One of Italy’s most prized seasonal delicacies is returning to the Algarve this November, with Gusto by Heinz Beck serving a seven-course menu dedicated to the celebrated white truffles of

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PM’s revelation follows launch of advice for households to have enough water and food to get by in civil emergency

• UK politics live – latest updates

Andy Burnham has stockpiles of beans, soup and Twiglets in case of a civil emergency, he has said, adding that a new government campaign was not reason for panic buying.

The prime minister was questioned on his domestic supply situation after the Be Ready campaign advised households to have enough bottled water and long-life food to keep going in case of an emergency, such as one caused by a weather event or cyber-attack.

Customers at America's biggest buffet chain can pile their plates high with steak, shrimp and comfort food favorites, but behind the all-you-can-eat spread is a carefully calculated balancing act, according to a new report.

Golden Corral has developed a sophisticated system to keep the buffet model viable despite challenging economic conditions, The Wall Street Journal recently reported.

The chain, with roughly 350 restaurants across the U.S., predominantly in the South and Southeast, offers about 150 different buffet items. What customers might not realize is that they are carefully arranged into "modules" that mix expensive and inexpensive foods, CEO Lance Trenary told the Journal.

AMERICA'S FAVORITE FAST-FOOD CHAIN NAMED: MCDONALD'S WINS HEARTS BUT NOT BEST BURGER, SURVEY SAYS

Pricier items like meat and seafood are paired with lower-cost items like hush puppies and french fries. Meatloaf goes side-by-side with potatoes, gravy and green beans, for example.

"We have to be pretty creative in the way that we present our menu," Trenary told the Journal.

The chain also has to adapt to changes in the market.

As beef prices have shot up, Golden Corral added a bone-in fried pork chop as a cheaper alternative to sirloin. 

RED LOBSTER'S 37-YEAR-OLD CEO BETTING ON NOSTALGIA, AI TO FUEL CHAIN'S COMEBACK AFTER BANKRUPTCY

The pork chop costs the chain only about 40% of what the sirloin costs, so every customer who chooses pork instead of steak helps reduce Golden Corral's overall food costs.

Quality also matters more at a buffet, where customers can simply discard a poorly prepared dish and return for something else.

Golden Corral tries to prevent that by keeping food fresh, making about 80% of its buffet items in-house and preparing only what it expects customers to eat. The chain uses demand data to forecast needs in 15-minute increments rather than cooking large quantities in advance and leaving them under food warmers.

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But the careful approach doesn't mean it has been smooth sailing for Golden Corral.

"This has been a difficult year for us, don't get me wrong," Trenary said. "We are trying to at least tread water."

About 38 cents of every dollar Golden Corral brings in goes toward food, while the chain is trying to keep its dinner buffet priced below $20 at many locations. 

Selling drinks separately helps bring in additional revenue, but rising food and other costs are making the all-you-can-eat model increasingly difficult to sustain.

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Still, the promise of getting more food for a set price remains appealing to budget-conscious diners and other restaurant chains have leaned into that appeal, according to industry data.

Red Lobster, Applebee's and Olive Garden are among those offering different types of unlimited promotions. 

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Major chains rolled out about 150 such deals in the first half of 2026 — roughly four times the number offered in 2021, according to Technomic data.

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Fox News Digital reached out to Golden Corral for comment.

• Restaurants are buying fewer paper cups and takeout containers.
• Companies making the goods say their North American sales declined in results released this year.
• It's the latest sign that diners are eating out less.

Even the humble disposable coffee cup suggests that diners are eating out less at restaurants.

Companies that sell paper cups, plates, delivery containers, and similar packaging to restaurants say that they're seeing less demand from US businesses.

Essity, a Swedish company that sells paper towels and cleaning supplies to businesses, including restaurants, said on Thursday that the dining pullback in the US was affecting sales. The company's sales volumes and prices in the US fell during its third quarter, it said.

"Consumers are not going out to restaurants as much as they do in Europe," CEO Ulrika Kolsrud told Reuters on Thursday.

Finland-based Huhtamaki Oyj, which makes disposable cups and takeout containers for fast-food restaurants, said that second-quarter sales in North America decreased.

Analysts at Jefferies wrote that results in the region, which accounts for about one-third of Huhtamaki Oyj's sales, will likely be hurt by lower consumer spending at fast-food chains in the US.

