#FOURNews | Future of food

08 Dec 2016
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2 min read
In preparing the third annual‘Future of Food’ report, CatchOn examined the changes now taking place in the culinary world to understand how these shifts will impact our future…

In preparing thethird annual‘Future of Food’ report, CatchOn examinedthe changes now taking place in the culinary world to understand how these shifts will impact our future.

The report has been subtitles ‘Conflict & Conscience’ to reflect the opposing forces, ironies and thorny moral issues that are shaping the future of the food industry. For example, although consumers have more access to food than ever before, they’ve never been more removed from the cooking process and food sources.While the internet bombards us daily with new information, many of us remain ignorant of the origins of the food we consume.

Through research and discussions with culinary experts, food critics, chefs and restaurateurs, the report hasidentified a number of key issuesand emerging trends…

*Chef, charlatan,or showman?

In recent years, chefs have transitioned from instructors to innovators. Blue-collar cooks are now white-knight advocates. As chefs continue to step out of the kitchens and into the spotlight, how will their public personas evolve?

*Faced with waste

With global food production struggling to keep pace with population growth, how are diners, restaurateurs and chefs cooking up solutions to produce more with less?

*Keeping it real

Eager to embrace the farm-to-table trend, consumers are drawn to restaurants who bandy about buzzwords and catchphrases like ‘organic’, ‘sustainably grown’ and ‘farm fresh’. The reality, though, is very different. With the rising incidence of food fraud and lab-created food products, is real food a thing of the past?

*Reaching critical mess

Once venerated and feared in equal measure, restaurant critics have had their influence eroded through the changing media landscape and the growth of social media. The internet has replaced experts with amateurs as bloggers engage in a meals- for-mentions trade-off with restaurants. Will traditional food critics have
the final say?

*Tradition versus innovation

When it comes to new dining experiences, will science replace our senses? To what extent does technology impact our taste?

*The historical future

In a back-to-basics trend, chefs are honouring primal cooking techniques, returning to fire and water, exploring indigenous cuisines and delving into the past to create a new culinary future. nostalgia and history are shaping the way we eat. Our generation is focused on recovering, preserving and maintaining cultural traditions through food by referencing historical texts and recipes or revitalising ancient cooking methods in a contemporary context.

For each of these six issues, they’ve analyzed perceptions, uncovered realities and predicted how these changes will impact the future.With those for a thirst for information and a hunger for new trends, we trust catchon’s latest Future of Food report will give you plenty to chew over…