Culinary trends for 2015

Colorado-based Sterling Rice Group, a consulting and advertising firm, has issued its predictions for culinary trends in 2015, reports Elaine Watson of Food Navigator USA. The trends range from new foods to twists on cuisine to restaurant incubators. If their forecast is accurate, here’s a sample of what we can expect to see next year:

• Regional grains – health conscious consumers will move away from “commodity” grains to ones they perceive as more healthful, including alternatives to wheat and corn. Local bakers and chefs will turn to milling their own grains for use in their cooking and baking.
• Hop-free beer – in a reversal of the “all hops, all the time” trend, expect to see brewers looking back to medieval gruits – using herbs and flowers such as lavender and elderberry as bittering and flavoring agents.
• Farm-to-table kosher – the trend moves into serving a growing market segment: millenial Jews who are starting to eat kosher
• Fancy charcoal – Japanese charcoal, or binchotan, is kilned oak that burns at much hotter temperatures than regular charcoal, offering a clean, odorless, and smokeless way to cook foods quickly while retaining flavors.
• “Advanced Asian” – according to SPG, we should prepare for “more complex and true-to-region Asian foods.” They predict the food with be spicier and will highlight underappreciated regions like northern Thai (Issan) cuisine and Filipino foods.

You can read the remaining predictions at the Food Navigator site. I am interested in the gruit-flavored beers because I am not a fan of hops. Are you intrigued by any of these trends?

Photo of grains by Darcie Boschee