Turmeric, purple and medicinal mushrooms all featured prominently Austin, Texas-based Whole Foods Markets Inc.’s top 10 trends for 2017.
Here’s an abbreviated list:
1. Wellness Tonics: going beyond fresh-pressed to include “functional” ingredients like beneficial botanicals, turmeric, apple cider vinegar and medicinal mushrooms.
2. Byproducts: utilizing materials that typically didn’t make it through the production process, like whey from strained Greek yogurt or spent grains from beer.
3. Coconut everything: not just oil and water, we’re talking coconut sugar aminos, chips made from flour and beauty products.
4. Japanese foods: seaweed, fresh and dried kelp, wakame, dulsi and nori are all new flavors to many consumers.
5. Creative Condiments: move over tomatoes, we’re talking pomegranate molasses, black garlic puree, date syrup and beet salsa.
6. Pasta, reimagined: spiralized vegetables, kelp noodles and other alternatives to grains.
7. Purple Power: foods like purple sweet potatoes, cauliflower, asparagus, elderberries, acai and corn boost nutrients and antioxidants.
8. On-the-Go Beauty: multitasking beauty ingredients, including items like coconut oil packet moisturizers.
9. Flexitarian eating: “special diets” like vegan before 6 p.m., paleo five days a week and vegetarian days of the week.
10. Mindful meal prep: not just what you want to eat, but how to stretch food dollars, reduce food waste, save time and eat healthier, including oven-ready meal kits, vegetable medleys and other time-saving foods.
For a full list, visit WholeFoodsMarket.com.