Sales are the same at his other store near Hulen and Interstate 30.
None are labeled "Atkins diet," but his stores carry the line of Atkins Nutritional products.
And though Weigand has no qualms catering to the Atkins demand, he has reservations about the low-carb regimen.
"Our customers tell me they lose weight doing the diet," said Weigand, a New Orleans-raised accountant turned entrepreneur. "I'm personally not doing the diet.
"Why? Because I believe everything should be done in moderation, and I've lost weight by keeping everything in moderation. I personally don't think God would put fruit and vegetables on Earth if we were to gain weight from them."
Although the Atkins plates have proved successful at Simon's Dixie House Cafe, Simon acknowledges that he wasn't initially keen on the idea.
"To tell you the truth, I was a little reluctant because we're in business to sell rolls and desserts," he said, rattling off the chocolate and coconut cream pies and double fudge cakes that bring customers back for more.
The carbs in a double fudge slice? "I couldn't imagine," Simon said. "We're not really in the diet business."
A diner spotted with a low-carb special broke a cardinal Atkins rule.
D.J. Burmeier, 50, owner of Pro Fast, an Arlington fastener company, asked for carb-loaded mashed potatoes and gravy to accompany his hamburger steak.
"I know, I know. I'm defeating the purpose, I guess. I ordered it because it looked good."
Over at Theresa's on East Belknap, 52-year-old Philip Whitmire was walking the dietary straight and narrow.
"I never get dessert, and I don't drink beer as I used to," said Whitmire, who has ordered an Atkins plate at Theresa's several times a week, each week for four months. And he has no regrets.
"This is hamburger steak with grilled onions. What more can you ask for?"
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Barry Shlachter, (817) 390-7718 bshlachter~star-telegram.com
"Restaurants find Atkins menu items attract weight-conscious patrons"
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