While consumers saw many great things in the food and beverage world in 2024 in many great restaurants, there are some trends that it would be nice to say goodbye to in the new year of 2025.
6 worst food trends in the food industry in 2024
Trend 1: Croissants that are too perfect
As croissants are one of life's most reliable pleasures, it is a law of nature that you can never have too many.) I'm certainly not one of those who object, and yet: in this era of "extreme lamination", when bakers perform ever more incredible feats of geometry with butter and flour, we have seen an abundance of croissants and other pastries that look as if they were designed by artificial intelligence rather than human hands. They are too perfect, too waiting to be adored on TikTok or Instagram. Which is not to say that they are bad. But I like a croissant that is ordinary and "imperfect" in shape, something that reminds me of what it was like to enjoy a croissant for its own sake, before social media existed." writes Rebecca Flint Marks, editor of the publication.
Trend 2: Annoying QR codes are everywhere.
The restaurant world has come a long way since the first dark days of the pandemic. In many ways, it has. But if there's one thing that can drag me screaming back to 2020, it's the QR code menu. And while I understand that some restaurants are likely to continue to do it for convenience and cost savings, like the diner that just has to do it. I continue to think about the growing alienation of society from the natural world and our mostly voluntary imprisonment by the "owners" of smartphones. Give me a paper menu! Just don't make me take out my phone - that's what I do all day, and I don't want to do it in a restaurant.
Trend 3: Strange and unusually limited opening hours for restaurants
It used to be that if you wanted to go out for lunch, you had to remember that many restaurants were closed on Mondays. But lately, I've noticed that more and more restaurants are closing for whole chunks of the week. Of course, working seven days a week doesn't guarantee that you'll make enough on those days to cover your expenses, and restaurants are probably just trying to make the numbers work. But it's frustrating to find yourself face-to-face with a restaurant that's closed on a Thursday night, or inevitably turning away customers because the hot pastry bakery is only open on weekends and has a queue around the block." - Jaya Saxena, Correspondent
Trend 4: Functional ingredients in everything
Lately, it seems like everything we eat has to have a purpose: Your passable drinks should contain enough electrolytes for an Olympic gymnast; your chewy candy should be fortified with vitamins while fighting inflammation; and your yoghurt should be packed with enough probiotics to scare away any illness. It's almost impossible to browse the grocery store aisles without seeing at least one "functional food" that promises you healthier, happier, protein-packed pleasures for just a few dollars. But rather than signalling greater transparency in the industry or a significant departure from the dietary fads of the past, much of this simply indicates that advertisers and manufacturers will go out of their way to sell consumers more while telling them less about what they are actually consuming."-Jesse Sparks, Senior Editor
Trend 5: AI's "food waste".
This year has seen a rise in various "creative recipes" for AI-generated food and drink, and I've found myself painfully drawn to Facebook, where my feed has been overrun with grotesque images of AI-generated "food and drink" that stretch the boundaries of our physical reality. Of course, some of the images are passable until you "adjust" your eyesight. What appears to be a shrimp, at first glance, turns out to be a poorly created torus shape: where there should be a tail, there are only more "shrimps". The recipe for "carrots" contains an image that vaguely resembles hot dogs, except for the orange. Jars of "cheese paste" have errors in the continuity of the drops. It goes without saying that the "recipes" accompanying these photos are also questionable, claiming that the list of ingredients does not match what is depicted in the image. The comments, if any, are unsuspecting. "It looks so good", these "people" say, only adding fuel to the fire of the "dead internet theory". It's hard enough for real chefs and cooks if everyone's eyes aren't already glazed over with all this rubbish." - Bettina Macalintal, Senior Reporter
Trend 6: Raw milk
Drinking raw milk is a trend that should be left behind in 2024 (or, better yet, in the 1910s, when pasteurisation became a prerequisite for selling milk in grocery stores). It should be made clear that drinking raw milk can make you sick. Unpasteurised milk is full of bacteria, including Salmonella and E. coli. Pasteurising or heating the milk until it is hot enough to kill these bacteria does not compromise the overall nutritional value of the milk. Please stop getting your nutritional information from incompetent "experts" and other "editors" of your diet." - Kat Thompson, Assistant Editor.
What are the worst trends in your opinion?
Source: Eater