[As we lead up to the New Year, Nancy will be diving further into 2011 Food Trend Predictions, and linking you to food around the world]
Restaurants, like the rest of us, are fighting to survive in a world of tight budgets, and intense competition. Inspirational Budget Cooking, while seemingly creative in its right, is born from the broader environmental and food trend: Local Food. With local eating making major strides in 2010, we saw the explosion of farm to table menus in restaurants of various flavours, colours, and stripes, the increase in local CSAs (Community Shared Agriculture), and a renewed affinity for regional craft food (Prince Edward County in Ontario, and Williamsburg in Brooklyn NYC are but a few examples that stand out).
Inspirational Budget Cooking isn’t simply about ensuring a black-inked bottom-line, it’s about using resources more carefully and minimizing waste, while still making great food. Small plates, minimalist menus, and one or two dish ‘menus’ converges with the latest environmental trends of reduce, reduce, reduce, and local, local, local.
Yet budget cooking is nothing to snuff at. Chefs are truly pushing their creativity and reaching new limits to cook up inspiring dishes with ‘simple’, ‘humble’, and offal ingredients. Making spare meat parts, like hoof, and tongue, or ‘blah’ local vegetables like parsnips and radishes delectable, palatable and menu worthy is no easy task. Grandiosity is making way for the humble; foie gras make room for the pâté!
Food producers are cutting back but still keeping it real. Giant portions that only the very hefty could ever imagine finishing are replaced with smaller dishes or even with a “choose your own amount” [video @ 2:56] option. Out of season fare is always pricier to obtain (transport) than local in-season goodies, or housemade pickles, preserves, and jams. New restaurants are opting for ‘previously owned’, ‘lightly used’, and ‘vintage’ furniture and decor for their renovations. Bare exposed walls, open-concept, and communal tables are both chic and budget savvy. These dining trends are all part and parcel of the convergence of Environmental Consciousness and Inspirational Budget Cooking.
These trends are not only the latest market trends, but they also prove to be fundamental strategies to staying financially afloat in this economy. Less is truly more.
[Pictures courtesy of Serious Eats]
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Would you please give us the recipes? It will be more useful I think. thank you.
Some useful and interesting information and ideas here. We are researching for an article about family cooking on a bu8get. Some of the articles and food alternatives may be a bit severe for what we are (ideally) looking for. Nevertheless, an interesting read.
OMG is that a pigs nose? Interesting article. Its refreshing to see budget cooking being teamed up with being environmentally
conscious. I’ve always imagined big portions, smaller cost. The amount of meat/cut doesn’t matter as long as its cheap. Its cool to see that portions are reduced and the use of these different parts are being maximized by these innovative chefs