Higher prices at some chains, and many consumers still working from home, "have impacted sales volumes, and ultimately packaging demand," the analysts wrote earlier this month.

With wages stagnant and the lingering effects of inflation, many diners are eating out less. Those who are still spending tend to look for good deals — a trend that has tested value menus at fast-food chains like McDonald's and benefited others, such as Chili's, which offered deals that got consumers ordering.

That doesn't necessarily mean Americans have stopped spending on restaurant food altogether. Many diners are still willing to pay for food delivery, a trend that has bolstered results at DoorDash and Uber.

Do you have a story idea? Contact this reporter at abitter@businessinsider.com or via encrypted messaging app Signal at 808-854-4501. Use a personal email address, a nonwork WiFi network, and a nonwork device; here's our guide to sharing information securely.

• Natendrea Jones used Facebook Marketplace to market her seafood-catering business.
• A viral TikTok review in May brought her more than 300 orders overnight.
• Jones now runs Red's Garlic Seafood from her home kitchen and hopes to expand into a food truck.

When TikTok food reviewer Gabriel Rivera DMed Natendrea Jones about her seafood this spring, she assumed it was a prank.

"I thought somebody was playing a joke," Jones, 36, told Business Insider.

The South Carolina native had spent years trying to turn her cooking into a full-time business. She grew up surrounded by home cooking and began earning money young, first by preparing salads for neighbors and family cookouts, then by doing hair and nails.

Cooking remained a side hustle for more than a decade. Jones made seafood platters for friends and occasionally sold pans, but hair and nails paid the bills.

A viral food review brought 300 orders overnight

Jones had been posting her food on Facebook Marketplace for years. The platform didn't strike her as unusual: As a hairstylist and nail technician, she'd previously used Craigslist to find clients.

"I would always post on Facebook Marketplace because that was like my Craigslist," she said. "I was a Craigslist girl."

Meanwhile, Rivera had built a following of more than 2 million on TikTok by ordering food through Facebook Marketplace and reviewing it from his car. When he found Jones' listing, he offered her $200 to make him anything she wanted.

Jones prepared a pan overflowing with snow crab legs, lobster, shrimp, oysters, and fixings. It was not yet a menu item, she said, but it would soon become known as the "Gabriel Special."

When Rivera posted his glowing review in May — "her seasoning is on another level," he said between bites — Jones woke up to a flood of orders.

"I checked my Square. I had literally over 300 orders," she said. "I dropped my phone. I dropped to my knees."

Jones said she generated $50,000 in sales over the following two weeks and later surpassed six figures in sales. She used some of the money to buy supplies, such as new pots and pans.

Going viral created new problems

The sudden growth was exciting, but it was also difficult to manage. Jones enlisted help from family members early on, refunded some orders, and said some customers waited as long as a month for their food.

"There's no way I can do 100 orders in a day," she said. "This type of motion is new to me."

The pace eventually caught up with her. About three weeks after the review went live, Jones said she had to pause orders for a day to reset and catch up on sleep.

"The adrenaline was there, but I crashed," she said.

Since then, Jones has built more structure into the business. Customers order through her website, which adjusts pickup dates based on demand. She uses preorders to determine how much inventory she needs and now schedules pickup windows. On busy days, she said, her home-kitchen operation can handle 50 to 60 orders.

She still gets inquiries through Facebook Marketplace, but said most sales now come through Instagram and TikTok, where she has built sizable followings.

The business behind the seafood platter

Jones' best-selling platters are not cheap to produce. She buys seafood in bulk, along with fresh corn, potatoes, garlic, butter, edible flowers, packaging, and other ingredients. She estimates that she spends roughly $20,000 a month on supplies, though costs fluctuate based on order volume and seafood prices.

"People just say, 'More money, more problems,'" she said. "Sometimes I'll have moments where I don't see money at all — the money is gone, but it comes right back because that's a business."

Her signature sauce is central to the business, she said. Jones spent nearly eight years refining it and is protective of the recipe.

"My sauce is everything — because anybody can make a seafood boil, but how is your sauce?" she said. "I make my sauce from scratch and love and magic."

The business is named Red's Garlic Seafood after her late father, who was known as "Big Red." He was a chef who had hoped to open a family restaurant, Jones said.

Her next goal is a food truck, though she's taking her time to secure the vehicle, permits, and licenses needed to operate it.

"I want to do everything the smart way," she said.

