South American foods and flavors are ripe with opportunity for the food industry. From now-assimilated foods such as quinoa to still exotic imports such as purple corn or aji amarillo, South American cuisines offer unique flavor, color, nutrition, and culinary potential.
At its best, marketing and promoting international and regional cuisines is neither strictly about tradition nor exactly about fusion. It’s about participating in the evolution of foodways that are “always-already” fused, continuing the intermingling of traditions and cross-cultural influences in the spirit of authenticity rather than under the strict letter of culinary law. Peruvian cuisine, for example, is built up not only from indigenous Andean and colonizing Spanish influences, but also from the history of Chinese and Japanese immigration to Peru, manifested in the Chifa and Nikkei expressions of this nation’s cuisine. Menu and product developers will find success with the right balance of respect for tradition and informed innovation. Much of the motivation for looking at regional Mexican cuisines as well as places further south of the border is to bypass the deracinated and overly Americanized Hispanic foods of a past generation. Instead, we can take American food culture back to the future—not simply back to the past— via authentic Latin American foodways.
Profiles in this issue
Looking forward, what’s the opportunity-scape for South American foods and flavors? This report profiles the following menu and packaged product development opportunities:
• Aji peppers and rocoto see expanded applications in sauces and as ingredients for snacks with a global flair
• Purple corn and purple potato will stake more claim as authentic and healing foods, including for those seeking non-GMO ingredients
• In the wake of quinoa, amaranth and pichuberry will play on texture and flavor attributes, as well as leverage health & wellness, to increase penetration in the specialty and natural market
• Pisco and Caipirinha will draw on perennial interest in international spirits and beverages to foster new mixology and flavoring applications
• South American stews, including Brazil’s Feijoada, have gotten their sea legs in the restaurant circles.
Consumer drivers
With a new front-runner and ambassador in Peruvian cuisine, there’s a lot of momentum behind South American cuisine. Consumers are ready for the exploration of these foods and drinks, and to effectively meet this market opportunity restaurants and food retailers must simultaneously respond to the long-term consumer drivers that are reshaping our food culture:
• Health and wellness
• Food authenticity and integrity
• Artisanal and craft spirit
• Purposeful eating
• Flavor adventure and tourism
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CuTTS: South American Flavors culinary research
1. Packaged Facts introduces its new culinary
research series, CuTTS, through its South American
Flavors report.
CuTTS
2. You may have the ingredients. We bring you the
analysis, insights and perspectives for a successful
recipe in food development.
- Culinary Trend Tracking Series
CuTTS
21. Spotlight on South American Flavor
The U.S. culinary landscape continues to benefit from Latin American flavor infusions, and the time is right for
introducing more dishes and ingredients from South American cuisine to a broader swath of consumers.
Latin American culinary profiles in past issues of CCD Innovation and Packaged Facts’ Culinary Trend Mapping
Report Series included Brazilian Brigadeiros and Mexican Takis (Worldly Snacks, May 2013), Peruvian Lomo
Saltado (Asian and Latin, December 2012) and Ceviche (Freshness, February 2012), Argentinian Alfajor cookies
(Baked Goods, April 2011), and the Venezuelan arepa, the Salvadoran pupusa, and Mexican huarache (Street
Foods, April 2010).
In this inaugural issue of our new Culinary Trend Tracking Series (CuTTS), Packaged Facts takes up the torch
again for south of the border flavors, with a focus on South American flavors from Peru and Brazil.
As is the case with any imported culinary trends, flavor tourism is at work in the spread of South American flavors
in the North American market. Flavor tourism is a subset of flavor adventure, and one especially relevant to
younger, upscale, and foodie consumers. Whoever in Buffalo (the issue is contested) first tried overloading fried
chicken wings with cayenne pepper hot sauce and blue cheese dressing was cooking up flavor adventure, and
expressing the enduring American taste for newness, novelty, improvisation, and something like impropriety in the
foods and drinks we consume. In contrast, while the flavor tourism driving the U.S. craze for Peruvian-style Pollo
a la Brasa (rotisserie chicken) certainly includes a quest for new flavor, it brings to the table a deeper interest in
international cultures and foodways.
Peru has one of the greatest cuisines in the world. You say Peruvian food to a person in the U.S. or in Europe,
and they wouldn’t even have a clue what it is, maybe ceviche and that’s as far as they could get. But it’s a beautiful
cuisine, not from just the standpoint of academically interesting: It’s deliciously interesting.
– Rick Bayless, celebrity chef and owner of Topolobampo, Chicago
Why does Peruvian roast chicken taste better? In every version I’ve tasted, the skin has more intense flavoring,
often with citrus and garlic notes. That same marinade goes between the skin and meat. The cavity, too, I’ve
found, is always coated with the marinade paste. Sure, there’s that simple satisfaction of a chicken roasted with
just salt, pepper and olive oil. But South Americans, by throwing anything and everything on their birds, do it a
heck of a lot better.
– Kevin Pang, Chicago Tribune
David Sprinkle
Research Director, Packaged Facts
Publisher, Culinary Trend Tracking Series
22. Flavor tourism is fed by the foreign travel of American tourists, who want to keep enjoying at home the foods they
discover internationally. Mexico accounts for 33% and Latin America in aggregate for 40% of the foreign travel
by U.S. citizens, easily eclipsing the shares claimed by Canada (19.5%), Europe (18.5%), or the Caribbean (11%),
according to 2013 data from the International Trade Administration. Also factoring in are the wannabe travel and
mental vacations that often spur a craving for foreign foods—who wouldn’t, at times, rather be beachside in Brazil?
