What Will We Eat in 2020? Something Toasted, Something Blue

Kim Severson wrote . . . . . . . . .

If you’re the sort of person who uses the annual avalanche of food and drink predictions as an anthropological window into the state of the American psyche, prepare for a stripped-down, no-nonsense 2020.

Mold and sobriety will be popular. Porridges like jook and arroz caldo are the new comfort foods. Saving the planet will have a new urgency, so bring your own mug to the coffee shop and learn to embrace the term “plant-based.”

“There is a sense that the rose-colored glasses are off,” said Andrew Freeman, president of AF&Co., the San Francisco consulting firm that for 12 years has published a food and hospitality trend report. This year’s is titled “We’re Not in Kansas Anymore.”

“The world just feels different,” Mr. Freeman said. “The labor market is tight, the political landscape is a mess. All of us are trying to navigate it.”

That doesn’t mean we can’t have some fun, though. If the forecasters can be believed, joy will be found in towers of buttered toast piled with ice cream, sourdough doughnuts, CBD-infused everything and even more fried chicken sandwiches.

Here, then, is a sampling of what could be in store for 2020.

Country of the Year: Japan

That recent Instagram uptick in soufflé pancakes and the fish-shaped ice cream cones called taiyaki isn’t a coincidence. With the 2020 Summer Olympics set for Tokyo and a rise in travel to Japan, the country’s influence will extend into the American culinary landscape, said Amanda Topper, associate director of food service for Mintel, the global market research company. Trendspotters also predict more interest in food from India, with a special emphasis on spicy Keralan dishes built from rice, coconut and fish, as well as foods from West Africa, Vietnam and Laos.

Cause of the Year: The Planet

As farmers grapple with climate change and consumers grow increasingly concerned about the environmental impact of what they eat, restaurants and food producers are doubling down on earth-friendly ingredients and practices. Vegan dishes and meat alternatives will show up on more menus, both fine-dining and fast-food. Regenerative farmers, who focus on soil health, are the new organic farmers. Chefs are exploring how to cook cover crops like peas and buckwheat, which regenerative farmers plant between harvests as a way to improve soil, control weeds and sequester carbon. Look for more edible and biodegradable packaging, and reusable everything, from cups to cutlery. “The companies that will win in the next 10 years will be those that fuel the new era of conscious consumption,” said Jenny Zegler, the associate director of food and drink research for Mintel.

Color of the Year: Blue

The hue started catching the eye of tastemakers a few years ago, but this year blue and its moody sibling, indigo, are expected to color more food. Butterfly pea powder tea (the new matcha!) is showing up in moon milk, a sleep remedy that is the latest adaptation of ayurvedic tradition. Ube, a purple yam, is the new “It” root vegetable; orach, also called mountain spinach, could be the new kale. Pop culture seems to be driving this one: Pantone has declared classic blue its color of the year, and blue food plays an outsize role in the novels of Percy Jackson, whose musical “The Lightning Thief” is on Broadway.

Toasted

The latest star imported from Asian tea shops is brick toast, built from thick slices of pain de mie that are scored, buttered, toasted and covered in sweet custard, syrup or ice cream. Variations on the dish, sometimes called honey toast, abound in different parts of Asia. In Japan, where it is also called Shibuya toast after the Tokyo district where the style began, a substantial portion of a loaf is hollowed out and filled with squares of toasted bread, ice cream, syrup and fruit. The Taiwanese style is more subdued, topped with condensed milk, custard or cheese. A second cousin is kaya toast, popular in Singapore, made with a thick slab of salted butter and a jam of coconut and pandan leaves that is usually served with soft-boiled eggs.

Not Toasted

Low and no-alcohol drinks are in, but that doesn’t necessarily mean people want to face the next decade without a little help. Look for a rise in mood food and calming beverages awash in CBD or adaptogens, plants that may help relieve stress. “It’s not just a young person’s thing,” said Willa Zhen, a professor of liberal arts and food studies at the Culinary Institute of America. “I think we’re all anxious.”