Eventually, she hopes to open a brick-and-mortar restaurant. For now, she said she focuses on making each platter with the same care she brought to Rivera's order — the one that changed her business overnight.

"I make sure every pan has the flavors that it needs," she said. "I put the love and effort into the pan."

Glee Boutique Café in Vilamoura is celebrating Halloween by launching a limited-edition collection of skulls, brains and one-eyed monsters – all thankfully made from mousse, chocolate, fruit and praline. Created

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• I often love Ina Garten's easy, flavorful recipes, so I gave her buttermilk mashed potatoes a try.
• The buttermilk made this dish more flavorful than other mashed-potato recipes I've followed.
• From now on, I plan on making this recipe every time I host or attend a dinner party.

I firmly believe that no fall or winter dinner party is complete without a big bowl of piping-hot mashed potatoes.

That said, there's nothing worse than digging into a pile of fluffy potatoes, only to discover that they're bland or dry.

Although there are dozens of ways to dress up spuds with mix-ins like cheese, sour cream, and extra butter, kitchen queen Ina Garten has a wonderfully simple recipe that I had to try.

I'm so glad I did. Not only is Garten's recipe short and sweet, but the dish is flavor-packed, ultra-creamy, and about to be a part of every future holiday spread in my house.

Here's how to make Garten's mashed potatoes.

The ingredient list is short and simple.

You only need six ingredients for this simple side dish: kosher salt, potatoes, whole milk, unsalted butter, buttermilk, and black pepper.

Garten recommends using a potato that's easy to boil, such as Yukon Gold. Russets would work well, too: Compared to other potatoes, these varieties contain more starch, which breaks down when mashed into a light and fluffy texture.

Yukons are my personal preference; I've found them to be slightly creamier than other options.

The potatoes took me under 10 minutes to prep.

Once I collected my ingredients — and set a big pot of well-salted water to boil on the stove — I started on the prep work.

The first step here is peeling the potatoes, but don't worry about doing it perfectly.

I've found that, as long as the spuds are clean, a few pieces of potato skin in the mix won't really change the dish's quality. Some home chefs might even like to leave a bit of skin on for extra texture.

The potatoes should then be cut into roughly equal-sized pieces so they cook at the same rate.

Garten recommends 1 ½-inch cubes, but it's OK if you're not super precise, since everything will be mashed together later.

Cook the potatoes, and don't let them get gummy.

Once the water came to a boil on the stove, I added the prepped potatoes and reduced the heat to maintain a gentle simmer with the lid off.

An important part of the recipe is to avoid boiling the potatoes, which can make them turn gummy. Instead, keep the water at a nice simmer until you can easily pierce the spuds with a paring knife. This took me between 10 and 15 minutes.

When they're done, drain the potatoes in the sink and return them to the pot to finish the dish.

While the potatoes simmered, I warmed the butter and milk.

Next, I created a mixture of melted butter and whole milk to infuse the cooked potatoes with rich, creamy flavor and texture.

A key step in Garten's recipe is to warm these two ingredients in a small saucepan while the potatoes cook. The butter will melt into the milk, causing an emulsion.

Dry spuds absorb hot liquids better than cold ones, and you'll have an easier time combining the ingredients without any cold lumps of butter.

Just don't let the mixture come to a boil, which can cause the milk to separate from the butter.

Then, I mashed the potatoes.

When the potatoes are done cooking, strain the water over the sink and return them to the pot. Now, it's time to start mashing.

Garten's recipe calls for using a food mill to break down the potatoes, but I live in a New York City apartment with barely enough room to store a large pot. So, I used a good old-fashioned potato masher.

Once I'd crushed the potatoes into a mostly uniform mush, I added the warm butter and incorporated it with a rubber spatula, per Garten's instructions.

I added just enough buttermilk for a super creamy mash.

Once you've folded the butter and milk into the potatoes, it's time for the star ingredient: buttermilk.

I halved Garten's recipe, which typically feeds five or six, and decided to add a half cup of buttermilk. At first, I was worried I'd overdone it — my mash looked soupy.

After a little more stirring and time, though, the starchy potatoes absorbed the buttermilk, and I had myself an incredibly light and fluffy mash.

The seasoning — and the buttermilk — made Garten's recipe stand out from the rest.

Adding the right amount of salt and pepper is essential for any dish, but mashed potatoes are often tragically overlooked in the seasoning department.

Garten recommends adding another 2 teaspoons of salt and pepper to the mash, and I agree wholeheartedly.

