ROCKVILLE, Md., Nov. 16, 2017 /PRNewswire/ -- From market
research firm Packaged Facts, here are ten food trends (listed in
alphabetical order) that you'll probably be seeing or start seeing
more of in 2018. The trends are based on our upcoming 2018 Food
Forecast ebook available soon on the company's website.
- Aloha. The Zombies are back, along with the craft
cocktail movement and the relighting of the torch for Tiki bars,
with their outré, escapist karma. More than that, it's about the
foodways of culturally polyglot Hawaii, where the East and West do meet.
Poke has already swept the mainland. There's also Moco Loco and
(you knew this was coming) Spam in sushi. Keep an eye out for
malasadas, the Portuguese-origin eggy donuts iconic in Hawaii and popular in California.
Hawaiian foods are DNAed for fusion, and especially primed for
cities and eaters with complicated cultural geographies.
- Color Is the New Sugar. In a good way. The
eye candy colors of high-antioxidant botanicals signal natural and
healthy, even if it's your matcha donut from Brooklyn's Dough or vegan turmeric ice cream
from Van Leeuwen. Chefs have
increasingly taken on a Jean Arp-ian
aesthetic of juxtaposing and layering, more than blending, food
ingredients and colorsꟷwith sushi as hero on one hand, and the
sensually duo-tone egg on the other. In this corner, too, the beet
goes on: earthy, vivid, and almost-too-familiar yet endlessly
reinvented, beet continues to gain traction, including for its
color bleed. Plus there's purple cauliflower.
- Cracked Pepper Is the New Sea Salt. Peppercorns
are eaten cracked, just as salt pretty much comes from the sea, but
that's not the point, especially for mass-market salty snack
products. Calling out black or cracked pepper in chips and crackers
says you're more than conventionally serious about bringing it with
flavor. Pepper is also flexing its flavor muscle in artisanal
foods, including for dessert. Pepper has come to the fore partly
because of the renaissance of interest in cured meatsꟷpastrami and
pancetta, plus gravlax, as a Nordic variation on smoked salmon or
lox.
- Everything Ancien Is New Again. If French
cuisine no longer rules the roost like she used to, given our
globalized food culture, she remains a very spirited Dowager Queen.
In the wake of macaron mania, a revival in interest in French
cuisine has stormed menus high and low: foie gras, tartare,
charcuterie, and confit in fine and upscale casual dining, an
avalanche of crème fraiche, and those fast-food brioche buns.
French Revival shares the stage well with the artisanal food
movement's emphasis on tradition, technique, and passionate
standards.
- Featuring Fig. Apples are great, berries may be
better, but fresh figs just have more going on. They also
have been doing it longer, with the easily propagated fig going
back to the salad days of Middle Eastern and Mediterranean Rim
agriculture. Chefs and specialty foods call out varietals,
including for regional notes with the California Black Mission fig
or the Turkish Calimyrna. In restaurants, figs' home base is fine
dining, but upscale casual dining is where the growth has been. Fig
brings star power to sweet & savory, and you can make it a
double feature with fresh figs plus a balsamic fig vinaigrette or a
fig-bacon jam.
- Meatballs on a Roll, and Spreading. Where there's
been meat, there have been meatballs — from
Italy to Sweden to Japan (chicken-based tsukune),
India (lentil
idli), and back to the Mediterranean rim
(falafel). This global comfort food form has apotheosed into a menu
specialty, celebrated in meatball-only concepts such as The
Meatball Shop. Think of global and next-gen meatballs as a spinoff
of the hyper-creative, consumer-welcomed alternative burger trend.
And Meat isn't just on a roll, it's also spreading.
Nduja salumi from Calabria and
pork rillette from France, both
soft with pork fat, are showing up on breads and pizzas, in
sandwiches, and as umami flavoring in sauces.
- Pistachio Country Transcontinental. Pistachios are
"re-glamorized and nutritious." This brightly colored, deeply
flavored, and protein-packed nut has still legs, suiting up sweet
or savory for Mediterranean, Middle Eastern, or Indian or
regional-accented California/Southwestern dishes. Then-newer
products such as Sahale Snacks Moroccan-spiced Pomegranate
Pistachios pointed the way by combining nut appeal, superfood cues,
and foreign accents for exotic-but-accessible food innovation with
global game.
- Sheep in Wolves' Clothing. Or rather, non-meats in
meat formats, taking turkey bacon one degree of separation further
while stopping well short of lab meat. Veggie and black bean
burgers have escalated into restaurant concepts such as Beefsteak
(tomato beefsteak, that is) by José Andrés in Washington, and to menu offerings such as the
shiitake bacon at Gunshow (Brazilian churrascaria meets
Chinese dim sum) in Atlanta.
- Sweet Potato Isn't Just for Southern Accents
Anymore. Along with dwelling in the inner sanctum of
Soul/Southern food and giving potato fries a run for their money,
sweet potato has been speaking in many tongues in cheffy
restaurants. Predating Columbus, the sweet potato has always
been farm/garden-to-table south of the border, and today's chefs
and specialty food producers are re-connecting the dots. Or take
another trade route and ply sweet potato with fusion flavorings
such as dukkah, miso, paprika, or shishito, or cross the waters to
pair with Kabocha squash. For a multicultural health halo,
pair with blue/purple corn or quinoa, ginger or
turmeric. Like beets, sweet potatoes also bring
stick-to-your ribs ballast and gorgeous color to vegetarian/vegan
plates. As with cauliflower and corn, there are also
the purples, including the Filipino ube, called out in
Packaged Facts' 2017 Forecast: Culinary Trend Tracking
Series.
- Vegan and Non-GMO Are the New Green Badges of Food
Formulation Courage. With packaged food innovation
focused on clean label, vegan and non-GMO have become all-star
package callouts, raising the ante on organic and all-natural.
Vegan is a positive cue even among those who are merely friends of
vegetarians or vegans, as has also been the case with
gluten-free.
About Our Food & Beverage Research
Packaged Facts is the trusted resource for food and beverage
industry trends and analysis. View our full catalog of food
industry market research reports at:
https://www.packagedfacts.com/food-beverage-market-c84/.
About Packaged Facts
Packaged Facts, a division of MarketResearch.com, publishes
market intelligence on a wide range of consumer market topics,
including consumer demographics and shopper insights, consumer
financial products and services, consumer goods and retailing,
consumer packaged goods, and pet products and services.
Packaged Facts also offers a full range of custom research
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Daniel Granderson
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dgranderson@marketresearch.com
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