Growing Up

This could be the year the children’s menu finally dies — or is at least radically re-engineered. Millennials, an unusually food-aware generation, are parents to more than half of the nation’s children. And as Americans opt for less processed food and more global flavors, chicken nuggets and mac and cheese may give ground to salmon fish sticks, agedashi pops and hemp pasta with ghee.

Generational Cooking

First-generation immigrants to America, and grandparents who live in other countries or have recently immigrated, will transform restaurant menus. This is part of a growing interest among chefs with mixed cultural backgrounds to create new dishes based on techniques and ingredients from both sides of the family.

Fresh Flours

Almond flour is so 2019. Look for alternative flours made from green bananas, sweet potatoes, cauliflower and watermelon seeds.

Tech Rescues

Artificial intelligence will flood restaurants, especially fast-food and quick-service operations, adjusting pricing in real time to accommodate fluctuations in supply and demand. Delivery apps and in-store menu boards will suggest foods in the same way Netflix recommends movies. Menu boards will use voice bots and face recognition software to customize and speed ordering. Unmanned rovers will bring you pizza; companies like Domino’s are testing them in Houston and some European cities, and robots are already bringing Dunkin’ doughnuts and Starbucks coffee to college students. Breakthroughs in food safety will result from better use of blockchain, a digital ledger that can track food as it works its way from the farm to the consumer.

And the Rest

• Churros.
• Flavored ghee.
• Koji, the ancient mold responsible for miso and soy sauce.
• Cantonese pineapple buns.
• Makgeolli, the sparkling, fermented Korean rice liquor.
• Puffed snacks made from vegetable peels.
• Floral flavors.
• Halloumi cheese.
• Edible flowers and botanicals.
• Cane sugar alternatives.
• Food wrapped in bijao leaves.
• Ice cream with hidden vegetables (think mint chocolate chip with puréed spinach).

Don’t be surprised if some of these fail to take hold. “The thing to remember is that it comes back to taste,” said Ms. Topper, of Mintel. “We can talk about various trends, but if it’s not something that first and foremost people want to consume, it won’t last.”

Source: The New York Times

Belgian-style Cheese Souffle Omelet

Ingredients

6 tbsp butter
1 cup finely grated sharp Cheddar cheese
1 cup whipping cream
salt
ground white pepper
5 eggs, separated
5 tbsp cold water

Method

1. Heat 4 tablespoons butter in the top of a double boiler over hot water until bubbly.
2. Add cheese and stir until smooth. There may be a small amount of melted butter around the edge but this will blend in with the cream.
3. Pour in cream very slowly, stirring constantly until smooth and creamy.
4. Stir in 1/8 teaspoon salt and a dash of pepper and keep warm.
5. Beat the egg yolks and water in a small bowl with a fork until blended. Season with salt and pepper to taste.
6. Beat egg whites in a large bowl until very stiff. Fold egg yolk mixture into the egg whites until mixture is a pale yellow foam.
7. Heat remaining butter in a preheated, 9-inch omelet pan until butter just begins to brown. Pour the egg mixture into the pan and cook slowly, pulling the edge away from the side of the pan and leveling the top to the side with a spatula. Pierce through the omelet occasionally with the tip of the spatula to allow the heat to rise through the omelet. Cook until the base is a light golden brown and set but the top is still foamy.
8. Place in a preheated broiler 6 to 8 inches from the source of heat. Broil for 4 minutes or until top is lightly browned.
9. Invert onto heated platter. Pour the cheese sauce over omelet. Return to broiler and broil until sauce is browned. Serve immediately.

Makes 3 servings.

Source: The Creative Cooking Course

In Pictures: Afternoon Tea Set of Restaurants in Tokyo, Japan

Study: Children Who Drank Whole Milk had Lower Risk of Being Overweight or Obese

Jennifer Stranges wrote . . . . . . . . .

A systematic review and meta-analysis led by St. Michael’s Hospital of Unity Health Toronto found children who drank whole milk had 40 per cent lower odds of being overweight or obese compared with children who consumed reduced-fat milk.

