Personally speaking, we’re all as guilty as the next person, being swept up into the tsunamis of food trends and figuring out how to interpret it all before it consumes us (or, often, peters out to a mere, jaded ripple). Some of them are fantastic while they last, but some trends either make us scratch our heads or pummel us to the point of exhaustion.
Here’s a sprinkled doughnut’s worth of responses when we asked about food trend pet peeves to folks at America’s Test Kitchen. Any resonate with you?
Truffle oil. Most of it is lousy, and chefs tend to over-use it as a way to make an ordinary dish sound “special” on the menu. Fortunately, it seems to be on the way out.
Cupcakes. I don’t particularly care for the taste, and there is always way, way too much frosting piled on top. I just don’t get the obsession.
I hate when vegan/vegetarian restaurants try to dress up tofu as something else. Don’t call a dish Ginger Chicken. You’re a vegetarian restaurant. I know it’s not chicken. Don’t apologize for serving tofu. Just tell me it’s tofu. I’ll still eat it.
And now for the Silly Question of the Day…
What food trend (current or otherwise) particularly annoys you? And why?
Leave your silly answer in the comments!
(Photo: Corey Ann)
About the Author: Christine Liu
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I actually love truffle oil (and use good quality truffle oil when cooking at home), cupcakes, and vegetarian restaurants. (Can’t quite figure out if the “trend” being referenced on the last one is tofu? Or vegetarian restaurants? I didn’t know either was a trend.)
One trend I’d like never to hear of again is food trucks. Food Network seems to keep running new seasons of shows all about food trucks and chasing food trucks. Living in NYC, I’ve eaten from my fair share of food trucks and I can say that the food has always been overpriced and generally mediocre.
People who take pictures of their food at restaurants. I like a good food blog as much as the next person, but watching people who are constantly taking pictures of the new poutine with foie gras or salted caramel ice cream just makes me cringe.
When chef’s say they only use fresh, farm to table, seasonal ingredients. It implies everyone else uses rotten, scientifically created, unseasonal food. It’s as if they’re hiding their lack of creativity behind the marketing jargon they’ve heard other people say.
I HATE the term “foodie.” Makes my blood boil to hear it. Although I have a food blog, I’m tired of food blogs about people cooking their way through some cookbook (Julie and Julia covered that territory completely and for all times. So, no need to revisit.) I was more amused than annoyed by 90s “towers” of food that were impossible to eat without causing a tower collapse.
@honorspianist The trend referred to in the last one is neither vegetarian restaurants nor tofu. It is when vegetarian restaurants try to make tofu sound better by not calling it tofu.
It bothers me to see any and every form of mayonnaise referred to as aioli regardless of whether it contains garlic.
Macarons, Hasselback potatoes, and pull apart bread. Ninety percent of the food bloggers out there have covered these three items numerous times. Can we please move on?
CUPCAKES – They are in every bakery, grocery store bakery department, and most are just terrible. Proportions are all wrong i.e. frosting to cake and typically the cakes themselves are flavorless and sugar laden. Frostings are to sweet too. Pricing is outrageous, for the price of 2 or 3 cupcakes you can purchase a whole cake. Thanks for asking, I guess I needed to vent.
Micro-gastronomy rubs me the wrong way. I just don’t get it. Why would I want to eat apple infused foam instead of a slice of apple pie?
I am really tired of hearing, reading and the talk about short ribs. Enough.
SLIDERS – They are mini hamburgers. I don’t really know what other food trends are out there right now. This is the only one that came to mind. I am just not into ‘food as entertainment’ so I try to prepare most of my food at home.
I am so enamored of the ATK show. Finally, recipes that work that I can make at home!
Perhaps not so much a “trend” as just a real annoyance to me when it comes to celebrity chefs. I am irked beyond belief by size 0 – size 2 female “chefs”. I’m sorry, but I completely subscribe to the saying ‘never trust a skinny chef’. If it’s not good enough for them to eat and show that they eat it, it’s not good enough for me to even bother trying. Ina Garten, Julia and Bridget – real women who make real food and you can see they eat it and enjoy it, because they aren’t anorexic sticks.
Recipes that call for sea salt as an ingredient rather than a garnish. The reason you’re paying 10x+ the price of Morton’s is because of the specific mineral nuances sea salt lends and its flaky texture. None of that comes through in your stew/cake/casserole unless your sprinkling it over the top at the last minute.
#firstworldproblems