If there was ever proof that sometimes progress just means going backwards, here it is: a list of the predicted food trends for 2019 has been released by a marketing consultant, and it includes lichen, calamansi juice and dulse (seaweed)
It is as if Homo erectus never evolved. Man is still fish, stuck in the sea, munching on sea-greens and foraging for lichen. Lichen! The fungus that grows over rocks and looks a bit like athlete’s foot is coming to a restaurant near you, sprinkled on toast and probably costing a tenner.
In a separate forecast, by the upmarket chain Whole Foods, other favourites next year will include “Pacific Rim flavours” such as guava vinaigrette, and pineapple and passion fruit sparkling water. And kelp jerky is due a moment.
This should come as no surprise: researchers have already documented how restaurants fill menus with fancy ingredients most people have never heard of because it means they can bump up prices. Nothing says “that is worth tons of money” more than having to watch a video of how to pronounce something before ordering it.
Food speaks to us in many ways. In Grayson Perry’s Channel 4 documentary on class, All in the Best Possible Taste, he revealed how ostentatious and often inane displays of taste often expose a desperate desire for status. In the same way that a potbelly was once a sign of a person wealthy enough to eat to excess, we now covet exotic fruits because they make us look well-travelled.
My favourite meal is spaghetti bolognese, mainly because it is stodgy and comforting. Everyone thinks their mother’s version is the best and my mum always made ours with Dolmio sauce – and no matter how much my middle-class friends look down on that, I will always find it the most delicious thing. It reminds me of a time when I didn’t have to pretend to believe that everything had to be made from scratch to taste good.
Our meals need not be specially engineered to meet our current ideas of “wellness”. My hangover meal is packet noodles and hot sauce – not courgetti noodles, and not kelp noodles. Sainsbury’s Basics noodles provide all the salt, sugar and carbs that I need when I want to be brought back to life.
These foods are popular for good reason. They are accessible and you know what they taste like. Unpretentious food is great because it is just fine as it is, and it doesn’t need bragging about. If the simple food in life could speak, it would be saying: “Take me as I am!” Lichen, on the other hand, would be begging you not to notice who it once was: a mouldy sea-green, hiding under the surface, trying not to be seen.
