Food Gets Fancy: my report from the 2010 winter fancy food show
The Fancy Food Show is kind of like a circus side show of culinary surprises. Attendance is a necessary evil for anyone involved in the retail side of food as well as journalists like me who cover this delicious nonsense.
The Winter show, held each year at San Francisco’s Moscone Center, is one of the most interesting and most repulsive culinary experiences. It is an opportunity to discover new food products, see how manufacturers have pushed the envelope and taste all those things you see at Dean & Deluca, Whole Foods and other gourmet retailers but aren’t sure you want to shell out the cash just to sample.
It is the place where new trends in food are made.
It is also place where otherwise civilized members of the food community allow themselves to be herded like cattle into convention center halls to stuff their faces with everything from duck confit to truffle butter to hand-made marshmallows, one after another (whiskey chocolate truffle followed by oil-free pesto next smoked pork then gluten-free scones then buttermilk ranch then more chocolate) while shuffling from booth to booth to booth of the world’s greatest decadences.
Today was my annual visit to this mecca of gourmet manufacturing. Countless miles in my black leather boots later, I feel, although I most certainly did not see it all (that would take days), I have a pretty good handle on what we can expect to see from the food world in the year to come.
Show organizers sent out a report that the big trends this year were “functional” foods; pickled things; yuzu and other exotic citrus and – BIG buzz word – gluten-free. In fact, manufacturers are rolling out gluten-free so fast that its almost as though the whole country has developed intolerance to the big G, its just that some of us didn’t get the memo. Now, I don’t know about you, but I love me some gluten. I did, I am surprised to report, find one gluten-free product at the show that I absolutely loved: Zix ravioli cookies. (Zix makes both regular and gluten-free but I have to say that, in this case, gluten-free is better!)
Other highlights of the show included Icio water, which offered both creative packaging and interesting flavors. Icio makes waters in lemon basil, peppermint and lemongrass cucumber and the bottle? a big, clear, plastic hip flask (old school, yet sleek – nice!) In other beverages, Coffees of Hawaii offers coffee berry tisanes. Though they’re made from from coffee’s husks, they have less caffeine than decaf but they still have all of coffee’s antioxidant benefits. The taste? I am a huge herbal tea fan and I loved these teas, nicely bodied but not heavy. The flavors come from natural, Hawaiian ingredients like Papaya Vanilla and Ginger. Another functional food I thought was cleaver and pretty well made was the Goji Gourmet’s new, preservative-free cookies, which use goji berries like raisins (only healthier) in cookie flavors like chocolate chip and almond oat.
From healthy to heavenly, the show proved that pork products are not dead. Bacon is everywhere, from bacon pretzels to bacon cakes to bacon-flavored salt, yep salt. There was also no shortage of cheese – in fact, I think it was the most cheese I’ve ever seen at the show. But believe it or not, even among the 526 cheeses upon which I feasted eye and taste bud, (no, I did not actually taste 526 – but I could have), there was one major standout. The Promontory Cheddar from Utah’s Beehive Cheese Company is the best smoked cheese I’ve ever tasted. The smoke flavor is subtle and beautifully balanced with the cheddar’s sharp notes, salt content and creamy texture. Yum!
Even among the thousands of temptations the show had on offer, I can pick out one product that was my favorite of the day: the Corks and Cookies from CookieZen, a brand new (as in founded last June) cookie company based in Washington DC. Baker Leah Kuo has created a full line of cookies that will pair with wines. Flavors are traditional, but slightly more subtle, less sweet than typical over-the-top confections and include double chocolate peanut butter chip; iced lemon sugar; oatmeal raisin and even a peanut butter with chocolate ganache. The cookies come with pairing recommendations by, as the cookie brochure puts it, “a professional sommelier.” I’ve yet to taste the cookies with wine myself – I’ve requested a set of samples to be sent to me at home so that little pleasure will be next week’s tasteriffic task – but having tasted the cookies, I think the potential is certainly there to spark a new, culinary trend of fine wine and down home baked goods. My fingers are crossed that the wines and cookies work as well as I think they will and that CookieZen will be able to get the cookies out there on a national level. (Currently they are only available online and in the DC area.) If they can, THAT will be the fancy food trend I have been waiting for all of my life!
Amy, you are great, we enjoy making the cheese as much as you enjoyed eating it…
Have a great day…
[...] I realize that there were more memorable products at this year’s Fancy Food Show than I’d originally reported. Although my favorites still remain the same, I wanted to share with you a few more products worth [...]
THANKS…from CookieZen! We were thrilled to see your ringing endorsement. We had a great time at the show and are happy to send you the cookies as promised. We are sure you’ll enjoy them with our suggested wine pairings. We’ll tweet a new pairing daily on twitter too…follow us: cookiesandcorks.
Please send me your address with cookie preferences…we’ll help get your “tastriffic” task under way!
BTW…our cookies be going out across the country within the next two months!