---
title: "Menu Tracker: New items from Chipotle, McDonald’s, and Sonic"
url: https://burnaze.com/article/ef05ade2-9ee4-4d75-8515-cd3740639411
source: "Nation's Restaurant News"
original_url: https://www.nrn.com/fast-casual/menu-tracker-new-items-from-chipotle-mcdonald-s-and-sonic
author: "Bret Thorn"
category: "Burger"
industry: "Restaurants"
segment: "Burger"
published: 2026-10-30T14:06:57.000Z
modified: 2026-10-31T13:18:52.119Z
image: https://eu-images.contentstack.com/v3/assets/bltea7aee2fca050a19/blt9bc1166145e04ad5/6ae4a8f8fe8087c125937357/menu_tracker_103026.png?width=720&quality=80&disable=upscale
---

# Menu Tracker: New items from Chipotle, McDonald’s, and Sonic

**TL;DR:** Major quick-service chains including Chipotle, McDonald's, and Sonic are rolling out new menu items to drive fourth-quarter traffic. The new items include seasonal menu innovations and celebrity collaborations.

*By Bret Thorn, originally published in Nation's Restaurant News on 2026-10-30. [Read the original](https://www.nrn.com/fast-casual/menu-tracker-new-items-from-chipotle-mcdonald-s-and-sonic).*

## Story

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.

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.

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.

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.

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

## Entities

- QSR (sector)
- menu pricing (topic)
- McDonald's (company)
- Nation's Restaurant News (publication)
- Chipotle (company)
- seasonal menu (topic)
- Sonic (company)
- Bret Thorn (person)
- celebrity collaborations (topic)
- q4 traffic (topic)

---
Originally reported by Bret Thorn, Nation's Restaurant News (https://www.nrn.com/fast-casual/menu-tracker-new-items-from-chipotle-mcdonald-s-and-sonic). Summarized by Burnaze (https://burnaze.com/article/ef05ade2-9ee4-4d75-8515-cd3740639411).