Nibbles is a compendium of food, dining and beverage information and trends from the U.S. and the world edited by John Lehndorff
Reported at www.JohnLehndorff.com:
“I honestly believe that if we all sat down and ate pie together, we’d find common ground. Our nation would be a better place if we made pie, not war. Each of us deserves their piece of the pie, not pie in the sky. We like to brag on things that are “as American as apple pie,” which is really to say that pie, like all us citizens, emigrated here from elsewhere and found a home. America’s allies and its enemies also understand pastry in its myriad manifestations. They believe in baklava, empanadas, samosas, b’stilla, hammentaschen, pasties, tarts or quiche. No matter what you call it, pie epitomizes abundance and celebration.” Note: National Pie Day is Jan. 23.
Reported by http://shine.yahoo.com/channel/food/food-trend-predictions-for-2011-2428460/
2001 food trend predictions from Epicurious:
–Food Halls: America may be a century or two behind on this trend, but we are finally embracing the food hall, in all of its gluttonous, groaning-shelves glory. Following in the footsteps of giants worldwide (Paris’ La Grande Épicerie and the food halls at Harrods of London and Takashimaya in Tokyo), New York has gotten into the act in a big way. Mario Batali and the Bastianich family recently opened Eataly, a boisterous celebration of Italian cuisine, in Manhattan.
– Macarons: Cupcakes and pies are looking downright crusty these days. Macarons or macarons, usually made with ground almonds or almond paste, sugar, and egg whites, will be 2011’s sweet sensation.
– Also: Meatless Mondays & Tofu Thursdays; Foraging; Tiki Bar Cocktails; Pop-Up Cafés; Sweet Potatoes; Urban Wineries; and Pimentón de La Vera.
Reported by www.westword.com:
“Because of the uptick on the stock market and stabilization of fuel prices, as well as a freeze on most federal taxation, the anti-luxury trend will loosen up, so I think we’ll see more foie gras, caviar, luxury meats and seafood making a semi-comeback,” predicts Michael Long, the executive chef of Aria, which opened last week in Cherry Creek . In addition, he says, “the farm-to-table will only get bigger as farmers adapt to food service purchasing needs and get real with pricing.” For his part, Long is longing for a year full of cardoons, bottarga, razor clams, huitlacoche, duck eggs that have the fetus intact, and more traditionally raised veal.
Reported by www.newyorker.com:
At even a moderately upscale establishment, you would invariably get what I had come to think of as the Portman Plaza dessert plate, since it so closely resembled the model that a developer would have proposed for the center of a crime-wracked mid-sized city in the seventies: three upright cylinders—small towers of something wrapped in something—with the tops sliced at an angle; a crumbly landscape of some kind; and a reflecting pool running around the edge. The plate would be advertised as, let’s say, a chocolate-peanut-butter mousse cake with walnut-balsamic crumble and a sesame sorbet with Concord-grape foam. But the effect was always the same: not enough of a cakey cylindrical thing, too much of a crumbly thing, far too much of a gelatinous thing, and an irrelevance of an off-key runny thing. Without surrendering sugar, dessert had surrendered all its familiar forms.”
Reported by: http://shine.yahoo.com/channel/food/the-coolest-food-trends-of-2010-2426151
Pie Is the New Cupcake: Pie has been sitting back, gaining momentum for a while, waiting for cupcakes to get over themselves. We saw pie all over menus this year, well before Thanksgivingtime. Sweet and savory; minis and normal-sized; graham cracker, pretzel, butter and leaf lard crusts; in a milkshake or on a stick. At Blue Bonnet Cafe in Marble Falls, Texas, they have an afternoon pie happy hour where you can score a slice and a drink for $3. Hill Country Chicken, which opened this year in Manhattan, does it too. Over in Brooklyn, the pie shop Four and Twenty Blackbirds makes a double-crusted strawberry balsamic pie and grapefruit custard ones. Whether they’re age-old recipes or newfangled ones, pie is always a happy-maker. Step off, cupcakes. Other themes: New Food TV Shows; Korean Tacos; Coffee Toys and Cuppings; Salt Swooning; GIY: Grow it Yourself; and Designer Ice Cubes.
Complaints, tirades, comments, critiques? lehndorffj@aol.com
John Lehndorff is co-author with Kim Long of the American Salumi Calendar 2011, the first calendar devoted to cured meat artisans in the U.S. Lehndorff is a former caterer, nationally distributed newspaper food columnist and restaurant critic, author of a restaurant guide book, and one of America’s foremost pie experts.
The 2011 American Salumi Calendar: www.americansalumi.com
Nibbles 