The result is a rich, tangy, and flavorful side dish you don't need to wait for a holiday to make. In my opinion, the buttermilk stole the show: I've found that potatoes can be a bit "blah" when not properly seasoned, and this recipe had a slightly acidic quality that I loved.

I'll be bringing these potatoes to Thanksgiving dinner this year, and every holiday party for the foreseeable future.

This story was originally published on November 20, 2025, and most recently updated on October 22, 2026.

• I compared brownie recipes from Ina Garten and Gordon Ramsay.
• Garten's "outrageous" brownies are decadent, with a nutty crunch. 
• But Ramsay's easy and delicious "world's best brownies" won my heart. 

On a chilly night, there are two things I crave: a '90s rom-com and a deliciously decadent brownie. I'm a stereotypical millennial who needs a little treat and a lot of nostalgia.

Ina Garten and Gordon Ramsay can't build a time machine, but they sure know how to bake. So I turned to them for inspiration and decided to have a little celebrity-chef showdown in the process.

Would Garten's "outrageous brownies" come on top, or would Ramsay's "world's best brownies" live up to their name?

First up is Gordon Ramsay's recipe for the "world's best brownies."

I've made many of Ramsay's delicious dishes — including his 15-minute pasta and 10-minute burger — but had never whipped up one of his desserts.

That changed when I came across his recipe for the "world's best brownies."

With a name like that, I obviously had to try it.

Ramsay's brownies include a lot of dark chocolate.

To make a serving of 15-20 brownies, you'll need:

• ½ pound of dark chocolate, broken into squares or roughly chopped
• ¼ pound of dark chocolate, chopped into small chunks (optional)
• ½ pound of butter, diced, plus extra for greasing
• ¾ cup of caster sugar (granulated sugar also works)
• ½ cup of light-brown sugar
• ½ cup of all-purpose flour
• 4 large eggs, lightly beaten
• 2 teaspoons of vanilla extract

Ramsay lists two separate chocolate measurements because the small chunks are added to the brownies in the middle of the baking process. To simplify things, I bought two bags of dark chocolate chunks (each was 10 ounces/283 grams) for this recipe.

I used one full bag for melting the chocolate and a third of the second bag while adding more chunks to my brownies. It was a little more chocolate than Ramsay intended, but I loved the results.

I began by preheating the oven, prepping my baking pan, and melting some chocolate.

After setting the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit, I greased my pan and lined it with parchment paper.

Then I diced the butter and threw it into a heatproof bowl with my chocolate. Since I didn't have enough pans to melt the chocolate over the stove (known as the double-boiler or bain-marie method), I used the microwave instead. Ramsay recommends throwing the chocolate and butter into the microwave for 3 minutes, but my mixture was ready in 2 minutes and 30 seconds.

After melting the chocolate, I whisked in the sugars and added my eggs, vanilla, and dry ingredients.

I sifted the flour and salt over the batter, then stirred everything together until it was smooth and combined.

I poured my batter into the lined pan and baked my brownies for 40 minutes.

I baked my brownies for 20 minutes, then took my pan out of the oven so I could add the extra chocolate chunks. Ramsay's recipe says you should "vigorously throw the chunks of chocolate" into the brownie mix at this stage, which was surprisingly therapeutic.

I let the brownies bake for an additional 20 minutes, then let them cool in the pan for 10 minutes.

Ramsay's brownies are a chocolate lover's dream.

Ramsay's decision to stick to dark chocolate really helps this recipe shine, because the brownies are indulgent without tasting sickly sweet. I also loved how many chocolate chunks were stuffed into each brownie, adding some texture to all that fudginess.

I made these brownies for my fiancé, who said he loved their "smooth, irresistible chocolate flavor."

These brownies taste fantastic on their own, but adding some vanilla ice cream would make an incredible dessert.

Get the full recipe for Gordon Ramsay's "world's best brownies" here.

Ina Garten used to make "outrageous brownies" at her Barefoot Contessa store.

Before she was a Food Network star, Garten ran a beloved specialty food shop in the Hamptons, ditching her White House job to follow her passion.

In her first cookbook, "The Barefoot Contessa Cookbook," Garten writes that these brownies used to fly off the shelves and that she sold "like a thousand" a week.

Garten's outrageous brownies feature two types of chocolate, instant coffee, and walnuts.

