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The comprehensive index of every blog post, magazine story and restaurant review that appears on Torontolife.com

All stories relating to trends

The Dish

Restauran-TO

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Ever-hungry/lazy 20-somethings lead brisk growth in the restaurant industry

“Quick-service restaurants” account for 64 per cent of food service in Canada (Image: Simon Law)

When they’re not bellyaching about adulthood and posing for Instagrams, it seems 20-somethings enjoy dining out—a lot. According to a new report from market research group NPD, Canada is witnessing a spike in restaurant traffic, due largely to people in their late teens and early 20s. People aged 18 to 24 played a large part in a three per cent traffic increase over the last two quarters. What’s more, the group writes that “visits to Canadian restaurants are forecasted to grow nearly two per cent per year between 2011 and 2016.” Okay, that might not sound like much, but that growth will apparently “surpass the projected 1.2 per cent annual growth of the country’s population.” The millennials are driving this growth partly because of their love of what the NPD calls “quick-service restaurants,” a delightful euphemism for fast-food joints. The group says fast-food restaurant QSRs account for “64 per cent of the overall food service landscape.” Which makes it one fatty landscape indeed.

The Goods

Business of Fashion

2 Comments

H&M’s “completely virtual” female form is completely unattainable (because, um, it’s virtual)

In what sounds like a plot point from Total Recall, H&M press officer Håcan Andersson has confirmed that the models in a recent lingerie campaign are “completely virtual,” not unlike those on Looklet.com. What exactly does that mean? Yes, real human beings were hired and paid real money to pose for the brand, only to have their heads superimposed on humanized bodies created with photo editing software (for consistency, allegedly).

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The Dish

Culinary Curiosities

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The bacon-everything trend reaches its tragedy and farce stage (parental discretion advised)

This morning, the world’s food editors, reporters and bloggers issued forth a collective shudder upon receiving the latest press release from J&D’s Foods. The Seattle-based company is famous for such creating novelty edibles as Bacon Salt, Baconnaise and, this year’s best April Fools’ joke (with us playing the role of the fool), BaconAir, a porky inhaler. But with their latest product, Baconlube, they’ve simply gone too far.

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The Dish

Bottoms Up

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Drunkorexia: the latest trend among female university students and/or authors of kids-are-not-all-right stories


Of course, there are ways to combine food and alcohol intake in one package

According to an article in the Calgary Herald, drunkorexia is a growing problem facing university populations in Canada. The term describes the practice of reserving one’s entire daily caloric intake for alcohol rather than food, a problem that apparently mainly affects females. The goal of drunkorexia: to keep weight down while getting drunk. Fast.

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The Dish

Restauran-TO

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26-course menu for Matt Kantor’s El Bulli tribute dinner released 

Now that Ferran Adrià has shuttered El Bulli, it seems that the dishes and techniques he pioneered at the World’s Greatest Restaurant are now fair game. Matt Kantor, the chef behind the Secret Pickle Supper Club pop-up venture, has just released the menu for the three-night-only El Bulli Imitació, which is either a tribute to the great master or an act of brazen recipe theft, depending on where you stand. Indeed, Kantor is part of a raft of Adrià appreciators—Chicago’s Grant Achatz will be serving nothing but El Bulli–inspired dishes at his culinary history exhibit restaurant, Next, in January. Kantor’s dinner—with dishes like frozen foie gras charcoal and Oreo black olive double cream—takes place next week at the Cookbook Store, and has unfortunately been sold out for some time. See the whole menu [El Bulli Imitació] »

The Dish

Bottoms Up

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The Black Hoof’s Jen Agg takes on the latest cocktail trend—barrel aging

Inspired by the experiments of Portland bartender Jeffrey Morgenthaler, forward-thinking mixologists across the continent have been trying their hand at something that was until recently the province of wine- and liquor makers: aging their drinks in oak casks. Rob Mifsud has an interesting piece in the Globe and Mail about Black Hoof co-owner and bartender Jen Aggs forays into barrel-aging her trademark Manhattans. Her initial verdict? “I’m going to go on the record. I don’t care for this.” It does get better, however. Check out the full story »

(Images: cocktail, star5112; barrel, g_kat26)

The Dish

Culinary Curiosities

9 Comments

Watch a video of a gender reveal party, the Internet’s favourite new food trend (there’s cake involved)


The gender reveal party is the latest food trend to explode across the Internet. For those yet to be invited to one, here’s how it works: following a prenatal ultrasound, the technician, instead of revealing the baby’s gender to the parents, writes it on a note and seals it in an envelope; that envelope finds its way to a local baker or friend, who makes a cake that’s either pink or blue on the inside; and finally, with great trepidation, the cake is cut at a party full of family and friends. Screaming and jumping typically ensues, regardless of the outcome. While we haven’t heard of any Toronto bakers getting in on the action—yet—check out this fab pink-and-blue-polkadotted creation from this Guelph baker.

The Dish

From the Print Edition

4 Comments

Where to Eat Now: 2011 edition

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The Dish

Culinary Curiosities

2 Comments

New bacon inhaler (yes, that’s right) arrives right on trend

A couple of years back, we told you about Le Whif, a French product that allows you to taste chocolate without the hassle of actually chewing by inhaling a puff of chocolate micro particles. Now, with equal parts excitement and revulsion, we present BaconAir: the world’s very first bacon inhaler that “combines the deliciousness of bacon with the unrivalled health benefits of 95 per cent Himalayan oxygen.”

