At the end of every year, countless companies and organizations try to “predict” food and flavor trends for the coming year. Some are based on research, others simply favor the company’s own products. Regardless, the real question is this: How can food processors take advantage of this information?
This year, we’re looking at how three companies are tapping trends for the new year. Sweet & spicy, Korean BBQ and Nashville hot chicken are recent but confirmed trends. Here’s how Daily Crunch, Gimme Seaweed and Rebellyous Foods are putting them to work.
Each of these food processors observed consumer taste trends and created a product with a somewhat complex, but still familiar, flavor profile that consumers find alluring.
Daily Crunch goes swicy
Consumers seem to love spicy foods these days, the hotter the better. And sweetness is always popular. So it’s no surprise that “swicy” – a combination of sweet and spicy – has been a hot food trend in recent years.
An example is Sweet and Spicy Sichuan Sprouted Edamame and Cashews from Daily Crunch, which specializes in snacks that include sprouted nuts as a key ingredient.
“The flavor officially launched nationwide in Whole Foods stores nationwide in October 2024, and the initial sales reports have been extremely positive,” says Daily Crunch CEO Laurel Orley. “Even better, Whole Foods included this flavor in their 2025 food trends report, and we’ve been collaborating with their team on some exciting announcements that are still to come. I’m confident this flavor will win industry awards — it truly has the trifecta of taste, collaboration and crunch.”
The new swicy snack came about after Orley connected with Fly By Jing at Natural Products Expo West 2024 last March. Fly By Jing makes Sichuan sauces and spices, and they sent Orley 18 jars of sauces and spices to experiment with after the show.
“We started doing small test runs with different types of nuts and then realized the cashews really worked the best with the spices and leaned into that,” Orley says.
The company settled on a coating that features Fly By Jing signature chile flakes and mala spice. Coating nuts with a sauce would have been easier than coating with dry ingredients, but Daily Crunch vows to not use seed oils in their products, and Fly By Jing’s sauces contain them. So they sourced the spices before they were mixed with the oils.
Orley says the next challenge was choosing another crunchy product to pair with the cashews in the same pouch, to create a complementary texture and flavor profile. Fava beans seemed like a good fit, but they eventually decided that dried, lightly salted edamame worked better.
“Its crunchiness aligned with our brand’s focus on texture,” Orley explains. “We wanted to create something new, but flavors that consumers already understand. Coating our sprouted cashews with Fly By Jing spices brought the flavors together in a truly unique way — and it really worked.”
The commitment by Whole Foods sealed the deal. The retailer agreed to carry the product in March, which allowed Daily Crunch to move into larger production runs and test the flavor with key customers.
The Sweet and Spicy Sichuan Sprouted Edamame and Cashews wasn’t the company’s first success with Whole Foods – the store also sells Daily Crunch Dill Pickle Sprouted Almonds and Pepitas. “We use real upcycled pickle pieces in our pickle paste, which has been a hit with customers,” Orley says.
Gimme Seaweed adds heat to Korean BBQ
Korean barbecue has been on the culinary scene for decades, and is now trending into processed foods. SPAM announced a Korean BBQ variety in July 2024, for example.
Gimme Seaweed introduced its version of a Korean BBQ-flavored snack around the same time, but it has a twist: It includes the flavor of gochujang, a spicy paste used in Korean cuisine that’s made from red chile peppers, fermented soybeans, rice and salt.
Gimme Seaweed Korean BBQ roasted seaweed snacks feature a combination of garlic, pepper, soy sauce and miso flavors, and the added gochujang gives a bit more heat than traditional Korean BBQ.
“With our new flavor, we wanted to pay homage to South Korea, the birthplace of our founder, Annie Chun, and the country where we grow our organic seaweed,” explains Diego Norris, the company’s chief marketing officer. “Spicy snacks have become increasingly popular in recent years, and this was evident to us with the success of our Chili Lime flavor, which launched in 2022.
“We also took note of Korean-inspired flavors coming to the forefront – particularly gochujang, which has become a go-to sauce for chefs to add a hint of spice to their dishes,” he continues. “While traditional Korean BBQ is actually not heavy on the gochujang flavor, our founder, Annie, wanted to do things differently and created this recipe intentionally to have a unique, spicy flair.”
Norris explains that seaweed’s porous nature amplifies flavors, making it a somewhat challenging substrate to work with. He says it took numerous iterations in the lab to get the ideal balance of heat, sweetness and savory depth to complement the delicate seaweed.
“Over the years, we’ve honed our expertise in crafting seasonings that enhance seaweed without overpowering it,” Norris says. “With Korean BBQ, we aimed for a light, crunchy bite that delivers the perfect blend of umami and spice.”
Moving from the lab to production also presented challenges, Norris says. The company uses only non-GMO ingredients, and they had to lean heavily onto their longstanding supplier relationships to find non-GMO ingredients to create the complex flavor profile of their Korean BBQ.