To make a serving of 20 (large) brownies, you'll need:

• 1 pound of unsalted butter
• 1 pound, plus 12 ounces, of semisweet chocolate chips
• 6 ounces of bitter chocolate
• 6 extra-large eggs
• 3 cups of chopped walnuts
• 2 ¼ cups of sugar
• 1 ¼ cups of all-purpose flour
• 3 tablespoons of instant coffee granules
• 2 tablespoons of pure vanilla extract
• 1 tablespoon of baking powder
• 1 teaspoon of salt

After preheating the oven and prepping my baking sheet, I melted the chocolate.

I set the oven to 350 degrees Fahrenheit, then buttered and floured my pan.

I had enough pans to use the bain-marie method while I was making Garten's brownies. So I melted my butter, bitter chocolate, and one pound of the chocolate chips in a saucepan that was placed over a pot of simmering water.

After combining the wet ingredients, I added the melted chocolate.

I added my eggs, vanilla, sugar, and instant coffee to a bowl. Garten says in her recipe to stir the ingredients together without beating the eggs, so be careful!

I kept stirring as I added the melted chocolate and butter, then allowed the mixture to cool to room temperature. You don't want the batter to melt the chocolate chips, which Garten says will ruin the brownies.

I sifted my dry ingredients in a separate bowl, then added them to the cooled chocolate mixture.

Before adding the chocolate chips and walnuts to my batter, I tossed them with ¼ cup of flour.

Garten says this trick helps prevent the chocolate chips and walnuts from sinking to the bottom of the brownies while they're in the oven.

I baked my brownies for 35 minutes.

After the first 20 minutes, I hit the baking sheet against the oven rack. Garten says this helps release air that builds up between the brownies and the pan during baking.

Garten's brownies tasted luscious and decadent.

Each bite of Garten's brownies tasted deliciously rich and fudgy, and I loved how much crunch the walnuts and chocolate chips added. I'm not surprised they used to be one of Garten's most popular dishes at Barefoot Contessa.

Get the full recipe for Ina Garten's outrageous brownies here.

This celebrity-chef showdown couldn't have been tighter, but if I had to pick a winner, it would be Ramsay.

There are really no losers here because both Ramsay's and Garten's recipes are delicious and easy to make, but I was a slightly bigger fan of Ramsay's dark chocolate brownies. I love the fact that, save for two bags of chocolate chips, I already had all the ingredients for Ramsay's brownies in the pantry. It's one of the quickest and easiest desserts you could make in a pinch, but it still tastes really impressive.

But Garten's brownies are still really good! And anyone who prefers a little extra crunch should give them a try as well.

Either way, you'll have a pan of delicious brownies.

• After our second child, my husband and I were struggling to balance our jobs and household admin.
• To outsource some of the cooking, I found a local chef to batch-cook meals for us once a month.
• Having a freezer packed with homemade meals saved us time, and I learned a lot from the chef.

When I returned to work after my second maternity leave, our family of four found ourselves very short on free time.

Back then, my husband and I had jobs in finance in London. We were working long hours, with video calls stretching from seven in the morning to nine at night.

On weekdays, like most families with young children, we felt like we were in a never-ending cycle of rushing everywhere. Our plates were filled with nursery drop-offs and pickups, Teams calls, making dinner, cleaning up, and getting the kids ready for bed and baths, with household chores and personal admin to be completed in what was left of our free time.

Though we had full-time childcare, we had little else in the way of daily support, as our families were not local.

In our social circle, we knew that dual-career parents with young children often bought supermarket-ready meals or ordered takeout. However, these options often felt too high in salt and sugar, and limited in their selection.

That was how I found myself posting in a Facebook group for Malaysian moms in the UK, desperately trying to find someone to cook for us.

I wasn't envisioning a personal chef who would shop and make three meals a day — our budget didn't stretch that far — rather, I hoped to find a decent home cook and had a few hours to make big, batch meals that we could freeze, then reheat on our busy weekdays.

That was how we found Evelyn.

For $150 a visit, we paid for someone to batch-cook meals for our family

Evelyn was an experienced pastry chef on furlough, like many in the food-service industry at the time — we connected in 2020, amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

She lived in a neighboring borough in London, which made our arrangement convenient. Equally as important, she was good at cooking Chinese-Malaysian dishes.

She would visit once a month, for about four to six hours. Our arrangement cost us around $150 per visit at the time. Before she arrived, we would discuss the menu over WhatsApp. Crucially, the dishes had to be easy to freeze and easy to reheat.