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The Goods

Weddings

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Weddings Week 2011: an insider’s look at how to buy the perfect wedding gift

Unless you want three fondue sets and two toasters, you need to register. Jackie Chiesa, a 30-year veteran at William Ashley with impeccable taste and the tact of a diplomat, has helped hundreds of picky couples say “I do” to the right dinnerware

(Image: Vanessa Heins)

Best part of the job: I get to attend merchan­dise shows in Milan and Paris, which is pretty great, but it’s working with excited young couples that I love the most. The experience of registering at Ashley can be overwhelming—it’s 24,000 square feet of stuff. My job is to navigate the hundreds of options and collec­tions to help couples choose pieces they’ll truly enjoy.

And the worst: When couples are bickering, I just step away and give them a moment. If the groom wants bold patterns and the bride wants basic white, that’s going to require some figuring out. But there is always a way to combine two aesthetics.

What every couple should know: If you’re not going to use fancy china and Waterford crystal, don’t get it. I always encourage couples to choose things they will use frequently. If something is going to sit in your cabinet collecting dust, what’s the point of registering for it?

Professional philosophy: The dinnerware sets the tone for the rest of the table setting. It’s like the gown. Obviously you wouldn’t start picking out the shoes and jewellery before settling on the dress.

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The Dish

Rumours & Rumblings

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12 trends we observed at 2011’s Canadian Restaurant and Foodservices Association show

Health-conscious indulgences at the Canadian Restaurant and Foodservices Association show (Image: Renée Suen)

Yesterday we reported the results of the second annual Canadian Chef Survey of menu trends. The relatively predictable list might reflect the chefs’ outlook on food trends, but attending the Canadian Restaurant and Foodservices Association show showed us exactly what food-service providers are pushing onto the dining room table. After the jump, 12 trends we observed from the CRFA show.

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The Dish

Restauran-TO

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Canadian chefs: local food is still the new black

Bite-sized desserts were one of the few fun trends in this year’s survey (Image: Eliyas J)

The results from the 2011 Canadian Chef Survey were announced Monday at the fourth annual Canadian Restaurant and Foodservices Association show. More than 500 chefs confirmed what locavores and the 400-plus attendees at last week’s Terroir Symposium knew all along: locally produced food and locally inspired dishes are hot. Less surprising still was the focus on sustainable practices and nutritionally driven plates. While the list hardly qualifies as revolutionary, it is interesting to compare this year’s results to the up-and-coming trends predicted one year ago. So how close was it?

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The Informer

From the Print Edition

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The unaffordable city: how did Toronto get so !@#$%&* expensive—and is it worth it?

Middle-class life isn’t what it used to be. Thanks to a heated real estate market, a strong dollar, new taxes and stagnating incomes, Toronto has become, improbably, one of the world’s most expensive cities. Is it worth it?

(Illustration by Julien Pacaud; skyline photo by Brian Summers)

Today, an average Saturday, I spent the following: $6 on a round-trip TTC ride; about $17 on groceries from the Wychwood Barns farmers’ market (organic Crispin apples, an olive boule and free-range eggs); $34 on two bottles of wine (one decent, one plonk); almost $20 on the recent Superchunk CD and $11 on toiletries. Lunch was cheap and simple: a peanut butter sandwich, an apple and a few spoonfuls of raspberry yogurt. Dinner was free: homemade rice-and-bean burritos at a friend’s house. On the way home from that modest dinner party, waiting forever for the Dufferin bus, I almost splurged on a cab, but it seemed wasteful. Then I got home and booked a flight to New York on Porter for a friend’s 40th birthday: another $326. There’s also what I spend on my mortgage, property taxes, insurance, utilities, cellphone, Internet, YMCA membership, charitable donations and credit card debt. All of that adds up to roughly $65 a day. So, as a childless, home-owning, not-terribly-extravagant-but-not-entirely-miserly-either Torontonian, this one day at the tail end of 2010 cost me—not counting the airfare, which, for argument’s sake, I’m setting aside as an exceptional expense—about $153.

That doesn’t sound like a lot, but it’s about $20 more than what I make every day, after taxes. And it leaves nothing, obviously, for home repairs, clothing, vet bills, investments, medical expenses, birthday presents, savings, recreational drugs, holidays or the kid that Liz, my fiancée, and I have been talking about having this year but which, if things continue in this fashion, we’ll have to postpone having until we get jobs that net us more than $50,000 each a year.

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The Goods

Design Scout

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Best in show: 11 amazing items from the Interior Design Show

Liana Chair by Patty Johnson at Liana Cane (All images: Stephanie Saunders)

As any good designophile knows, Toronto was host to the annual Interior Design Show this past weekend.  The show’s offerings ranged from humdrum soaker tubs to avant-garde lighting installations. No easily discernable trends overwhelmed the experience this year, but there were certainly some bright lights that stood out from the rest. Below, our eleven picks for the best of IDS 2011.

Start the slide show »

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The Dish

Restauran-TO

11 Comments

Between two trends: John Lettieri on coffee and burgers in Toronto

Lettieri’s busy Queen Street West location (Image: Steve Harris)

John Lettieri is in an interesting position these days. As president and founder of both Hero Certified Burgers and Lettieri Espresso Bar and Café, he straddles two of Toronto’s biggest food trends: gourmet burgers and coffee. Recently we noticed that his company decided to transform two Lettieris—one at Bloor and Bathurst and another at Church and Wellesley—into Hero Burgers. Is one hot trend overtaking another, or is the indie café explosion creeping up on the chain? We caught up with Lettieri and got his take on Toronto’s coffee and burger scenes, the future of his chain and a new concept he’s launching soon.

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