Melissa Blease tucks into the top food and drink trends you can expect to see piled high on your plates and filling your glasses in 2025
The UK’s ongoing cost of living crisis combined with turbulent political upheaval and the climate emergency continue to dominate the headlines at the start of 2025 – and food world, both on the domestic front and out-and-about, is adapting accordingly. While fads, fashions and trends should never be at the forefront of our agenda when it comes to what – and how – we eat, myriad influences dictate both conscious and unconscious decisions; you can dispute that statement as much as you like, but I bet you’re not eating a Vesta curry of Findus Crispy Pancakes followed by Arctic Roll or a slice of Black Forest Gateau for dinner… are you?
So! What are the key factors and ingredients that will guide us through a year of food and drink, 2025 style – and which fickle fads are yesterday’s news? These are our predictions…
Waste not, want not
Cutting back on waste will maintain high-priority status on the 2025 menu-agenda. According to the Soil Association, it’s estimated that a whopping 9.5 million tonnes of food is wasted or binned in the UK, the majority being generated by production and processing plants at various stages of the food supply chain. But this statistic is falling year-on-year as we become both more ingredient- and packaging/processing-savvy; as food writer and development chef Luke Churchill says, “Consumers are, today, less inclined to buy highly processed, over-packaged plant-based alternatives and would rather purchase foods where the provenance of the ingredients is traceable and seen as more ‘natural.’”
As a result, the rise in consumers who make more use of fresh, seasonal, locally-sourced vegetables is expected to increase in 2025 (new buzzword: cottagecore), and a stronger focus on grains, pulses and legumes as the hero ingredient in at-home dishes combined with clever use of – and even planning for – leftovers (new buzzword: ‘culinary upcycling’) is the way forward.
Meat the Reducitarians
According to a 2024 YouGov survey, 13% of Britons now identify as flexitarian (increasingly referred to, in ‘hip’ parlance, as ‘reducitarian’) compared to just 7% the previous summer, and Waitrose is just one of the big supermarkets who report that searches for ‘plant-based’, ‘meat- and/or dairy-free’ and plain old ‘vegetarian’ have increased by 115% year-on-year – that’s an almost direct correlation with the rising cost of meat in the UK, and figures are expected to continue soaring throughout 2025.
Meanwhile, a 2024 Oxford University study indicated that switching just one red meat meal for a plant-based alternative every week has the potential to slash the UK’s carbon footprint by an impressive 50 million tonnes – and your wallet will certainly thank you for the change too.
Convenience Chic
What the air fryer started, a whole host of ‘revolutionary’ kitchen gadgets will run with in 2025. The Crockpot – a heady combination of energy-efficient slow cooker, pressure cooker and super-speedy oven (“roast a whole chicken/rustle up a curry in 30 minutes!”, etc) – leads the way, with chic, sleek electric/gas-powered barbecues set to replace that rickety old drum-on-wheels thing that’s been rusting away in your back garden for years and instant pizza ovens, smokers and tandooris transforming our summertime menus. Will we, this time next year, be getting rid of our traditional/ conventional ovens altogether? It could happen…
And to drink with that…?
In 2024, those aged between 28-43 demonstrated a distinct shift towards non-alcoholic beverages than in previous years, with ‘fashionable’ cold-pressed fruit juices, prebiotic and vitamin-supplemented sodas and alcohol-free seltzer/sparkling drinks proving to be a big hit with Millennials. But across the board, our thirst for alcohol will, it seems, continue to decrease.
Roughly 20% of the UK population is now thought to be completely teetotal, and the keen interest in craft mocktails and ‘wellbeing’ drinks (coconut, birch and ‘balanced’ waters; matcha tea; Manuka honey-infused elixirs, etc) is thought to continue throughout 2025. Meanwhile, alcohol-free alternatives to wine and beer are popping up on Set and Tasting Menus in restaurants, and even supermarket meal deals are cashing in on the soft drinks action.
For those who whine about not drinking wine, the demand for high-end, small format and environmentally sustainable canned wine is on the increase, with companies such as the Bristol-based Nania’s Vineyard, a drinks company born out of, and inspired by, its small urban vineyard on an allotment in central Bristol, at the vanguard of a wine revolution.