I would then shop for the ingredients she needed, which meant a combination of online grocery shopping and trips to Chinatown for less-common items.

On her visit, she would cook large portions of three dishes, which she further subdivided into another three family-sized portions. In total, we had around nine portions, which were then packed into containers and frozen — like a supermarket-ready meal, but tastier and probably healthier.

The meals she cooked were Malaysian Nyonya or Chinese-Malaysian dishes: ayam tempra (chicken dish), chai boey (a delicious sour and spicy stew with leftover roast meat), babi pongteh (a braised pork dish), and chicken with ginger and spring onion.

The 4-year arrangement had both expected and unexpected benefits

As a result of Evelyn's visits, we did not spend precious hours batch cooking on the weekends. We could spend our limited free time with our children.

Although her meals did not completely replace the need for us to cook, the constant everyday drudgery of preparing food was partially mitigated. On weekdays, after a long day of work calls, I would grab a container out of the fridge and pair it with plain white rice.

And the biggest unexpected benefit was that she taught us more of my culture. Though I'm Chinese-Malaysian, I was never taught how to cook growing up. When I started living independently, my cooking repertoire did not extend much beyond pasta, curry chicken, and whatever I could learn from YouTube videos.

Nothing compares to being shown what to cook and how to do it by a more experienced person. It was a learning experience for me to hunt for the ingredients that Evelyn had asked for in the local Chinese grocery store. On one of my trips, I had gotten a vegetable that I believed to be kai choy (Chinese mustard green), only to be told by Evelyn that it was choy sum (Chinese flowering cabbage).

By watching her, I also learned about different types of tofu and which work best for various dishes, plus how to get a good sear on meat (very high heat and a willingness to tolerate oil splatter).

Evelyn continued to come to our place every month or so until we left London about four years later. We did not restart an arrangement like this in our new place, as the kids were older and our jobs were more flexible.

I am a firm believer that you have to make your own village in this modern world, especially for those of us who have found careers far away from our families of origin. So I am forever grateful to Evelyn for her help in the intense years with babies and young children.

We had been looking for a "batch-cooking service," but instead we got a stand-in "aunty."

• Amazon's sales of fresh groceries like seafood and produce are growing fast, new data show.
• The retail giant is also gaining market share against more traditional retailers, Nielsen IQ found.
• The data shows momentum for Amazon in a business it's spent years trying to break into.

Amazon is gaining ground in grocery thanks to items like fresh shrimp and berries.

Roughly a year after expanding same-day fresh grocery delivery to thousands of cities and towns in the US, Amazon's perishable grocery sales are booming — and taking market share from traditional retailers, according to data from market research firm Nielsen IQ.

Sales of groceries such as seafood, dairy, and produce on Amazon increased severalfold between June and August, per Nielsen IQ's data. Amazon also posted market share gains in the food category for the year through late August as traditional grocery stores lost it, Nielsen found.

"Shoppers are increasingly embracing Amazon for categories that historically represented one of the largest barriers to online grocery adoption," Nielsen wrote in its report.

Amazon has spent years trying to break into grocery, though it hasn't hit a home run in the category as it did with books or cloud computing. The company acquired Whole Foods, opened and shuttered another brick-and-mortar grocery chain, and created a selection of private-label groceries, among other steps.

The Nielsen IQ data suggest that Amazon's latest push — toward delivering fresh groceries quickly across much of the US — is yielding some results in the competitive grocery space.

Many of the shoppers buying fresh foods on Amazon come from households with incomes over $100,000 and tend to be older, according to Nielsen IQ. They also tend to be frequent Amazon users, placing more orders and spending more money on the platform than an average user.

That means fresh groceries, one of the most frequent purchases for US households, are "a potentially important lever for increasing shopper frequency and overall spend" on Amazon, the report reads.

To keep the momentum going, Amazon will need to take on formidable rivals. One is Walmart, which already uses its stores and its own army of gig workers to deliver groceries same-day.

Amazon is considering opening about 1,000 same-day fulfillment centers around the US by 2031, Business Insider reported in September. That move would create the same sort of advantage that Walmart has by placing more fulfillment centers close to more customers, one analyst said.

Do you have a story idea about Amazon's retail operations? Contact this reporter at abitter@businessinsider.com or via encrypted messaging app Signal at 808-854-4501. Use a personal email address, a nonwork WiFi network, and a nonwork device; here's our guide to sharing information securely.

