A box designed for the 2024 US Open finals holds a $100 order of chicken nuggets and caviar. The clever box design is a sign that more elaborate takeout packaging is coming in 2025. Photo / Karsten Moran / The New York Times
In 2025, food trends in the US will focus on breaking rules with unconventional choices and adventurous flavours.
If you want to understand what’s going to be big in food next year, ignore the fridgescaping and hot-honey espresso martinis. Instead, peer into the nation’s psyche.
When Americans were scared and isolated during the Covid shutdown, they ate comfort food with abandon. In 2024, weary and worried after a stretch of inflation and political uncertainty, they craved edible escapes they could afford. Little luxuries like the crunchy pistachio-cream Dubai chocolate bar and caviar bumps were big.
With a President-elect intent on turning institutions inside out, rampant hyper-individualism and an adventurous, sceptical Generation Z wielding outsize influence, 2025 will be all about breaking rules and ignoring tradition. At least, that’s what the market researchers, food sociologists and other prognosticators are saying.
“It’s a take-chances time right now,” said Andrew Freeman, president of AF & Co., the San Francisco consulting firm that for 17 years has published the popular Hospitality Trends Report with the brand marketing firm Carbonate. “Think of what we’ve just gone through. The whole world shifted. And if the whole world is going to break rules, why not do it with what we eat and drink?”
Rebellious consumers are pushing limits with unconventional choices, said Melanie Bartelme, a global food analyst and trend spotter for Mintel. They eat snacks when they should be eating meals. They embrace weird combinations like bao stuffed with Nashville hot chicken, and offbeat brand collaborations like Kate Spade teaming up with Heinz ketchup. Healthy food made from scratch is in, but so is a night out at Chili’s.
Here are some of the predictions most likely to influence how we’ll eat in the coming year. And if the forecasters are wrong, who cares? In 2025, anything goes.
From Chipotle’s viral vinaigrette and Raising Cane’s peppery mayo-ketchup blend to more culinarily elevated versions of romesco, salsa macha, tzatziki, hoisin, harissa and garlicky toum, sauces will be a national obsession.
Ranch will continue its reign, with new flavour extensions like pickle or chimichurri. But watch for more nuanced and culturally specific sauces as diners continue “on their global flavour journey,” said Emily Murphy, director of specialty merchandising at the specialty food company Baldor.
Forget caramel mocha pumpkin spice lattes with two pumps of extra syrup. Savoury coffee drinks are the next wave. Chefs are infusing coffee with sunchoke puree and avocado, and flavouring drinks with ginger, lemongrass and rosemary smoke. Yemeni coffee houses, which got their start in Detroit and are spreading to other cities as late-night alternatives to bars, flavour pots of coffee with hawaij, a spice mix heavy with cardamom, ginger and cinnamon. And yes, coffee is starting to get the omakase treatment, in which customers are offered several courses of the drink in various preparations.
Japanese convenience stores, popularly known as konbini, are open 24 hours and revered for well-prepared foods like onigiri, ramen and the egg salad sandwiches on milk bread that Anthony Bourdain loved. Soon, the Japanese parent company of 7-Eleven will start to export its konbini-style food to some US stores.
That’s not the only zhuzh coming in convenience-store fare. Gas stations are preparing made-to-order meals, selling their own brand of frozen foods, stocking salads with local produce and creating coffee bars with as many opportunities for customisation as Starbucks. The East Coast chain Wawa is bringing its much-loved sandwiches to the South, and the Texas-born Buc-ee’s is taking its brisket to more states. We’re still a long way from road food as good as you’d get at an Italian Autogrill, but we’re getting closer.
The hottest trend in hospitality will be … hospitality.
Getting wrapped in a warm blanket of good service is an antidote to feelings of disconnection and loneliness, which Surgeon-General Vivek Murthy has identified as a growing public health epidemic. He suggests eating together more often as one way to counter it.