In, out, shake it all about: What’s hot for 2025?
Newstalgia: Classic British comfort food dishes, reimagined yet again to revitalise jaded palates – think, fish and chip pie, fruit-laden Yorkshire puddings, sausage and mash burgers, savoury donuts/cheesecakes, walnut ‘meatballs’.
Shichimi Togarashi (aka Japanese 7 Spice): Sweet, smoky,
a little bit citrusy… and addictive in the best possible way.
Seaweed caviar: A sustainable, affordable, plant-based alternative to caviar (typically made from unfertilised fish eggs) created from dried seaweed or kelp, a type of algae.
Embered food: Meat, vegetables or fish cooked directly on the embers or coals of a fire, bolder than a barbecue and all about theatre, theatre, theatre.
Foraged/heritage/indigenous UK herbs: Lovage, yarrow, cowslip, meadowsweet, woodruff, lemon balm, lavender, borage – the English country hedgerow is the ‘new’ herb garden.
Bespoke butters: Handmade, flavoured butters often made with different kinds of dairy (or non-dairy) produce (goats’ butter; raw butter; buffalo butter; plant-based butters; etc).
Soy sauce: Umami back-flavour to the max in savoury and sweet dishes.
Fig leaves: Sweet, floral and mildly citrus/coconut-y in flavour, fig leaves will pop up on menus/in recipes everywhere, from wrappings for baked fish and cheese to an ingredient in oils, dressings and cocktail syrups by way of panna cottas, ice creams, custards and compotes.
Rarebit: The classic combination of hot cheese, ale, mustard and Worcestershire sauce, usually served on toast and thought to have originated in Wales in the early 1700s, is having its catwalk moment, popping up in pickles, mash, pies, croquettas, tacos, donuts, cool canapes and more.
Black Garlic: Aged, fermented garlic resulting in a soft, sweet, umami-rich flavour bomb that adds depth, flavour and complexity to all manner of dishes.
Ripples: From a revival of traditional rippled ice creams (raspberry, strawberry, peach, etc) to thick ribbons of flavour semi-stirred through purees, soups and sauces, the ripple will make menu waves this year.
On the way out: What we’re saying ‘good riddance’ to…
Towering, fully-loaded, stacked and/or dirty burgers, fries, sides, etc: Ugly, unmanageable and ostentatiously over-indulgent! 2025 is all about ‘clean’.
Deconstructions: Trifles, Cottage and Shepherd’s Pies, cheesecakes, salsas, crumbles, pizzas… they were all constructed for very good reason; in 2025, chefs will,
at last, stop taking them apart.
Street Food sections on restaurant menus: If you’re not eating it in the street, you’re not eating Street Food.
Bowl food: We’ve all started to realise that it’s just food, served in a bowl. A Poke Bowl? That doesn’t mean anything. A Buddha Bowl? Same.
Violent menu descriptions: Traditional culinary terms such as mashed, marinated, blanched, barbecued and minced will replace words such as smashed, smacked, burnt, scalded and pounded all-kinds-of-everything, sending them all back to the boxing ring, where they belong.
Over-lit dining rooms: Massive filaments inside what appear to be goldfish bowls, spotlights that give an ‘interrogation room’ vibe and canteen-style striplights are, at long last, being turned off in restaurants everywhere as subtle backlighting comes back into (soft!) focus
Caramelised biscuits: They peaked too fast in 2024 to stay fashionable; the social media-generated backlash (“too sweet”; “just… sickly!”; “oh please, don’t add them to anything else!”) has begun…
Cocktails served in jars: Kilner jars, jam jars, sweetie jars et al are swiftly being removed from behind bars… and put back in the pantry.
All You Can Eat buffets: They disappeared in the post-pandemic world and don’t seem to be making a return any time soon.
Cash!: According to an autumn 2024 Morning Advertiser survey, 89% of restaurant, pub, cafe and coffee shop customers in the UK now use cards or contactless payment to pay their bills. Meanwhile, 43% of hospitality operators in London don’t give customers the option anymore; cash-free, it seems, is the new king.
