Winter Fancy Food Show features innovative snack and breakfast options.
Specialty food and beverage sales, growing 9.3% from 2021 to 2022, approached $194 billion across all retail and foodservice channels. According to the Specialty Food Association (SFA), New York—which is organizing the 48th Winter Fancy Food Show in Las Vegas from January 21–23—it is projected that they will have reached $207 billion by the end of 2023.
And it will be quite the expo, according to Denise Purcell, the SFA’s vice president of resource development.
Specialty meals are the ideal method to counter what’s going on these days because people start indulging themselves when things are hard, the person added. “The hardy specialized food sector has persevered through hardships since 2020 and is still growing now.
“Although food inflation has affected the market in recent years, things are starting to stabilize, and the business is well-positioned for the future with a number of favorable factors in place. Specialty food sales are occurring through a greater number of retail channels, foodservice is increasing, and producers are experimenting with ingredient procurement, promotion, and sourcing.
According to Purcell, there will be a lot of innovation in crunchy snacks and breakfast dishes on display this year on the expo floor. There will be a global twist to many of them.
Crunchy snacks are the best-selling specialty food category, with $6.1 billion in sales annually, according to Purcell. “In this space, new shapes and distinctive formats are being explored along with new grains and more seeds.”
For example, Drinks Bakery, Edinburgh, Scotland, is launching Drinks Biscuits, an eight-year-old product line that is prepared for export, as its first Fancy Food offering. The flavoring of the biscuits is intended to go well with particular drinks.
The beverages Bakery was founded by Andy Murray, who stated, “After observing the emergence of craft drinks over the last 20 years, I realized that the snack market had hardly changed and wanted to share my family’s appreciation for the partnership between snacks and drinks.”
The recommended pairing for the Lancashire Cheese & Spring Onion cookies is a hoppy IPA, stout, or pilsner beer. According to the brand, they also pair well with Speyside whiskey or dry white wine. Conversely, gin-based drinks pair best with the Pecorino, Rosemary & Scottish Seaweed biscuits.Poppy Handcrafted Popcorn LLC, Asheville, NC, is celebrating its tenth anniversary by expanding its menu to include three new flavors: Mexican street corn, Mediterranean herb, and Caribbean jerk.
The three new flavors were created following a vacation to Italy with my children, according to founder and CEO Ginger Frank. The flavors of snacks are so unique and different over the world. I’m constantly trying to give Poppy more flavor options. I started with ten ideas for international flavors with the team. These three were deemed the best after being taste-tested and approved by the entire Poppy team.
Consumers munch at any time of day, but when it comes to invention, the breakfast hour is when things really happen. The recurrent feature of these products is convenience.”We’ve seen breakfast becoming the growing meal for specialty food purchasers since the pandemic,” Purcell said. “A lot of the new items that are being introduced this year are centered around.
foods that enable you to prepare international cuisine in your own kitchen,” the speaker stated. Additionally, customers are telling us that they desire more shortcuts.
With its new frozen Ekiben Onigiri, Tokyo-based Shingi Co., Ltd. wants Americans to feel as though they are traveling across Japan. The company uses various regional ingredients and recipes from different parts of Japan, along with cutting edge freezing technology, to preserve freshly prepared rice balls. In the microwave, they are ready within two minutes.
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Managing the lack of labour for mushroom pickingPurcell stated, “It’s all about maximizing flavor and enjoyment while minimizing mess and stress.” “And simultaneously experimenting with flavors and food for both better taste and a more immersive cultural experience.”The topic of environmental effect is once again being discussed in relation to all specialty food and beverage categories.Purchases with an environmental focus have become far less popular.