Summer Fancy Food Show: Hot List

To wrap up my trend coverage of the Specialty Food Association 68th Summer Fancy Food Show, here is a list of hot products that popped out from the rest thanks to new flavors, styles, benefits and just plain innovative approaches in the specialty food channel.  

Hot Flavor: Guava: Tropical guava is one of the latest fruit flavors to break out in new places like Bonne Maman Guava Preserves and Lifeway Kefir 

Hot Color: Pink: Thanks to Barbie, pink was the color of the Show in dragon-fruit enhanced cookies, varietal pink pineapple, pink chai, and even frozen Korean rice cakes in a rosé wine sauce  

Dairy Innovation: We spotted new types of dairy with Strive Freemilk, made with animal free dairy protein; Smearcase’s FroCo high-protein cottage cheese frozen dessert; and Bellwether Farms A2 Organic Whole Milk Yogurt 

Alt-Dairy Steps Up: Innovative Stockeld Cultured Cheddar Melt made with cultured legumes and cultured-cashew Shire’s Dairy-Free Cheese Ravioli and Cream Cheese were new tasty non-dairy cheeses 

Alt-Protein Plays: We were intrigued with 50/Cut, a mycelium product to blend with meat in the vein of blended mushroom burger and with Kula’s Plant-Based Protein frozen meals in Caribbean styles, like G.O.A.T Curry and Ginger Beef, made with Canadian pea protein

Novel Ingredients & Forms: Blue corn flavors Monsoon Chocolate’s Desert Series Blue Corn Atole White Chocolate Bar. Dixie Grace’s Boiled Peanuts blended its legumes into a hummus-like dip, so new there wasn’t even a package. We were stopped in our tracks by the Food Crayon, a seasoning crayon in an agar-agar base that one ‘sharpens’ into food 

Aperitif Hour: With our Show coverage complete, we are headed outside to relax with Pleasant Elevation Zero Proof Sparkling Tea Elixir and the Italian Aperitivo Kit