New Trends in Natural Foods

As Dana Jacobi tells it, timing is everything. Her first soy book, published in 1996, won culinary awards, but it didn’t really catch on until five years later, when the public was ready to embrace the benefits of soy. On the other hand, 12 Best Foods, her latest book, has been an instant success, due to the public buzz about antioxidants.

Keeping ahead of trends is a big part of what makes Dana a successful book author. She is a sought-after prognosticator who spoke at the Natural Products Show press briefing earlier this fall. Dana, a friend of many years, shared with me the information she presented. It represents her projections of food trends we can expect to see six to 12 months out.

The umbrella trend in natural foods is the communication between head and heart, Dana explains. “The head represents reason. People’s heads are influencing their food desires.” Even if the desire is about gratification, “our choices are being influenced by reasoned information,” she says. “We are concerned as never before about well-being and food safety.”

On the other side of the spectrum is the heart. “In these extremely stressful times, we require comfort,” Dana observes. “This translates to desires for meat, sweets and treats, and stimulants.”

Here’s how the desires of head and heart merge:

• Booming sales of organic meat and lean sausages.
• Caffeine drinks — green tea, especially chai, and lattes; also free traded coffee and cocoa.
• In sweets, raw food bars — as sweet as candy, but also providing fiber and antioxidants.
• Frozen desserts, sorbets and chocolate.
• In functional foods, the best-sellers are ones with natural functional benefits.
• Blueberries, tomatoes, oats and all other fruits and whole grains, rich in antioxidants, detoxifiers and fiber.
• Salmon and walnuts, naturally high in omega-3 fatty acids.
• Soy, for the growing evidence it can help strenghen bones.
• Acai (ah-sigh-ee), a fruit from Amazon palmberries harvested in the rainforests of Brazil, is a “comer.” It tastes like a blend of berries and chocolate and has many nutrient benefits.
• Chocolate is the biggest star, Dana says. “Watch for it to become a newsworthy ingredient in savory items — tomato sauce, soup, frozen entrees like mole, seasoned nuts and other snack foods.”
• “Good carbs are coming back,” Dana adds. “Little potatoes are a great example. Our head says they are okay because they have lots of skin — both tasty and a source of fiber, vitamins and minerals, while our heart is happy to have them. ”
• Watch for more good carbs like whole grain mixes, such as brown rice with dried fruits and spices.
• “In our continuing obsession with flavor, we are crossing new, far-flung borders. Beyond products from — and cookbooks about — every crevice of Italy, we are sampling foods and recipes from all of the Mediterranean — Israel and Syria, for example. Africa is supplying hot stuff. Rices from the Himalayas are becoming a supermarket item, along with purple potatoes adapted from Peru and chimichurri sauce from Argentina,” Dana says.
• Multi-culural dining — Mexicans eating sushi, Chinese eating Ethiopian. “A lot of this stems from diversity in the workplace,” she notes.
• “Watch for an explosion of gluten-free goods, especially in cereals and cookies where products have texture and taste as good as conventional choices,” Dana predicts.
• Good fats. Dana believes Americans are coming around to understanding that not all fat is bad.
• More ready-to-use raw ingredients such as chopped fresh onions from Melissa’s. “The goal: soups and stews made completely from what you throw into the pot without touching a knife or reaching for a cutting board,” Dana forsees.

  INSIGHT: Take a tip from Dana Jacobi: New products need to appeal to the head and the heart to be successful in tomorrow’s marketplace.

Tuesday, November 29th, 2005 | 3:45 pm | Food Trends, Niche Marketing, Trade Shows, Trendsetters, People, Food Marketing
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