I just returned from San Francisco where I served on a panel of trendspotters at the 38th Winter Fancy Food Show. The show is the largest marketplace for specialty foods and beverages on the West Coast, with 80,000 products on display including cheeses, snacks, olive oils, vinegars, chocolate, and natural and organic products from the U.S. and 35 other countries and regions. To learn more about the show, go to Specialty Food. There was a lot to look at and taste but some trends were evident. Here’s what we selected for the top five food trends of 2013 (along with some examples of the products and producers within each trend).
Botanical Beverages
Numi Organics: Broccoli Cilantro Tea
Wild Poppy Juice Co.: Blood Orange Chili Juice
The Republic of Tea: Moringa SuperHerb Tea
Oil Nouveau
Arette Foods: Organic Tea Seed Oil with Sundried Tomatoes & Chili Pepper
Culinary Imports: Stöger Cherry Seed, Chile Seed and Tomato Seed Oils
La Tourangelle Artisan Oils: Organic Coconut Oil
Blue Cheese Redux
Bissinger’s Handcrafted Chocolatier: Point Reyes Blue Cheese Wine Grapes
Rogue Creamery: Blue Heaven Blue Cheese Powder
Mt. Sterling Co-op Creamery: Smoked Sterling Bleu Goat Cheese
So Many Seeds
Enjoy Life Natural Brands: Crunchy Flax Chia Cereal
K.L. Keller Imports: Dukkah
Lundberg Family Farms: Hemp-a-Licious Organic Rice Cakes
Top Banana
Vosges Haut-Chocolat: Wild Ophelia Peanut Butter & Banana Milk Chocolate Bar,
PB Crave: CoCo Bananas Peanut Butter
GoodPop: Frozen Banana Cinnamon Pops
Other trends identified are fruit-infused vinegars, chips with a healthy glow such as fuji apple chips, peppery sweets such as cayenne shortbread, agave, and single-serve sizes.