There is virtually no way I could have resisted Sylvie McNamara’s dispatch from her journey to a disreputable McDonald’s in Stafford, Virginia. I’ve listened to my share of the Doughboys podcast, and regularly debate burger rankings with my son. What’s more, I went to high school just two miles down the road from this particular location, whose aggregated Google reviews won it dubious distinction in a nation of interchangeable fast-food franchises. Thankfully, McNamara’s lighthearted investigation, which invites readers to consider Robert Caro and teenage commitments to the social contract, will satisfy you no matter your relationship with the Golden Arches. It reminded me of tongue-in-cheek alt-weekly features, a few pleasurable Paris Review web essays, and that episode of Mystery Show where Starlee Kine goes deep with a Ticketmaster employee. Ba-da-ba-ba-ba, I loved it.

I asked the employee for an explanation. “I think I can give you real insight,” he said. “It be the certain workers we got.” He himself is a high schooler, but he said that “we’re starting to get more younger managers. As soon as they turn 18, they’re getting a manager spot. I think my general manager’s 20. It’s a lot of kids getting these manager titles and positions, but they’re not really managers.”

I told him that to be honest, that environment sounded kind of fun.

• I recently visited LongHorn Steakhouse as the chain reports positive sales growth this year.
• Many casual-dining chains are struggling, but LongHorn is performing surprisingly well.
• I thought the food was high quality and a great value for the cost.

LongHorn Steakhouse is having a moment.

While many casual-dining chains continue to struggle, LongHorn has posted some of the strongest sales growth in Darden Restaurants' portfolio.

In the fiscal first quarter, which ended August 30, LongHorn same-store sales rose 6.2% from a year earlier, outpacing sister chain Olive Garden, whose same-store sales rose 1.1%. LongHorn's overall sales across all locations increased by nearly 11% to $861 million, making it Darden's fastest-growing major chain that quarter.

During the company's earnings call, CFO Raj Vennam said LongHorn's first-quarter sales growth reflected both stronger sales at existing restaurants and the expansion of its footprint. LongHorn grew from 595 to 624 restaurants over the past year.

LongHorn's success is not a recent comeback, but rather a steady rise to the top. In the preceding quarter, which ended May 31, LongHorn's same-store sales rose 9.5%, while total sales increased nearly 22% to more than $1 billion. Darden credited a record-breaking Mother's Day weekend and strong lamb-chop sales for the results.

The chain has now posted positive same-store sales for 22 consecutive quarters, and its sales at existing restaurants have climbed 17% over the past three years.

Still, it's a tough time for casual dining.

Applebee's same-store sales fell 1.8% year-over-year in its most recent quarter, while Cracker Barrel's sales at existing locations fell 2.1% and its total revenue declined 2.2%.

In an environment where chain restaurants are constantly competing for customers, I wanted to find out what about the Texas-inspired steakhouse chain was drawing people in.

I visited LongHorn for the first time and was surprised by the quality of the food, generous portions, and overall value for the price.

I tried LongHorn Steakhouse for the first time to see what the hype was about.

LongHorn Steakhouse has quietly become one of casual dining’s biggest success stories, and recently outpaced its sister brand, Olive Garden, in same-store sales growth.

I’d never been before, so I brought a friend along to our nearest location in Queens, New York, to see whether the food, atmosphere, and value lived up to the hype.

The restaurant felt much warmer and more polished than I expected.

I expected a fairly standard chain-restaurant experience, but the entryway felt inviting right away.

The stone accents, dark wood, and low lighting gave it a cozy, classic steakhouse atmosphere. It was casual, but it did not feel cheap. I could see why it would potentially work for both casual weeknight dinners and slightly more special celebrations.

Despite visiting on a Friday night during the dinner rush, we were seated quickly in a booth at the busy shopping center location.

The dining room was busy, but it still felt comfortable and relaxed.

The restaurant had plenty of tables, yet it did not feel overly crowded or chaotic. The warm lighting made the large dining room feel more intimate. It was definitely family-friendly, but couples and groups of friends were also dining there.

About halfway through our meal, one of the tables next to us broke into a rendition of "Happy Birthday" for a guest.

I also thought the vibe was much more polished than a typical casual chain. It was more on par with chains like Red Lobster than slightly more casual ones like Chili's or Applebee's.

The menu had a surprisingly broad selection beyond just steak and sides.

