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| True Food Kitchen's onsite Herb Garden |
Welcome to CB.com's 2012 food and dining predictions. I've always loved postulating about where food and food culture is headed. Sometimes I'm spot on, and other times I've failed miserably. We feel that we have a pretty good pulse on this industry and want to look into that crystal ball and lay out some educated guesses on what the food retail industry may look like like in 2012 without any of the Nicholas Cage Mayan calendar nonsense.
Let's continue with our educated guessing!
Can we be done with this list already? It might be 2013 before this is completed. Coming in at number three on our trend list is the movement towards retailers farming their own food. As you can see in the picture above, True Food Kitchen, a concept based out of Arizona, maximizes it's real estate. The interior's open layout, high ceilings, large sliding glass doors, and citrus color scheme bring the outdoors in. An on-site herb garden and smoker lend to farm-fresh feel. The airiness of the place creates a unique sense of openness when we almost walk into the wall-less kitchen. The garden ultimately is what makes this place credible.
Coast to coast, more chefs and restaurant owners are adding pitchforks to their small ware repertoire as they create gardens to feed their culinary zest and their diners. Ambitious and environmentally conscious chefs on the West Coast (and everywhere in between), are growing their own veggies and herbs and bypassing the traditional procurement route.
Let's set the record straight. This isn't a new and novel idea. Restaurants across the country have been doing this for years. But.....the ROI is staring to surface in a unique and opportune way that many mainstream outlets are looking into this culture of cultivating. Whatever the scale of the agricultural endeavor, the benefits are clear, you can pick something during the day and incorporate it into a special that night. It creates a convenience and nimbleness that most restaurants aren't afforded otherwise. The trend has caught on with high-end, Michelin-starred restaurants in California such as The French Laundry in Napa and has trickled down to more casual friendly outlets as well.
Providing boutique vegetables for high-end diners has been proving it's worth as of late. Adding the ability to walk outside your back door and get the same high end quality, could provide a new way of menu engineering from a micro sense. I personally think we are just scratching the surface on this...Stay tuned.
2012 Food and Dining Predictions:
#5 - Cloud Eating and Cooking
#4 - Grains, Grains. Grains and .....more Grains.
