With the affordability of international travel and growth of the internet, it’s now easier than ever to immerse yourself in different cultures and trends in other countries. Food is one area that has blurred the boundaries of travel, where we are now accustomed to a wide variety of flavours and dishes from around the world.
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Focus on ice cream
One food item that enjoys universal appeal is ice cream. Although the popularity of ice cream isn’t likely to wane any time soon, there has been a recent shift in the trend for unusual flavours. For a long time, vanilla, chocolate and strawberry have been the staple ice cream flavours, but people are increasingly wanting to go beyond the ordinary and try something different. They’ve seen images on social media such as Instagram of exotic flavours of desserts, and want to taste them, too. To reflect this trend, manufacturers are starting to take inspiration from Asia, infusing exotic tastes into the ice creams they produce.
Exotic flavours
People are becoming more adventurous in their food tastes, and it appears that we’re more than happy to swap vanilla ice cream for something a little less ordinary. Ice cream manufacturers have begun experimenting with introducing exotic ice cream flavours that are popular in Asia, such as red bean flavour, toasted sesame or chocolate miso. According to the Guardian, particularly noticeable is the surge of matcha green tea ice creams.
Big brand name Unilever has already pounced on creating exotic ice cream flavours, where it sells red bean Cornettos in China, kulfi ice cream in India and dung dung ice cream in Indonesia. It’s not just the flavours that are changing; ingredients such as mastic gum and ground powdered orchid root are being used to create a thicker and chewier texture of ice cream, like those in Turkey.
Although many people still enjoy traditional flavours of ice cream, incorporating natural raspberry flavouring, for example, from http://www.foodieflavours.com, lots of us are willing to sample new flavours, even just the once, to see what they might be missing out on.
This does not necessarily mean to say that the days are numbered for vanilla ice cream, but we may increasingly find that vanilla is being blended or infused with hints of little-known flavours from across the globe, to provide an extra element of intrigue.