Maile Carpenter
Editor in Chief
@maile__fnmagand food-trends guru Francesca Cocchi is
forecasting a pretty exciting year ahead,
filled with caffeinated granola, super-
realistic faux fish and lots of mango lassis
(if you haven’t had one, you probably
will soon). We have a decent track record
here with trend predictions. Last year
our editors put their bets on elderflower,
oat milk, CBD and alternative straws, and
they were spot-on. But we’ve had some
misses, too. We thought that kakigori was
going to hit it big in 2019 and we’ve yet to
see an explosion in Japanese shaved ice.
We were also convinced a few years ago
that gochujang was going to be the next
Sriracha. Haven’t heard of gochujang?
That’s because it never became the
next Sriracha.
I know this much, though: America will
keep trying new diets (check out some
of the craziest on page 98), and we will
inevitably look back one day and wonder
what on earth we were thinking. For now,
let’s just take a moment to enjoy the fact
that fat is in fashion, and that cheese chips
are a thing.’ve felt guilty about something
for more than 25 years, and it’s
time to fess up: I worked at a deli
in college and occasionally put full-fat
ranch and Thousand Island dressing
on sandwiches when customers
ordered low-fat. I didn’t do this for
fun, of course. I did it because the shop
regularly ran out of low-fat dressing
and my boss told me to quietly sub in
the regular stuff. I should have spoken
up, but I knew that would be disastrous:
This was the early ’90s, when no one
wanted anything to do with fat. Carbs?
No problem. Sorority girls would
come to the deli and order giant bagels
with low-fat cream cheese and buckets
of low-fat frozen yogurt thinking they
were making smart choices.
What a difference a few decades
make. Fat seems to be everyone’s
favorite ingredient now. Thanks to the
keto diet, bacon, butter and pork rinds
have become health food, and snack
makers are churning out chips made
entirely of cheese. The cheddar crisps
on this page have 14 grams of fat per
serving, and America can’t seem to get
enough of them.
You’ll find the story behind these
and other surprising food trends on
page 26. Our tireless associate editor14 FOOD NETWORK MAGAZINE ●JANUARY/FEBRUARY 2020
CARPENTER: TRAVIS HUGGETT. FOOD PHOTO: RALPH SMITH.editor’s letter
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