“Vegetables in 2017 will extend their domination of the dinner plate, shoving animal protein to the edges … or off the plate altogether,” Baum + Whiteman said. The firm pointed to chefs paying more attention to vegetables, as well as to the spread of vegetable-centric fast-casual chains such as Sweetgreen, in which customers eat mostly vegetables over bowls of salad or grains, sometimes with bread. 

Noting that 26 percent of consumers said in the past year that they were eating less meat, Baum + Whiteman predicted that plant-based protein would become more widespread. The firm noted that Tyson Foods has acquired a stake in plant-based protein company Beyond Meat, which is now offered at several restaurant chains. Meanwhile Silicon Valley investors have shown interest in Impossible Foods, a firm with a plant-based hamburger substitute now available at the restaurants of San Francisco chefs Chris Cosentino, Tal Ronnen and Traci Des Jardins. The firm also noted that vegetable-centric restaurants were drawing crowds, such as Ladybird in New York City, which “has a vegetable charcuterie plate of smoked carrot, cured beet, mushroom pâté, beet chorizo, cultured cheese and fig compote.”  

There’s a growing trend of restaurants with their own butcher shops attached, such as Parts & Labor in Baltimore, Gwen in Los Angeles, Shank Charcuterie in New Orleans, and Belcampo Meats in Los Angeles’ Central Market. The latter two are butchers with dining counters. Additionally, Baum + Whiteman point to Le District Food Hall at Brookfield Place in New York City, “Where meat is priced like jewelry … you buy a slab of well marbled steak to cook at home or, for a $12 upcharge, they’ll grill it and dispatch it to your nearby dining table with fries and a salad while a waiter delivers your wine.”

McDonald’s all-day breakfast has inspired competitors, such as Jack-in-the-Box’s Brunchfast, and more robust items from Starbucks (which the firm says is testing weekend quiche and French toast) and Einstein Bros. Bagels, which had a limited-time offer of eggs, avocado, chorizo, pepper and jalapeño salsa on a green chile bagel. Independent restaurants are introducing heartier breakfast sandwiches, such as Grand Central Market in Los Angeles, which serves Wagyu tri-tip, fried egg, chimichurri, red onion and arugula on a brioche bun. Astro Doughnuts & Fried Chicken in Washington, D.C., and Falls Church, Va., offers a honey-butter fried chicken sandwich on a doughnut. Baum + Whiteman also suggested keeping an eye out for more creative breakfast tacos.

Beet greens, chard, turnip greens, mustard greens and carrot tops are all becoming more widespread in this “waste-not” economy, Baum + Whiteman said. Additionally, seaweed is gaining wider acceptance in part due to the ramen boom, the firm said. “If we’re wrong, hedge your bets by exploring the world of squashes,” Baum + Whiteman added.

Fast-casual sales started to slump in late 2016, and Baum + Whiteman said it might be due to an excessively formulaic experience: “Choose a (fill in the blank), add a (fill in the blank), top it with (fill in the blank) and garnish it with (fill in the blank). Your food will be (choose any three) local, sustainable, farm-to-table, mindfully sourced, natural, artisan, eco-friendly, authentic, healthy, humanely slaughtered, meaningful, seasonal, vegetable-forward, mission-driven, chef-driven.” Additionally, although there has been a proliferation of culinary genres in the segment — Indian, Chinese, Korean, Mediterranean, lobster rolls, salad bars, poke and ceviche, “bowls of all kinds,” and ethnic sandwiches — they’re “mostly dumbed down.” The firm said to look for innovation in the segment, including new design elements, more alcoholic beverages, delivery of food to tables or possibly drive-thrus.

Less likely to splatter, and potentially free of carbohydrates, unlike sandwiches, bowls full of greens, whole grains, raw fish, the Korean staple bibimbap and more are proliferating at restaurants, “and chefs are finding that assembling a decorous bowl is easier and faster than the complexity of plating upscale entrées because they don’t have to fuss around with all that white space,” Baum + Whiteman said. Also, they’re portable. 

Baum + Whiteman see a proliferation of new ice cream formats, including the freakshake — a fad that started in Australia and features milkshakes topped with ice cream, “as much sauce and whipped cream as possible, and then surmounted by insane quantities of cake, cookies, doughnuts, ice cream sandwiches and various candies until the concoction threatens intellectually and physically to topple.”

Ice cream rollups — “liquid ice cream frozen into crêpe-like thinness on a super-cooled metal plate … and then scraped into tight cylinders” in front of customers — originated in Thailand and are now spreading, they said. The firm also pointed to decorated shaved ices proliferating in Southeast Asia, soft-serve embedded in cotton candy now being served in the United Kingdom, and ice cream with non-dessert ingredients such as avocado and roasted beets.

Yes, cayenne pepper consumption rose globally by 47 percent in global product launches last year, Baum + Whiteman said, citing Innova Market Insights, but caraway, saffron, horseradish and turmeric are also on the rise. The firm predicted an upward trend in the spices of Indian and Southeast Asian curries, including chiles, tamarind, lemon grass, turmeric, ginger, coriander, cardamom, kaffir lime, cumin, cinnamon, cloves, caraway mustard seed, citrus juices and zests, as well as shrimp paste. “Not all at once, but a few at a time, sometimes with barely detectable drops of soy sauce,” Baum + Whiteman predicted. The firm added that hot spices are being balanced with sweetness, hence blends such as jalapeño honey and jerk watermelon.