Food news antipasto

If you are the sort of person who likes to look at a dessert menu before you even order your main course, we have two articles you might want to peruse. First up is a growing trend in dessert-only restaurants. These places offer inventive menus that often include dessert and wine pairings. Says pastry chef Will Goldfarb, “There’s this appetite for accessible luxury — something indulgent, but not pretentious. One perfect spoonful, then onto the next.”

The types of desserts you might find on restaurant menus is highly influenced by both the internet and younger diners, who love to see ‘gram worthy dishes that are not too heavy. Enter things like cloud cake, jiggly Japanese cheesecakes, and cake flights. Having smaller portions means diners can try more than one thing without filling up.

Do you ever wonder who makes the store brand products on supermarket shelves? It’s not a secret that stores do not have big processing facilities and instead rely on other companies, who likely sell the same or very similar products under their own brand. Most stores keep this information close to the vest to protect the relationship they have with the supplier, but there are ways you can determine who makes the product. In addition to the suggestion in the article, sometimes you can tell by looking at the production codes/expiration date and see what other brand on the shelf uses the same printing.

While people may not enjoy mixing food and politics, sometimes the two crash into each other in a way that makes it unavoidable to discuss. This is happening with the tariff situation between the US and other countries. With an August 1 deadline looming, stores and restaurants will have to grapple with how much more certain ingredients will cost. Chefs are rethinking ingredients, changing the menu to exclude items, and (when possible) finding more local suppliers. However, some ingredients just can’t be sourced locally. Houston chef Nick Wong diners will have to accept the higher prices or risk losing their favorite restaurant. “Why is my fried rice so expensive? Food is politics,” he says. “You don’t get to exist in a vacuum and say you didn’t want this. It’s gonna affect you anyway.”

The latest TikTok trend offers a way to beat the heat this summer with something that is cool, refreshing and easy. It involves freezing clementines (aka Cuties), then cutting them in half and popping out frozen segments of fruit. The article has a video showing the final result and tips on how to safely slice the frozen spheres.

Few foods are as synonymous with their country as the full English breakfast. For hundreds of years it has graced dining tables in England, starting as a way for the gentry to show off their largesse and continuing to the current day, where it can be found everywhere. As ubiquitous as it is, perhaps this dish has run its course, say David Ellis.

In case you missed this article from yesterday: Baking Nation newspaper debuts.