Flavor tourism is also fueled by the increasing (and increasingly center stage) multiculturalism of the United States,
whereby authentic foods and drinks from different countries and regions brush up against each other and mingle
in restaurant rows and on grocery store shelves. This increasing multiculturalism applies equally to the Hispanic
community within the U.S.: in the same way that less than two-thirds of the U.S. population is non-Hispanic white,
less than two-thirds of the Hispanic population in the U.S. is of Mexican origin.
Thus, in our increasingly multinational world, the dish that represents flavor adventure and flavor tourism to one
table of diners might, at the next table, be the nostalgic favorite that grandmother used to make. The domestic
and the foreign mix and mingle (rather than melt) into a complex stew.
The United Nations declared 2013 to be the “International Year of Quinoa,” the Andean seed that has been
cultivated like a grain. The Culinary Institute of America declared 2014 to be the year of Peruvian cuisine. The
National Restaurant Association’s “What’s Hot? 2014 Culinary Forecast,” a wide-ranging survey of top trends
identified by American Culinary Federation chefs, lists Peruvian as the top among “Ethnic Cuisines and Flavors.”
Chef Gastón Acurio, head of the renowned Astrid y Gastón restaurant in Lima, Peru, has called for a collaboration
of Latin chefs, farmers, and all food stakeholders to promote Latin American cuisine (Bloomberg, December
2013). And American consumers will be looking to explore Brazil and its food culture due to the global spotlights
created by the 2014 FIFA World Cup and the 2016 Summer Olympics.
With the stars aligned for new incursions of South American flavors into the North American market, Packaged
Facts’ Culinary Trend Tracking Series is proud to continue the tradition of highlighting salient new opportunities
and profitable fresh tracks for menu and product innovation.
David Sprinkle,
Research Director, Packaged Facts
Publisher, Culinary Trend Tracking Series
23. Culinary Trend Tracking Series: South American Flavors | March 2014 | Packaged Facts
Purple Potato and Purple Corn: Nutritious, wellness foods with promise 30
With reference to apples as a cholesterol-lowering food, for
example, Robinson cites a 2009 study that found no change in the
health of participants with high cholesterol and triglycerides who
started, in the spirit of the old adage, eating an apple a day. In
this study, the apples had far too low a content of phytonutritents,
which could have acted to lower the men’s cholesterol. Ironically,
the study suggested that because of the low nutritional value in the
Golden Delicious apples they were eating, the participants' risk for
cardiovascular disease actually increased.
Robinson points out that it’s not that apples don’t have health
benefits, but rather that there was a tactical slip in the selection
process of consumers looking for nutrient-rich fruits and vegetables.
Robinson’s book calls out the purple potato and recasts the
Peruvian purples in the context of nutritional foods with a
purpose:
A purple potato native to Peru has 28 times more cancer-fighting
anthocyanins than common russet potatoes. One species of
apple has a staggering 100 times more phytonutrients than the
Golden Delicious displayed in our supermarkets.
─ Jo Robinson, Eating on the Wild Side
The Boomer Wellness Culinary Trend Mapping Report (January,
2014) by CCD Innovation and Packaged Facts highlighted the
quest for improved nutrition as an integral driver of food trends.
This is a concerted and high-momentum effort and manifests
itself in myriad efforts by consumers to “self-track” nutritionally
and eat for wellness.
Purposeful eating behavior drives choices
According to a January-February 2014 Packaged Facts survey,
nearly 37% of consumers seek foods that have nutrients targeted
to specific health concerns.
Furthermore, American consumers are specifically looking for
healthier options in the salty snack aisle. As our report on Salty
Snacks in the U.S. (November 2013) indicated, over 42 million
American adults are healthy salty snackers.
Current GMO concerns bring in another dimension. According
to Packaged Facts survey data, 21% of consumers strongly
agree that groceries should be non-GMO, while another 22.5%
somewhat agree. Though the jury is out on whether consumer
resistance to GMO ingredients and foods is truly as deep as
24. Culinary Trend Tracking Series: South American Flavors | March 2014 | Packaged Facts
Purple Potato and Purple Corn: Nutritious, wellness foods with promise 31
it is broad, non-GMO product development using purple corn
and purple potatoes has this card to play in gaining consumer
acceptance.
Consumer pursuit of healthier and more natural foods are broadly
in evidenced in the consumption of diverse categories of foods
and the changing food shopping habits of consumers. Purple
carbohydrates will benefit from these changing habits.
Consumers are embracing these changes and heeding the experts
that espouse them. The popular talk show host Dr. Oz, for example,
suggests we eat plenty of blue, purple and dark vegetables and
fruits. “Boost your dark-food intake with raisins, dried plums, black
mushrooms, purple cabbage, blueberries, blackberries, purple
potatoes and eggplant,” he recommends in his website.
Drinkable purple and it’s ‘newness’
Food websites like Delish.com hail the popularity of retro cocktails
going back to the pre-Depression era, but there is no reason not
to look back much further to pre-Incan times. The ancientness
and wellness attributes of non-alcoholic beverages like the chicha
morada are inspiring an era of new cocktails.
Combine consumer interest in eating and drinking for wellness,
the historic halo of purple potatoes and corn, and the new
exposure factor (the foods aren’t new, but their exposure in the
context of wellness is), and you have a recipe for success in the
beverage category for the purples.
The Kitchn food blog, for example, suggests a recipe for chicha
morada that can be alcoholic or boozed up.
The original chicha morada is already a favorite among many
Hispanics and is sold in bodega and specialty store aisles.
Expect additional beverage formulations as non-Hispanics with
25. SOUTH AMERICAN FLAVORS
For more information, see our Culinary Trend Tracking Series
information page here:
http://content.marketresearch.com/culinary-trend-tracking-series
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