Food trends to peak in 2011: special needs, urbanism, on-demand

SIAL 2010, the traveling International Food and Beverage Exhibition, ended on October 21 in Paris with predictions for what's to come in the food world in 2011 and beyond.

Many of the insights mirror the International Food Technology (IFT) "mega trends" for product innovation including consumer demand to know what they are eating poses no risks to the environment, the body or others and the exploration of "new, exotic" tastes.

However SIAL hints at three new trends that may track:

 - "Handling and new needs": especially for boomers like painful joints.
 - "Urban style": a city itself becomes a food trendsetter
 - On-demand, real-time product information

And, major players highlight that innovation is going to serve up new tastes, textures and "it" ingredients:

 - Tastes: spiciness, fruit & spice combinations, chili chocolate, honey, wasabi, ginger, speculoos
 - Textures: frothy, crispy/crunchy (with bits), pearl, multi-texture
 - Ingredients: seeds, superfruits (acai berry, acerola, cranberry, wolfberry, guarana, noni, yumberry, blueberry, guava, morello cherry), natural sweeteners (stevia), ewe's and goat's milk, flowers

If you missed SIAL in France, you might want to check out the debut of SIAL Middle East on November 22 in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates: http://www.sialme.com/

To read more about IFT's "mega-trends," go to: http://ind.pn/aAVKgs

http://en.sial.fr