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Guest blogger: Rachel and Logan of Boots in the Oven
While I’m with my family in Missouri this week, stuffing my face with Oreo cream cheese balls, breakfast casseroles and cashew chicken, Central Texas food bloggers are taking over Relish Austin to answer one question: Food-wise, what are you looking forward to in 2009? Today’s guest blog is from Rachel and Logan of Boots in the Oven:
Hi, from your friendly neighborhood bloggers at Boots in the Oven! Since Addie is on a family-friendly tour of hopefully snow-riddled Missouri, she’s given us the opportunity to pontificate on what food trends we’re looking forward to in 2009. I’m hoping for levitating magnet-powered robot cookery, but I’ll probably have to wait until 2011 for that. Meanwhile, here’s some food stuffs we wanna see in the next year — let’s check back in December ’09 and see how much of our face we fell on.
Happy Holidays, and thanks again for the platform, Addie!
Mobile Meal Diversification
Austin currently hosts food trucks of a wide variety. We have your requisite hot dog and pizza vendors, Middle Eastern fare, burgers, and lord knows some of the best Mexican food in town comes from those little trailers. We even have seafood and Vietnamese sandwiches. I don’t think the trend has peaked though. With the low overhead and relatively minor start-up costs, I look forward to seeing some real yummy and possibly cutting-edge cuisine coming out of more tiny mobile kitchens in the very near future.
The Great Cupcake Bust
Don’t get me wrong. I love a delicious cupcake as much as the next frosting whore, but I think “cupcakes” as a business scheme has reached critical mass. Hey Cupcake!, Cupprimo Cupcakery, Blue Cupcake, Hill Country Cupcake, Babycakes, Polkadots Cupcake Factory… the list goes on and on. Next year, I hope to see a thinning of the herd. Only the moistest most scrumptious will survive, leaving the rest to collapse in a hail of sprinkles and cutesy paper linings.
The Milkman Returns
For a few years now, farm fresh eggs have been all the rage. People realized that locally raised, free-roaming chickens produce a noticeably tastier product. Farmers responded, and now it’s super easy to pick up a dozen multihued eggs at the market (and for practically the same price as the industro-carton at the corner store.) The next staple to make the leap is good ol’ fashioned milk.
If all goes well, folks will start joining little milk co-ops, and uber-fresh milk from pastured, grass fed cows will be every bit as common as farm eggs are today. I mention co-op because there are some silly laws about pasteurization and sales. A few wily farmers have circumvented the regulations by basically selling off “shares” of their milk cows. If you own a piece of the cow, you’re not actually paying for the milk, you’re just collecting your part of the output. Currently, a few vendors are selling low temperature pasteurized milk at the markets, and I highly recommend supporting them. However, I’m also excited about the imminent prospect of undisrupted cow to doorstep service that I know is on the way.
and Brings His Yolky Sidekick
Since I mentioned eggs I’ll throw in a little bonus that I’m also a bit tingly about. Next year should bring an egg diversity like we’ve never seen. Sure, we all know chicken eggs — duck and quail eggs pop up occasionally — but are you ready for ostrich, goose, turkey, emu, gull, and pheasant eggs? It’s going to be a veritable egg arms race. These unique and underutilized products haven’t had a market mainly because of their sheer exoticness. But consumers are ready. Our palates have reached full adventure throttle- if they can lay it we’re ready to try it.
Lox cured in my very own Frigidaire
Doing It Yourself in a Way Your Mother Can Approve Of
My final eeeeh! for next year relies exclusively on you people (and possibly your friends and neighbors). I’m really excited about the continuing reclaiming of food processing by the home cook. There’s nothing better than showing up at a friend’s house for breakfast and being served fig preserves from her tree outside and some salty home-cured bacon.
More and more people are realizing how simple and amazing it is to preserve your own fruits, vegetables, and meats. Once you wrestle back a few staples from Hormel and Green Giant, the pickling/canning/smoking/curing fever only spreads. The re-personalizing of processing won’t just bring folks closer to what they eat, it’ll also bring a taste variety explosion. There won’t just be a couple of brands to choose from but instead hundreds in every neighborhood. That’s the kind of potluck I’m dreaming about.
Well, happy holidays from your friends over at Boots in the Oven. We hope that the season finds you well-fed and among friends. And one last big woot to Addie of Relish Austin — thanks so much for letting us highjack your site for some hot guest action!
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By elmundodemando
December 29, 2008 11:08 AM | Link to this
I’m with you on the cupcake bust. I just don’t understand how you make a living or even hire employees on cupcakes, seriously. I compare it with the chiclets sellers in MX. ;) Btw, I like Lulu B’s. They good!
El Mundo de Mando www.twitter.com/elmundodemando
By crystal
December 29, 2008 11:38 AM | Link to this
I totally agree with the cupcake prediction…there are so many cupcake shops! Let’s get creative! Also looking forward to local dairy.
By Sicilian
December 29, 2008 8:44 PM | Link to this
Hmmmmmmmmmm. I think you should share your cupcake shops and mobile food trucks with your neighbors further north. Of course we could share the farm fresh eggs and fresh milk with you. Sounds like a match made in heaven. Ciao
By Rachel
December 29, 2008 9:42 PM | Link to this
This was so much fun! I can’t wait to read what other Austin bloggers have to say.
By addie
December 29, 2008 9:44 PM | Link to this
Hey, Sicilian! I bet Crystal AND El Mundo de Mando and I would be happy to drive up a few dozen cupcakes in exchange for some fresh eggs and milk! We always want what we don’t have, right?