The Noise of the Trend
I don’t chase food trends. I chase flavor.
I learned that doing catering, not from a lecture, but from a table. A long table dressed like a promise. Mason jars lined up like centerpieces, each one filled with candy. A candy bar.
At a bridal shower or an engagement party, it always looked perfect. Everything was themed. All blue M&Ms and various blue hard candies. Salted caramel in three different forms.
I get it. It’s pretty. It photographs well. But I’d stand there and think, how long is this crap going to last?
Trends aren’t the enemy. Untasted food is.
Salt showed up on every dessert for a while. Salted caramel. Salted brownies. Salted cookies. Salt on everything like it was a finishing move that could save the whole idea.
Salt can be gorgeous in sweets when it’s done with intention. It can sharpen caramel, make chocolate taste deeper, and keep sugar from turning flat. I understood why it caught on.
But half the time it wasn’t done right. Too much salt, or the wrong salt, or salt dumped on top because someone saw it somewhere and wanted the look. The dessert didn’t taste more expensive. It tasted confused.
The avocado toast era
Then came avocado toast. Fifteen dollars for avocado toast.
I couldn’t look at a breakfast menu without seeing it. To be fair, if I’m paying $15, I want one thing. Slices, not a sad mash. And most places did slice it beautifully, which at least told me someone cared.
Still, the price wasn’t about flavor. It was about the moment. It was breakfast as a statement, even when the toast was just toast. I am really not sure what the avocado toast trend was trying to say.
Board culture and the performance trap
Then we got board culture. Cheese boards. Charcuterie boards. Butter boards. Everything served like a display.
I’m not mad at a good board. A board can be a real strategy. It feeds people, buys you time, and makes a room feel taken care of.
The board wasn’t built to taste good or buy you some time, it was now built to be photographed.
The discipline of favor
Not every trend was noise. Some of them solved real problems, and I respected that.
Cupcakes were the first big party trend I noticed in catering. They made sense. Portion control. Easy service. A little dainty. And if I’m honest, I still picture Carrie Bradshaw at a book launch with those perfect cupcakes and tiny little shoes. That trend had charm.
Then sliders were everywhere too, and they came with a price tag. Order three at a restaurant and suddenly it’s sixteen dollars.
I’m partial to the originals. White Castle sliders near 80th Street Park in North Bergen, N.J.
I remember grabbing some with my friends and hanging around the car eating them as we sat and enjoyed the night.
Some trends stick because they taste like something you remember. That part I’ll always understand.
Why authenticity wins
Two “trends” improved food, and I’ll say that out loud.
MSG coming back was one. It stopped being demonized, and I was like, finally. Growing up Latino, Sazón Goya was on everything. It woke up food and it made weeknight cooking taste like it had a plan.
The other trend was sous vide. I remember when Anova made it accessible, I understood the excitement. Not because it was fancy, but because it made food better. It gave regular people a technique they never had access to before.
If it makes the food taste better, keep it. If it doesn’t, let it pass.
I cross-hatch hot dogs before grilling, not because it’s cute, but because it works. More surface area means more browning. More browning means more flavor.
That’s the whole point.
Heat, salt, fat, acid, time. Those are the real influencers. Everything else is noise.
But if you have to choose, choose flavor. Because dinner isn’t a performance. It’s a relationship.
And the best compliment is still the same one I trust every time. That quiet second after the first bite, when nobody talks. Not because you impressed them, but because you fed them.
Flavor first. Everything else is noise.