Hotels and restaurants are using artificial intelligence and data analytics to make service more personal. Look for cosy counter service, soulful food served in comfortable dining rooms and shorter menus that mix value and deliciousness. Restaurants that connect to the community and offer work-life balance for employees will matter more than ever.
“We are feeling doom. We are feeling big feelings,” said Renee Wege, a trend expert and publications manager at the research firm Datassential. “So more than anything else, people are craving that cosy, warm hospitality and service.”
It might have begun with the candyfloss-flavoured grape, but new designer fruits and vegetables will begin to pop up with more regularity. Badger Flame beets from Row 7 Seed company are one example. Tropical Bliss strawberries from Driscoll’s are another.
Some of the new offerings emphasise nutritional advantages and highlight the quality of the soil they are grown in. Others are pure flavour plays. “We have seen an incredible interest in seed development and the search for flavour and sustainable growth,” said Jon Hansburg, director of food service sales at Baldor.
Social media will play a role, too, accelerating demand for new or lesser-known fruits and vegetables.
Protein will continue its rise to the top of the popularity pyramid, driven in part by gym bros and Americans on GLP-1 weight-loss medications, who need extra protein to maintain muscle mass.
Food manufacturers have started highlighting the protein content on packages of cereal, chips and other products. High-protein Turkish breakfasts, peanut butter smoothies and meat snacks are on the rise. Even organ meats could catch on, said Steve Young, a managing partner at the private equity firm Manna Tree, whose portfolio includes companies that produce cottage cheese, and eggs from pasture-raised chickens.
“We are in the second inning in a nine-inning game for consumers to get more protein in their diet,” he said.
Drinks spiked with cannabis and other mood-altering components like kava, guarana and a brain-calming amino acid known as Gaba will explode as interest in alcohol declines, especially among Gen Zers.
Buzzy non-alcoholic beverages have already migrated from the wellness aisle to bars and restaurants, where some are tailored to pair with specific dishes.
“Younger generations see cannabis as having less negative side effects than alcohol,” said Candace MacDonald, co-founder and managing director of the marketing firm Carbonate. “We’re just beginning to see a shift in how this impacts their consumption.”
The all-pink Hot Girls Have IBS campaign was only the start of a movement aimed at normalising and addressing particular health issues. Milky is a pill marketed to young people with lactose intolerance. Meal kits are being designed to ease symptoms of menopause. Food allergies are becoming a point of connection rather than ostracisation. “There are micro-communities popping up that allow people with food allergies to say, ‘I see you and you’re cool with me,’” said Bartelme of Mintel.
As the world of takeout and delivery continues to expand, so do the containers it comes in. Restaurants will up their game with thoughtful, Instagrammable packaging that lends itself to unboxing videos and can serve as a fun focal point for entertaining at home – like the $100 chicken and caviar box sold this year at the US Open, and the three-tiered Triple Treat Box from Pizza Hut. “The packaging is part of the food experience that gets overlooked,” said Freeman of AF & Co.
Freezer martinis, rooh afza (an herbal and rose-scented cooling red syrup) and yuzu’s more complex sibling sudachi will show up in many a glass. If the runaway success of chamoy pickle is any indication, that sweet-spicy-sour Mexican condiment will appear in more forms. Pickling will continue its popularity, this time in the form of the spicy Haitian pikliz and the Japanese pickle oshinko.
Sourdough will migrate into pasta. North African food, silky pastina and coconut pudding will pop up on menus (though probably not the same one). Wine packaged in recycled paperboard bottles will become more available, and ingredient labels will continue to be simplified.
What else? New twists on chow fun, banana-flavoured cocktails and tahini egg creams. Salted egg yolks will be the new umami bombs, and fig leaves the new wrappers. Conchas will keep riding a wave with new, savoury forms like chopped cheese. And is Oakland, California, the new “it” food city?
This article originally appeared in The New York Times.
Written by: Kim Severson
Photographs by: Karsten Moran, Vincent Tullo, Matthew Staver, Colin Clark
©2024 THE NEW YORK TIMES
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