Former Golden Arches execs look to bring health to fast food

The big dude with the tattoos and a bad case of five o’clock shadow served up a plate of roasted kabocha squash, organic brussels sprouts, and free-range chicken breast. None of this would have been worth noting had the dish been just another locavore delicacy, prepared by just another hipster chef, during just another lunch hour here among the food-obsessed in Palo Alto, California.

But this artfully arranged plate—the chicken breaded and “unfried,” the veggies tossed with parsley and chives in a Dijon vinaigrette, all sprinkled with dried cranberries—was something else. It was the future.

I had come to the artisanally fed vale of Facebook and Tesla to sample the first fruits of Lyfe Kitchen, a soon-to-be-chain of restaurants that might just shift the calculus of American cuisine. At Lyfe Kitchen (the name is an acronym for Love Your Food Everyday), all the cookies shall be dairy-free, all the beef from grass-fed, humanely raised cows. At Lyfe Kitchen there shall be no butter, no cream, no white sugar, no white flour, no high-fructose corn syrup, no GMOs, no trans fats, no additives, and no need for alarm: There will still be plenty of burgers, not to mention manifold kegs of organic beer and carafes of biodynamic wine. None of this would seem surprising if we were talking about one or 10 or even 20 outposts nationwide. But Lyfe’s ambition is to open hundreds of restaurants around the country, in the span of just five years.

Read the rest at Wired.