LongHorn’s menu is centered on steak, but there were plenty of chicken, seafood, salad, burger, and sandwich options, too.

Even though I went in wanting to understand the chain’s steakhouse appeal, there were enough tempting appetizers and sides that narrowing down our order was harder than I expected.

My friend and I started off with a round of cocktails.

A steakhouse dinner calls for a drink, and the classic "Perfect" margarita ($11.49) was a refreshing — and surprisingly inexpensive — way to start the meal.

It was ice-cold and citrusy, served in a generously sized glass with an extra shaker on the side. My friend ordered the Texas tea ($10.99), LongHorn's version of a Long Island iced tea, which she said was sweet and not too strong.

We were both impressed by the price and serving size of our drinks — they were on par with what we'd spend at a dive bar in Brooklyn, but with much better service and flavor.

The complimentary bread was a nice start to the meal.

The bread arrived warm with a side of butter before our appetizers hit the table. It had a slightly sweet, honey-wheat flavor and a tender texture.

It was simple, and probably could have had a better crust — but it was free.

The stuffed mushrooms were one of the meal’s first real surprises.

We ordered the white cheddar stuffed mushrooms ($12.29) as an appetizer, and they arrived bubbling hot in a rich, creamy four-cheese sauce that reminded us slightly of Alfredo pasta sauce.

The mushroom caps were tender without becoming soggy and had a slightly salty flavor.

The cheesy filling gave them a savory, indulgent flavor that made them feel like a true steakhouse starter.

It was the kind of appetizer that disappeared quickly, and one I'd definitely order again. I had to remind myself to save room for the rest of our food.

Around the same time as our appetizer, our server brought out my salad course.

The lettuce was crisp, the generous helping of croutons added good crunch, and the dressing had plenty of flavor. It was a classic steakhouse Caesar; it did exactly what it needed to do, but it wasn't anything mind-blowing.

It was also more than big enough to share with another person as a way to add something fresh before our richer entrées.

The ribeye steak and loaded baked potato made for a filling, indulgent entrée without an over-the-top price tag.

For my entrée, I ordered the ribeye steak ($30.79), which came with the aforementioned Caesar salad and one side. I chose the loaded baked potato, which came topped with cheddar cheese, sour cream, bacon, and green onions.

The steak arrived with a flavorful sear and a side that felt like a meal in itself. Together, the plate felt hearty and indulgent without being unnecessarily over-the-top. It was easy to see how a diner could leave feeling like they got their money’s worth.

The loaded baked potato was fluffy inside and piled high with toppings.

The potato was rich and comforting, with a soft, fluffy center, while the potato's outer shell was perfectly crispy.

I appreciated that LongHorn did not skimp on the toppings. It helped make the entrée feel more complete and substantial, without having to upgrade to a premium side.

The steak was surprisingly tender and well-seasoned.

The steak had a savory, well-seasoned crust that added a lot of peppery flavor, but the true magic lay within.

Inside the tender ribeye, the meat was buttery and unbelievably juicy. It was not trying to be a high-end steakhouse steak, but it was extremely satisfying for the price. I ordered the steak medium-rare, and it came out at the right temperature.

This was the dish that made LongHorn’s popularity click for me.

Instead of ordering a main entrée, my friend ordered a side of roasted Brussels sprouts and the mac and cheese.

The crispy Brussels sprouts ($6.49) were roasted just enough to caramelize while still holding their shape and flavor.

The mac and cheese was a standout part of our meal.

The steakhouse mac and cheese ($6.49) had a rich, creamy sauce and a browned topping that added texture, while bacon bits added even more savory, smoky flavor.

It was exactly the kind of comforting side I want with a steakhouse meal.

If you weren't ordering it as a main dish, the portion was also plenty large enough to share, especially alongside everything else we ordered.

I preferred this chain-restaurant mac and cheese to others I've tried.

By the end of dinner, I understood completely why LongHorn is winning over value-conscious diners.

The food was more polished than I expected, the portions were generous, and the experience felt like a real sit-down dinner rather than a quick chain-restaurant meal after a day at the mall.

We ordered two drinks, an appetizer, a salad, a steak, and multiple hearty sides, yet our bill for two still came in under $100 before tip. With the tip, we paid $103.83.

By the time we left, I could see exactly why LongHorn has become a go-to for diners who want a steakhouse meal without steakhouse prices — and I'll definitely be back for more.