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Get ready for a year of booze-free happy hours, pancakes that jiggle and foods that have an irresistible shade of purple.
With the new decade comes new food trends that are both Instagram-worthy or totally delicious — and sometimes they're actually both! Yelp just released its annual trend forecast report, using consumer data from Yelp reviews and searches, to predict what will really be on people's plates in 2020.
Last year was filled feuds over fast-casual chicken sandwiches, a bone-chilling creation that combined kale and candy canes and a slew of plant-based alternatives to traditional beef burgers.
Here are the foods the trend experts at Yelp are expecting to get even bigger this year.
Elevated pancakes
Soufflé pancakes, a culinary trend that originated in Japanese in the early 2010s, were first mentioned on Yelp in the U.S. in September 2018. Since then, mentions of the dish have been skyrocketing. Reviews for dishes like soufflé pancakes and cinnamon swirl pancakes have increased by 156% in the last year.
Nashville Hot Chicken
You definitely don’t have to head to Tennessee for this special spicy chicken dish anymore. Variations of Nashville Hot Chicken have been popping up on menus at chain restaurants like KFC and Ruby Tuesday, but it's also spreading to hundreds of local eateries across the country so we're expecting to see it almost everywhere in 2020. Yelp mentions of "Nashville Hot Chicken" have popped up all over the country, from southern states like Kentucky and Alabama, all the way up to Illinois.
Ube
Vibrant green matcha tea was everywhere in 2019 but in 2020, we'll be seeing more purple, thanks to the rising popularity of this electric purple yam. Yelpers love taking photos of dishes made with ube, a purple yam that hails from the Philippines and is used in both sweet and savory dishes. Often used in ice cream, ube has been popping up in everything from ice cream sandwiches to cakes, doughnuts, puddings and pies.
Pineapple buns
Yelpers have shown an increasing interest in these Cantonese pastries, which are often served as a dim sum snack, breakfast bun or dessert pastry. Yelp trend forecasters have been seeing mentions of the sweet treat pop up in cities like Los Angeles, San Francisco and Jacksonville, Florida.
Boozy kombucha
Boozy, bubbly and fill of probiotics, hard kombucha is the fermented tea's, well, harder cousin. Review mentions of this boozy beverage grew 377% in the last 12 months. Yelpers in San Diego couldn’t stop talking about it (perhaps because of the San Diego-based company Juneshine, which serves hard kombucha).
Floral-infused drinks and dishes
Chrysanthemum and butterfly pea tea are just two of the extracts popping up in cocktails and dishes across the country. Leading the charge on this trend are a few celebrity owned owned hotspots. Check out the Madame Butterfly cocktail at Tom Tom (owned by the stars of Bravo's "Vanderpump Rules") in Los Angeles, which features butterly pea tea and Champage. Mentions of floral-infused food and drinks were highest in cities like Los Angeles, San Francisco and Waco, Texas, where HGTV stars Chip and Joanna Gaines recently opened a restaurant and coffee shop.
Non-alcoholic happy hours
Raise a glass to the mocktail. Non-alcoholic bars are popping up all across the country and zero-proof concoctions with delicious juice and tea blends may become just as popular as a glass of wine when it comes to unwinding after work.
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Healthy-swap comfort food
As the wellness industry continues to creep into culinary spaces, diners are continuing to look for healthier, trendy items to enjoy ... even when they're "indulging" on a night out. Cauliflower's comeback from unwanted vegetable to a highly coveted carb alternative will continue to thrive on restaurant menus, according to Yelp. Some of the most popular searches on Yelp were for cauliflower mashed potatoes and cauliflower pizza, so it's unlikely that this cruciferous staple will be disappearing in 2020.