The research, published in The American Journal of Clinical Nutrition, analyzed 28 studies from seven countries that explored the relationship between children drinking cow’s milk and the risk of being overweight or obese. None of the studies – which involved a total almost 21,000 children between the ages of one and 18 years old – showed that kids who drank reduced-fat milk had a lower risk of being overweight or obese. Eighteen of the 28 studies suggested children who drank whole milk were less likely to be overweight or obese.

The findings challenge Canadian and international guidelines that recommend children consume reduced-fat cow milk instead of whole milk starting at age two to reduce the risk of obesity.

“The majority of children in Canada and the United States consume cow’s milk on a daily basis and it is a major contributor of dietary fat for many children,” said Dr. Jonathon Maguire, lead author of the review and a pediatrician at St. Michael’s Hospital.

“In our review, children following the current recommendation of switching to reduced-fat milk at age two were not leaner than those consuming whole milk.”

Dr. Maguire, who is also a scientist at the MAP Centre for Urban Health Solutions, next hopes to establish the cause and effect of whole milk and lower risk of obesity in a randomized controlled trial.

“All of the studies we examined were observational studies, meaning that we cannot be sure if whole milk caused the lower risk of overweight or obesity. Whole milk may have been related to other factors which lowered the risk of overweight or obesity,” Dr. Maguire said.

“A randomized controlled trial would help to establish cause and effect but none were found in the literature.”

Source: St. Michael’s Hospital

Study Finds Potential Link between Cardiovascular Death and Some Types of Pesticides

Tom Snee wrote . . . . . . . . .

A new study from the University of Iowa suggests that people who have higher levels of a chemical in their body that indicates exposure to commonly used insecticides die of cardiovascular disease at a significantly higher rate.

Findings from the study, published in the journal JAMA Internal Medicine, suggest those who have high levels of exposure to pyrethroid insecticides are three times more likely to die of cardiovascular disease than people with low or no exposure.

Wei Bao, assistant professor of epidemiology in the University of Iowa College of Public Health and the study’s corresponding author, says the findings come from an analysis of a nationally representative sample of American adults, not just those who work in agriculture. That means the findings have public health relevance to the general population.

He also cautions that as an observational study, the research does not determine if the people in the sample died as a direct result of their exposure to pyrethroids. He says that the results indicate a high likelihood of a link, but more research is needed to replicate the findings and determine the biological mechanisms.

Pyrethroids are among the list of commonly used insecticides with the largest market share and they constitute the majority of commercial household insecticides. They are found in numerous commercial insecticide brands and are used widely in agricultural, public, and residential settings for pest control. Metabolites of pyrethroids, such as 3-phenoxybenzoic acid, can be measured in the urine of people who are exposed to pyrethroids.

Bao and his team of researchers analyzed data on 3-phenoxybenzoic acid levels in urine samples collected from 2,116 adults aged 20 and over who participated in the United States National Health and Nutrition Examination Survey between 1999 and 2002. They cross-referenced mortality records to determine how many of those adults in their data sample had died by 2015 and of what cause.

They found that during an average 14 years of observation, those people who had the highest levels of 3-phenoxybenzoic acid in their urine samples were 56% more likely to have died of any cause by 2015 than people with the lowest levels of exposure. Cardiovascular disease was by far the leading cause of death, with a three times greater likelihood.

While Bao’s study did not determine how the subjects became exposed to pyrethroids, he says previous studies show that most exposure to pyrethroids is through food, as people who eat fruits and vegetables that have been sprayed with them ingest the chemical. Residential use of pyrethroids in gardens and homes for pest-control is also a significant source of exposure. Pyrethroids are also present in household dust in homes that apply these pesticides.

Bao notes that the market share of pyrethroid insecticides has increased since the 1999–2002 study period, which makes it likely the rate of cardiovascular disease-related deaths related to its exposure has increased, as well. However, Bao says, further investigation is needed to assess whether this hypothesis holds.

Source: The University of Iowa

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