Is the future of fine dining in a drive-through restaurant?
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During social distancing, when people feel most safe in their own cars, drive-through supermarkets, cinemas and eateries have become abundantly popular. A new project takes this the logical step further, providing a fine dining experience, over 10 courses, where diners don’t leave their cars at all.
The event is called The Resy Drive Thru and involves 10 restaurants in Los Angeles, who will each prepare one course for the diners. Customers arrive in their cars at staggered times parking up at the first station where they eat the first course. They then move up the track, one place at a time, eating a new course at each of the ten stations.
The event will take place at the Hollywood Palladium in Los Angeles on October 15 and 16 but it is hoped that this will be a model which can be rolled out by restaurants under pandemic conditions in every state.
Drive-through restaurants are a good fit for the pandemic
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Each car will have their own designated waiter–pre-tested for Covid–who will move up through the tracks with each car to serve each different meal in single-use containers. Waiters will wear masks, protective gloves and shields.
Curtis Stone, owner of one of the ten restaurants, Gwen and Maude, says that it gives chefs and restauranteurs an opportunity to collaborate to create a coherent menu, but they can also commiserate about their struggles. Quoted in Fast Company, he says that “the fight’s so real that we can’t really think about anything else.”
It will take place over 2 nights, costs $95 per person, for cars of up to 4 people maximum and will serve 300 guests each night.