New Spice Trends for a New Year

Still trending are healthier ingredients in foods and beverages, interest in ethnic international flavors, and more sustainably produced seasoning and spices.
 
This growing interest in spice blends and ethnic tastes means new flavor profiles are in demand.
 
Increasing numbers of consumers are keen on Middle Eastern and African flavors, including the exotic sumac berry, one of the za-atar spice blend’s essential ingredients, and the berbere, zhug, chermoula, Baharat, and ras-el-hanout blends.
 
Hence, the requirement for traditional and curated blends is rising, including vegetarian and vegan mixes. Indeed, according to ResearchAndMarkets.com, the global spices and seasoning market is predicted to hit $57.7 billion by 2030, increasing at a 5.6% CAGR1.
 
This exotic and exciting direction in food and beverages means adventurous manufacturers must explore imaginative and innovative combinations and re-imaginings while ensuring healthier, more natural ingredients in a cleaner label.
 
Spicy: What Does it Mean for Savory, Confectionary, Sweet, Beverage, and Bakery?
It means the spiciness of authentic local seasoning and layers of flavors yielding unique and multi-faceted waves of taste and heat.
 
Consumers want to experience flavor fantasies.
 
So, explore regional ingredients and traditional dishes from far-flung places such as Southeast Asia, India, the Eastern Mediterranean, and North Africa. Suffuse your products with the richly flavorful, aromatic, and colorful spices from these inspiring cuisines, mixing and matching profiles – fusing new and old, traditional and modern, Eastern and Western, known and unknown – in unexpected ways.
 
For example, the unusual pairing in spicy honey has grown in interest by 53% over the past 24 months2, the tasty combination bringing new life to a stagnant category.
 
So, what does this mean for savory, confectionary, sweet, beverage, and bakery?
 
Spices and sweets are no strangers, with spices long used in desserts worldwide. Consider how, in Mexico, cuisine pairs chocolate with chilli, adding delicious depth and kick; how in India, fennel seeds enhance the malpua flavor profile; while in Greece, cinnamon introduces warmth and nuttiness to heavenly baklavas.
 
So, think beyond vanilla.
 
Instead, elevate your dessert profiles with sweetly spicy and licorice anise seed, intensely sweet, lemony, and minty green cardamom, lightly citrusy and sweet mace, subtly bitter and highly warming cloves, and sweet, warm, and tangy ginger.
 
Then, beyond embracing umami mushrooms, salty seaweed, and other plant-based foodstuffs such as jackfruit, add spicy variety and vibrance to savory products, dancing delightfully with unique Eastern, Middle-Eastern, and African cuisine and ingredients.
 
The heat should be complex – excitingly hot yet teasingly tasty. Offer underlying and layered flavor notes, pairing and fusing disparate tastes or sensations for novelty and impact. Think “kimchi chips” or “ginger lemongrass jellies”.
 
In addition, with street food epitomizing authentic international taste localization, embrace the flavors and spices of this genre, for example, North India’s chaat masala – a typical spice blend in many street dishes. According to a recent Spoonshot report, consumer interest in this spice is five times that of business, representing a hot opportunity for manufacturers .
 
Finally, spice up your beverages.
 
With increasing consumer demand for flavorful and functional beverages, whether for energy, nutrition, or a healthy kick, including low or non-alcoholic “alcohol”, healthy spices, and those yielding a burn or a throat catch, should be high on the list of producer ingredients.
 
Enhance your energy and vitamin drinks, flavored sparkling waters, colas, selzers, ready-to-drink teas, and even milk and shakes with sizzling spices.
 
Look for pure and natural flavor molecules, ensuring responsible and sustainable sourcing and production.
 
At the same time, manufacturers must source their spice ingredients from reputable producers who heat or otherwise treat spice products to obviate potential toxins in line with strict industry regulations.
 
Advanced Biotech is one such ingredient producer, helping flavor savory, confectionary, sweet, beverage, and bakery products globally.
 
Choose Advanced Biotech: Your One-Stop Spice Flavoring Shop
Advanced Biotech produces an extensive range of flavor and fragrance molecules – 100% natural, plant-based, and EU-certified.
 
So, browse our collection to add intense and spicy notes of anise, black pepper, cayenne pepper, chili, cinnamon, clove, ginger, turmeric, and more, to your portfolio.
 
Please contact us for more information.


1 https://www.globenewswire.com/en/news-release/2022/07/18/2480807/28124/en/The-Worldwide-Seasoning-Spices-Industry-is-Expected-to-Reach-57-7-Billion-by-2030.html
2 https://www.chocolate-academy.com/en-US/inspiration/trends/5-bakery-and-pastry-trends-2023
3 https://foodinstitute.com/consumerinsights/experts-top-3-flavor-trends-to-watch-in-2023/