New on the Menu: Variations on a Scotch egg, pan con tomate, and scrapple
Plus pork belly with clams and a Martini-spritz mashup.
June 12, 2026
A Scotch egg — a deep-fried hard-boiled egg wrapped in sausage — is a classic British pub snack, so it stands to reason that it would translate into bar food in the United States. That’s just what happened at King Tai in Brooklyn, N.Y.
The neighborhood has been gentrified in recent years, attracting hipsters, including plenty of vegetarians, so the owners swapped out the sausage for risotto.
Scrapple is a traditional breakfast food among the Pennsylvania Dutch, and it’s given local flair at 82 Acres in Portland, Ore., thanks in particular to the pork head and trotters that come from its affiliated farm.
And pan con tomate is a revered snack in much of Spain, particularly the Northeast, and it has been reinterpreted at Heretik in Denver, and turned into a premium item thanks to Santa Barbara sea urchin.
A Martini is turned into a Spritz at Felice in New York City, and the Portuguese dish of pork belly and clams is treated with West Coast sensibility at Bar Esper in San Francisco.
Contact Bret Thorn at [email protected]
Follow him on TikTok and Instagram: @foodwriterdiary
About the Author
Bret Thorn
Senior Food Editor, Nation's Restaurant News
Senior Food & Beverage Editor
Bret Thorn is senior food & beverage editor of Nation’s Restaurant News and Restaurant Hospitality.
Hi is responsible for spotting and reporting on F&B trends across the country for both publications.
He is the co-host of a podcast, Menu Talk with Pat and Bret, which features interviews with chefs, food & beverage authorities, and other experts in foodservice operations.
From 2005 to 2008 he also wrote the Kitchen Dish column for The New York Sun, covering restaurant openings and chefs’ career moves in New York City.
He joined Nation’s Restaurant News in 1999 after spending about five years in Thailand, where he wrote articles about business, banking and finance as well as restaurant reviews and food columns for Manager magazine and Asia Times newspaper. He joined Restaurant Hospitality’s staff in 2016 while retaining his position at NRN.
A magna cum laude graduate of Tufts University in Medford, Mass., with a bachelor’s degree in history, and a member of Phi Beta Kappa, Thorn also studied traditional French cooking at Le Cordon Bleu Ecole de Cuisine in Paris. He spent his junior year of college in China, studying Chinese language, history and culture for a semester each at Nanjing University and Beijing University. While in Beijing, he also worked for ABC News during the protests and ultimate crackdown in and around Tiananmen Square in 1989.
Thorn’s monthly column in Nation’s Restaurant News won the 2006 Jesse H. Neal National Business Journalism Award for best staff-written editorial or opinion column.
He served as president of the International Foodservice Editorial Council, or IFEC, in 2005.
Thorn wrote the entry on comfort food in the Oxford Encyclopedia of Food and Drink in America, 2nd edition, published in 2012. He also wrote a history of plated desserts for the Oxford Companion to Sugar and Sweets, published in 2015.
He was inducted into the Disciples d’Escoffier in 2014.
A Colorado native originally from Denver, Thorn lives in Brooklyn, N.Y.
Bret Thorn’s areas of expertise include food and beverage trends in restaurants, French cuisine, the cuisines of Asia in general and Thailand in particular, restaurant operations and service trends.
Bret Thorn’s Experience:
Nation’s Restaurant News, food & beverage editor, 1999-Present
New York Sun, columnist, 2005-2008
Asia Times, sub editor, 1995-1997
Manager magazine, senior editor and restaurant critic, 1992-1997
ABC News, runner, May-July, 1989
Education:
Tufts University, BA in history, 1990
Peking University, studied Chinese language, spring, 1989
Nanjing University, studied Chinese language and culture, fall, 1988
Le Cordon Bleu Ecole de Cuisine, Cértificat Elémentaire, 1986
Email: [email protected]
Social Media:
LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/bret-thorn-468b663/
Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/bret.thorn.52
Twitter: @foodwriterdiary
Instagram: @foodwriterdiary
TikTok: @foodwriterdiary
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