[email_link]

Why cook when you can just enjoy food? Said some people before they made feta cheese pasta, followed cooking influencers on TikTok, or bought an air fryer.

Over the last 5 years, Google searches in the Philippines for how to cook and baking reached an all-time high when quarantine began, telling us that non-cooks have started cooking. Food trends change almost every month. At one point, we are making Dalgona Coffee; the next month, we are posting our versions of banana breads. While immediately we attribute this to boredom from being stuck indoors, there are drivers that kept the behavior going for more than a year: Cooking to connect, non-expert influencers, and the availability of ideas.

Cooking to connect

Online activity shot up in 2020 since it is the only way they can connect with others. 2 of the top 5 things Filipinos search “how to” for are food related. This shows that a chunk of social conversation revolves around food making. There’s always a bit of FOMO if most of your friends are doing the same things that you’re not into yet, like watching a new Netflix series or buying a bike, and one of those is learning how to cook. But the biggest push is really connecting with people by participating in visually stunning food trends that anyone without basic culinary experience can do.

According to Philippine news media, the other top food trends of 2020 are Ube Cheese Pandesal, Sushi Bake, Burnt Basque Cheesecake, Korean Cream Cheese Garlic Bread, Kori Kohi, Minimalist Cakes, Milk Tea-inspired and choco butternut-inspired desserts. Yes, there is no ulam or even something near as such. While people of decades ago, had Filipino delicacies or viands as their entry point to cooking; nowadays, it’s these. Biggest quality of a food trend is to be visually unique (it must be Instagram worthy). It also must be easy to make with available ingredients, simple steps, and kitchenware as opposed to creating a complicated dish that needs meat and vegetable cutting skills. Creating AND POSTING a food trend as your friends interact with your cooking online is one of the ways people are recreating and reconnecting with society.  

Culinary influencers are not culinary experts

SHEF is a term coined more than a year ago, a parody to the word Chef. It is a meme used to describe someone who is excessively proud of the simplest kitchen tasks, such as not burning your toast or cracking an egg perfectly. The meme is a representation of level-zero cooks attempting to cook.What’s pushing this further are content creators or influencers, who are along the same spectrum.

If celebrity chef Judy Anne Santos can cook it, then you can do it! This may inspire those who have at least basic cooking knowledge but doesn’t really give level-zero cooks the confidence to start cooking; as compared to your TikToker friend’s 30-second video showing how to make a runny poached egg. A popular example would be Heart Evangelista’s Pancit Canton Pizza recipe. In TikTok alone, you’ll see non-chef-level content creators doing easy-to-do recipes such as, Tuna Cheese Lumpia by @heyeatsteppi, @shineeede’s IG-worthy recipe using only Skippy peanut butter and Banana, and Korean Corn Dog by @dandoesthecooking. Thousands of videos that are on this level of difficulty are on TikTok. This gets people to say, “if someone who is not a culinary expert can do it, then I can do it.”

Availability of easy-to-try content

Aside from popular Tasty Video formats or recipe cards, more and more are getting into bite-sized recipe videos wherein the creator simply takes split second shots of each step and voice over with instructions. 2020 food trends have hundreds of videos like this. These video formats are so much easier to create now thanks to TikTok. Bite-sized instructional videos make it look like anyone can do it. This even extends to other how-to videos on TikTok around computer problems and home DIY content. Bite-sized videos are more efficient and fun to comprehend but it will never contain all the information you need. That’s why long form YouTube videos and TikTok bite-size videos work together. TikTok videos gets people to do the first step which is getting people to say, “I can do it too. I’m gonna try it.” From there, we can just rely on the Facebook and YouTube algorithm to push them further.

People are aware that some hacks are unrealistic that’s why another video format from non-chefs are going around. It’s where they debunk or confirm hacks. Eitan Bernath and Johny Nonny are the best examples. The influencer reacts to the hack and tries it themselves to find out if it’s reliable. These types of videos are not limited to food but it’s a good format to strengthen the trust to a recipe.

Getting people to cook isn’t just about content formats. Kitchenware and ingredients that are easily available is a big factor. This is a common theme among food trends as well. No-bake recipes became a popular at one point during the time when baked goods are everywhere. But not everyone has an oven. One of the brands that tapped into this is Monde Cheese Bar with their No-bake posts. Instant ramen hacks, canned foods, simple egg recipes are available on all social media platforms. People have been adding common household ingredients and taking them to the next level. Check out this canned corned beef sisig and this restaurant level ramen just using instant noodles.

Searches for Oven, which usually spikes during Christmas season in the Philippines, shot up in March 2020 and showed sustained interest until now. Out of nowhere, the Air Fryer at one point exceeded search interest for Oven in year 2021. This resulted to once again non-chef-level content creators making Air Fryer recipe videos on TikTok like bacon and egg toasts. What all these tools and ideas do is empower non-cooks to try doing a recipe that will be easiest for them. 

A thought for businesses

This opportunity for market expansion for culinary brands lies with the new wave of level zero to level 1 chefs of 2020/21. Here some ways brands can take advantage of this:

1. Use TikTok – The entry point to food making and the driver of most food trends. The platform isn’t just for discovery or inspiration, it is where people want to perform in the kitchen whether they’re a cook or not. What cooking video trend can you create where your product can play an integral role?
2. Add a quirky twist to a common dish – It doesn’t have to make sense or even Gordon Ramsey-approved, rather it must be silly enough. 2020 gave birth to different forms of pancit canton! Is there a common Filipino ulam that can be upgraded to a silly instagrammable dish using your product?
3. Provide space to be creative – Trends do not rely with replication alone. If they can add their own touch, like with instant ramen hack versions, they’re more likely to participate. What is a recipe base that your brand can suggest that people can play around with?
4. Their idols should cook – FOMO is felt towards friends and idols, not experts. What type of content creators does your audience follow? It doesn’t matter if they’re gamers, singers, dancers, or just funny; make them cook.
5. Aesthetic over flavor – Topics on price or taste quality of cooking resonates with experienced cooks. With shefs, however, the motivation is how it will look on a post and how easy it is to start. In what form should you show your recipe content to encourage content creation?
6. Bite-sized information – It is rare to see a food trend that circulates because of a 2-min video or longer. The new shefs don’t need complete information to act, they just need to know the ingredients and the method within 60 seconds. The rest they’ll figure out on their own if it’s interesting enough.
7. Fun methods over efficient methods – The dish can be fun but is it fun to make? Is it like mixing for a long time to make the perfect foam for Dalgona coffee? What can we insert in the cooking process to make something more fun to do?
8. Design tools for them – Expert chefs know the right amount of ingredients and where to get them from different places, but DIY kits have been getting around to cater to newbies. What tool can your brand provide to make the journey from Discovering to Trying much shorter? Or can your product be used with a trendy kitchen tool they currently depend on? E.g. Air Fryer, Microwave, Oven, or Cast Iron Pan

Unlike the commonly targeted experienced home cooks, these new “shefs” have not developed unshaken preferences yet when it comes to how they work around the kitchen, how to season their dishes, and what tools will make their lives easier. This makes them teachable and likely buy into a belief that we sell. They don’t have a solid foundation for now so that could be your brand’s meaningful role.