2021 Food Trends- Readers' Selection
If this year’s holiday gifts are any indicator of what friends and family believe will be essential for surviving 2021, then we’re looking at two things: delicious food—or anything which resembles it—and home entertainment.
Scanning the bounty under the tree, I spy Heath’s BBQ from South Carolina; Blackberry Patch pure cane syrup from Georgia; homemade blue berry and raspberry jams; B’s Caramel Drop sauce; and balsamic vinegar from Modena, Italy. The coffee cardamom cookies sent by my granddaughter Nicole, and “made in a COVID-free home with clean hands and masks,” were consumed as soon as they arrived. Her older sister Leah’s zucchini muffins were stashed away in the freezer for post-holiday breakfasts. A purple velvet pomegranate was added to the dining room holiday centerpiece. Three pastel macaron ornaments went right on the Christmas tree as soon as the present was opened. The remaining other gifts were stay-at-home-friendly: Toni Morrison’s book of poetry; a 1000-piece puzzle of Paris monuments; and a Wine Life “snarky” coloring book for adults.
The Covid-19 takeover
It is no surprise that last year’s Coronavirus vortex swept up every aspect of our life. Amid the many social and economic upheavals, we reinvented the way we lived. With that reality, let’s take a moment to reflect on these changes and how they will carry over into the new year. In this two-part post, we’ll start with what you, the readers, predict as hot trends. Next week, we’ll pass the baton to the pundits and see how our predictions stand up to theirs. Given its importance, as illustrated by the gifts I received, the focus will be on food and beverage. What are the behavioral shifts in our eating and drinking habits?
Diane McComber, former food scientist who lives in Phoenix, Arizona, remarked how surprised she was by the number of people discovering they could cook and even found the process satisfying. She predicts that Americans will continue this newfound passion to cook at home in 2021.
Pivoting to keep business alive
Susan Sokol-Blosser—whose family owns one of Oregon’s original wineries, Sokol-Blosser Winery—commented on the survival mechanism utilized by chefs and restaurants across the country. Using her winery in the Willamette Valley as an example, “When the winery tasting room had to shut down and we only did curbside pickup, our winery chef started doing meal kits on weekends. At the start they went mainly to cellar club members and family but now they have a broader audience and are available Friday through Monday. He also did Thanksgiving, Christmas, and New Year’s. Now I see restaurants doing the same thing, like the venerable but trendy Higgins in downtown Portland. The restaurants that are succeeding have learned to pivot.”
From the newsroom to the kitchen
Susan continued. “I think the NY Times Cooking app must have seen a huge expansion. I read it every day now, looking for interesting things that sound good.” Turns out Susan was right. The NYT was on to something big. When they launched their food app in 2014 it was offered for free. They decided to charge for it in 2017 and quickly amassed 120,000 subscribers. A year later, it ballooned to four million. In early 2020, their success, based on a library of 19,000 recipes plus the addition of a video component, allowed them to raise their rate from $15 to $17 a month. Their on-line food preparation platform morphed into home entertainment. A digital cookbook and a possible NYT cooking show are predicted in the near future.
Baking up a storm
Susan also pointed out the increased popularity in home baking during lockdown. “And baking—did I tell you about the book Rage Baking: The Transformative Power of Flour, Fury, and Women’s Voices, by Kathy Gunst and Katherine Alford? You know how baking took off—flour and yeast shelves were empty for a long time.” Indeed, Susan was correct. When I set about my marathon baking project last month, it was impossible to find all the required ingredients in just one store. In the end, I went to five stores around town to get everything I needed.
Dalgona coffee and hot cocoa bombs to the rescue
My eldest granddaughter, Leah Patel-Lauber, noticed two new food trends. She claims that if a trend has legs via social media, it has a good chance of sticking. “In terms of trendy foods, the two I've noticed the most this past year have been: Dalgona coffee (a whipped coffee drink) and Hot cocoa bombs. As she describes them, this is “a ball of chocolate with marshmallows and hot cocoa mix in them, you pour hot milk over it in your mug and as the chocolate melts, the marshmallows and cocoa mix are exposed and mix in. Both are very Instagram-able.”
A proliferation of crab restaurants
Her sister, Nicole Lauber, who also lives in Florida, has noticed that lots of food halls and ghost kitchens (delivery only restaurants) are popping up in St. Pete. “That's probably not super unique compared to other major cities! But it is exciting for us nonetheless to have so many grab-and-go options with differing cuisines. Takeout and delivery have definitely been our speed this year with the pandemic.”
Another local trend she’s followed is the abundance of crab restaurants cropping up in her area. “It’s bizarre—I can count five crab restaurants in St. Pete that have opened up all within the past year. We’ve tried to figure out why, but nothing quite makes sense. Florida’s Fish & Wildlife Conservation Commission has actually set new guidelines this year to minimize the overfishing of crabs. One of my friends is convinced it’s a money laundering scheme, which oddly seems possible! “
America’s appetite for throwback comfort food
Joan Brower, New York City travel and luxury goods marketing guru, attributes this obsession with food in 2020 to a number of factors: “Unsurprisingly, and due to the home cooking requirement combined with high stress levels, there's clearly been an explosion of desire for anxiety-reducing comfort food like meatloaf, mashed potatoes, pasta, breads (especially sourdough and banana), cake/cookies/tarts, ice cream, and old-fashioned breakfast foods such as pancakes, waffles, and bacon.”
In New York City, as well as around the country, online food shopping and food delivery services are booming, she also noted.
Kids taking over the kitchen
According to Joan, another byproduct of staying at home last year is more kids in the kitchen. To confirm her theory Joan told me about “The three-year-old granddaughter of one of my friends is already a pro in the kitchen, working alongside her dad!”
Many of us have witnessed this trend. My goddaughters, Zoe and Mei, take over the kitchen every time they are home from college. Much to the delight of their parents, they have embraced the role of menu planners and home cooks in between their on-line classes at Wooster College.
A surge in alcohol consumption
On the beverage front, Joan has observed that “the chemistry of cocktails has taken off as a universal interest, more intense than ever.” Here are a number of different aspects of the trend she has followed:
1. Wine and spirits budgets have soared! People are home and drinking more, a combination of boredom, anxiety, and no worries about drinking and driving.
2. Increasing amount of Zoom and FaceTime Happy Hours as a means of connecting friends and family for an evening of socially distanced drinking together.
3. The creation of bigger and better home bars!
4. Unique combinations of mixed drinks, with alcohol added to some of the everyday, mundane beverages like coffee, tea, milkshakes, and cola.
5. The continuing return to retro classic cocktails -- the nostalgic symbols of a simpler time.
6. Pre-batched cocktails sold in individual patches and perfect for takeout meals.
7. And one of the most unusual (to me) that I've been reading about -- cocktail microwave infusions (heat blasts the ingredients together to "mix" cocktail flavors faster to both integrate and soften the flavors.”
While Joan is reluctant to try this last one—she prefers her Macallan 12 with just one ice cube—she is correct that people have dramatically increased their consumption of alcohol. The pandemic has been a boon to retail alcohol sales of all kinds. Consumers are not only drinking more but also trading up by purchasing more premium brands. Until the effectiveness of a Covid-19 vaccine becomes a reality, I predict this trend will continue in the foreseeable future.
So, let’s sit back, make ourselves a cocktail from our enhanced home bar and enjoy the moment. Next week we’ll dive deeper into the topic of food and beverage trends. Our goal will be to see how our observations net out against those of the pros. Stay tuned!