WHERE DO WE GO FROM HERE?

Global & Local

Restaurant trend can be determined by the interaction between local buzz and global pipelines of gastronomy. Following global events and feeling the local hype of gastronomy allows a restauranteur to sense trends. It is a matter of choice when it comes to going with a potential trend. Not everyone wants to be a visionary when creating a concept, sometimes it is safer to go with an already trending concept in the region. A restauranteur can create a completely new, never seen before concept and become a success, or be inspired by an already successful business. Either way it is vital to follow the trends. We’ve listed and explained some of the trends of 2021 below.

Bread & Lahmacun

Google publishes search trends each year. In 2020 global search trends on recipes, “Ekmek” (Bread in Turkish) and “Lahmacun” (Kind of pizza like Turkish food) are in the top 5 with also “Pizza” and “Sourdough Bread”. With the pandemic as literally everyone remaining indoors, a boom in bread making became a global trend. This usually results in a deeper public knowledge on bread and as a result, demand for high-end artisan bakeries. Also, the fact that pizza and alike search trend means that it is one of the most consumed food (Italian cuisine is the most popular cuisine is the world with 84% like rating according to a YouGov survey) and people are trying to make them at home. You may follow the trends for your own artisan bread bakery or maybe become an owner of yet another pizza place in town.

Go Green!

Another important trend in the year 2020 and 2021 as of today is the healthy side of eating. People are more informed on ingredients and the benefits of their food for a healthy living. Many documentaries, books, broadcasts on nutrients created a global drive for the consumer to take a healthy stance on diets (Eating on the Wild Side by Jo Robinson is a recommended read). Going vegan, vegetarian or flexitarian (eating meat only once in a while) are the effects of this global direction. Challenging the humans’ hunting and gathering roots became a global trend for a few years now. To open a vegan or a vegetarian restaurant may be a great way to ride this wave of healthy eating.

Mental Stability

Life is going faster and faster, rivalry and stress in the work place is consuming our lives out of office. Healthy food for our bodies is not only a the physical but also is a mental issue. With yoga, pilates and other meditation-based activities, the mentally health food consumption comes as a bundle. People with a mentally healthy lifestyle prefers food that are mentally healthy for them. Every ingredient, mineral, nutrient is carefully analyzed to create a perfect flow for the most peaceful diet.

Herbs, Roots, Mushrooms

This trend has been in the gastronomy scene for ages with gaining and waning effects but today it is at its peak, it is the soil! People from the day they walked on earth consumed food grown in the soil. As population grows and agriculture is on a path to maximize yield it gets crucial to choose a pure, organic and healthy produce to consume. Mass grown, over produced products are full of dangers we can or cannot perceive as of today. This brings us to the peaking trend of locally produced organic ingredients that are prepared fresh. Farm to table restaurant is a great hit but it comes with its challenges. It demands great knowledge of seasonal produce and a mandatory menu change every couple of months. It is great to have earth and soil friendly restaurant but managing this kind of a precision machine in a region where knowledge is scarce is not an easy task.

Neighborly Ghost

These past two years have changed the way we live including the drastic change to our restaurant habits. Takeout has become the way we enjoy our favorite restaurants. Some were closed altogether; some did not prefer takeout and some up their games with new packaging or innovative ways to bring the restaurant to us the consumer. Whichever they used, restaurant food in our homes became a trend so fast we didn’t even understand how much it changed. As the pandemic grew longer it was “takeout or death” to many restaurants. New and innovative packaging became a must and some restaurant started preparing their dishes as make at home kits, whereas others started creating movie matching experience with tasting menus with packaging and label ever little detail. The race to come inside of our homes has been fierce ever since.

This was exactly when the idea of a non-storefront restaurant with no seating at all, with only industrial kitchen equipment and takeout packaging, only a couple of employees. Maybe just a small logo or a banner outside indicating the brand. All the branding was online with food ordering apps and social media. Nobody knew where the restaurant was but the takeout was brilliant. Welcome to the age of “Ghost Kitchen”. With nobody coming out to eat in restaurants, why bother for a fancy seating area with all the furniture and stuff. It wasn’t even a surprise when owners started multiple brands from the same kitchen with a master brand that harbored all others because basically most of the equipment used in kitchens are very similar if they aren’t exact.

Sustainable

Sustainability is actually a whole topic by itself that has so many angles that cannot be discussed in a few paragraphs. But in some sense “sustainable” wasn’t a game changer in the local restaurant scene but it means a lot in a global prospect. Lowering waste, regenerative agriculture, recycling are only few ways to reach a sustainable gastronomy. With resources going down and population going up we need to be more aware of the effect we are leaving on the world. With a global action the sustainable trend is another important way to watch for in food industry. It is even a new way to show everyone you are a responsible human being taking care of the world when you create and run your own restaurant.

Fusion

The age-old local ingredient and a French fine dining experience fusion restaurant started losing their grip all around the world. More specialized cuisines were on the rise since the 2000s. As of today, information is everywhere and traveling is (without the pandemic) never easier. People eat all sorts of cuisines all around the world. It is time to bring those foodie memories and combine them with our own cuisines in smaller, cozier spaces. Korean tacos, Mediterranean mezze with Brazilian barbecue, Indian spices and sauces in an all-American Burger, Nordic Asian, Viet-Cajun… all these endless opportunities are on the rise as people are looking for new ways to enjoy food. The fusion trend can be easily spotted on the World’s 50 Best Restaurants list, a hefty number of restaurants have fusion cuisines.

Everything is Fine

Fine dining to fine eating is also becoming the next best thing in many regions of the world. Crowd pleasing approach, remove pressure of expectation from well-known restaurants. Daniel Boulud, NY, Daniel Restaurant is making Michelin starred burgers, Copenhagen Noma is creating pop up burger POPL and Manchester Mana includes a burger with takeout only 100 burgers a day (The 12 biggest global food trends for 2021). Many of the fine dining restaurants are releasing some steam with crowd pleasing options. The aim can be to remove pressure on the outside but they may be desperate for customers, if not for profits. Fine dining can be state of the art food, but it comes with enormous costs and tiny profits. With the pandemic this year for most fine dining restaurants, takeout is unspeakable so they may need a profit boost to start over again when things settle back to normal. Fine eating is also preferable for the consumer too in a way that many people also suffered in incomes all around the world, fine dining may be a notch luxurious for many for a few years.