In addition, the formula had to be adjusted to meet production levels, but since seaweed is so delicate, even minor adjustments during production can impact flavor and texture. Norris says they worked closely with their co-packers to refine the process and ensure that the snack consumers find on the shelves is the same as what the company created on the bench.
The product is now in Whole Foods, Target, HEB, Sprouts, Meijer and other retailers, and the reviews from consumers have been “overwhelmingly positive,” Norris says.
“Developing new flavors is a mix of art and science,” he explains. “We analyze consumer trends to ensure we’re creating something people truly want, but we’re also guided by Annie’s instincts. Annie is the tastemaker of our brand, and her ability to create crave-worthy, balanced flavors is unmatched.”
Nashville hot (plant-based) chicken
Like Korean BBQ, Nashville hot chicken has been a culinary trend for a few years now, and food processors are jumping on the bandwagon. Now school children can enjoy the flavor – and in a plant-based version – when their cafeterias serve Spicy Kickin’ Patties from Rebellyous Foods, a company that makes plant-based chicken products.
The company launched the product in October 2024 at the California School Nutrition Asson. Show and were “overwhelmed by the positive feedback,” reports Christie Lagally, the company’s CEO and co-founder.
Lagally explains that they decided to develop the flavor based on feedback from their school customers, who said spicy chicken sandwiches are top sellers among their students, and they wanted a plant-based version. Rebellyous Foods surveyed customers to learn whether they preferred Buffalo flavor or Nashville hot chicken flavor, and the latter won out.
“The flavor profile consists of two main categories of ingredients,” Lagally says. “The first includes umami aromatics, such as garlic, onion and salt, which contribute savory flavors and serve as the foundational building blocks of any coating system. The second category features heat components that act as top-note flavors.
“Black pepper offers a unique combination of earthy and pungent notes, while capsicums, derived from chili peppers, add both vibrant color and a tailored level of heat. Together, these ingredients create a harmonious balance of flavors that delivers a bold, mouth-watering experience.”
Getting to that “mouth-watering experience” was not simple. Rebellyous determined that the best way to deliver the flavor was to put it in the breading that coats the plant-based protein patty.
They also needed to establish a spice level that appealed to children, which was a special challenge because “spiciness” is subjective. Lagally says some taste testers could not detect any heat in the preliminary versions, while others found them way too spicy. It took multiple iterations in the lab before they landed on the current version.
“From a custom formulation standpoint, it was clear we needed a patty with a burst of flavor in every bite and it had to be visually appealing,” she says. “We are committed to avoiding artificial colors and we wanted to ensure the color of the final product was indicative of the flavor, so we landed on beet powder as a color enhancer to give the nice red-orangish color people expect in a spicy chicken product.”
The next step was converting the bench-created product to a formulation suited for full-scale production. The biggest challenge Rebellyous faced was that the spices aerated during production.
“Because the product contains peppers, the air in the environment becomes saturated, so we had to take precautions to ensure the comfort of the workers on the manufacturing floor, and after our first production run, worked to make further adjustments,” Lagally explains.
The Spicy Kickin’ Patties have been a hit with students. A week after the California School Nutrition Assn. Show, the company handed out 800 samples to Philadelphia Public School students.
“The kids loved it so much they were coming back for seconds and thirds!” Lagally exclaims.
Naturally, every food processor wants its customers to “come back for seconds and thirds.” Following consumer trends, and adopting those trends to processed foods, is one way they do it. As these case studies reveal, the process is not always easy, but it often pays off.
What Else (Might Be) Hot in 2025?
Many organizations and companies try to predict what flavors will take off in the coming year. Here is a small sample of the predictions for 2025:
- Serenity: Ingredient maker Flavorsum predicts that the tumultuous social and political scene will cause consumers to seek out flavors that relax them, including honey, matcha, hazelnut and parmesan.
- Haitian Flavors: People will be interested in trying flavors from Haiti, according to Datassential. Key Haitian flavors include sour orange, beets, garlic and parsley.
- Brown Sugar: That’s the pick of ingredient supplier T. Hasegawa.
- West Asian and African Tastes: American International Foods Inc. says flavors from this part of the world, such as hawaij (a blend black pepper, cumin, cardamom, and turmeric), za’atar, and harissa will grow in popularity in 2025.
- Spicy Beverages: Flavorman, a custom beverage developer, says international spices – such as coriander, turmeric, star anise, ginger and peppercorn – will add zip to beverages in the new year.
- “Thoughtfulness”: That may be the way to sum up Hartman Group’s three themes of Experience & exploration, Supportive wellbeing and Intentional consumption.
- “New Human Nature”: ADM says that’s the common theme in its four trends of Revisit & Re-Invent, Adaptive Eating, Euphoric Wellness and Made for (You).
