Molly Baz joins Sweetgreen as chef in residence

Molly Baz becomes Sweetgreen's first chef in residence on September 29, with three menu items built around her own dill pickle mayo running through November 9.

The cookbook author and recipe developer designed three dishes for the fast-casual chain: the Big Dill Caesar Wrap, the Pickle Caesar Salad and the Double Chick Scoop. Each centers on a dilly chicken salad made with Ayoh's Dill Pickle Mayo, the avocado-oil condiment Baz launched under her own brand.

Zipporah Allen, Sweetgreen's chief commercial officer, said Baz "approaches food with curiosity, conviction and a very clear point of view on what makes something delicious." Baz framed the collaboration as a mission against bland lunches: "I'm on a mission to put an end to boring sandwiches and sad lunches — and that includes wraps."

A cookbook author now writes the specials board instead of the index.

Sweetgreen built the launch around a campaign called Lunch Means Business, which casts Baz as a fictional executive running her workday through tastings instead of meetings. The tone borrows from 1990s corporate culture, a deliberate contrast with the chain's usual wellness-forward marketing.

Sweetgreen's new chef-in-residence model

The title is new for Sweetgreen, which has worked with outside names on limited menus before but not under a recurring program. Baz arrives with an audience of her own: two cookbooks, Cook This Book and More Is More, a recipe club, and Ayoh, the mayo brand she founded after leaving Bon Appetit's video team.

For Sweetgreen, the tie-in offers a shortcut to relevance among home cooks who already follow Baz's recipes, at a moment when fast-casual brands are competing hard on menu novelty rather than price, the same pressure pushing chains like Chipotle into new international joint ventures.

Six weeks to prove the format works

The menu runs for six weeks, short enough to read as a trial. If Sweetgreen repeats the format with another chef, Baz's run becomes the template the next one is measured against.

The novelty push comes as parts of the fast-casual sector show financial strain: a seven-unit Dave's Hot Chicken franchisee filed for Chapter 11 bankruptcy this month, even as its parent chain keeps expanding. Sweetgreen has not said whether pricing on the three items differs from its standard salads and wraps, or whether any will graduate to the permanent menu after November 9.