2011 Summer Fancy Food Show - Oser Communications Group

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SEASONINGS & SPICES UPDATE www.gourmetnews.com ■ SEPTEMBER 2011 ■ GOURMET NEWS
Salts and spices:
no longer used as currency,
but still worth serious money
BY ROCELLE ARAGON
America’s come a long way from plain old
salt and pepper: according to NASFT figures,
seasonings generated an estimated
$493 million in specialty food retail sales in
2010. Sales of specialty seasonings rose 13.2
percent between 2008 and 2010, compared
to 8.9 percent for non-specialty, making it
one of the brighter areas in specialty food.
This growth comes from a combination
of factors, but mainly it is customers’ quest
for maximum flavor with minimum fat or
sodium. Consumers also crave restaurantquality
flavors at home, and spices are an
important step to that—fennel pollen, for
example, is often marketed as a “chefs’ secret
ingredient.”
Another factor is the mainstreaming of
cuisines built on specific spice blends: Mexican,
Indian, Jamaican, Thai—not to mention
the boom in all-American barbecue, the
backyard obsession that launched a thousand
spice rubs.
Salts
Throughout 2011, the gourmet salt business
continued its explosion, which began with
America’s “discovery” of fleur de sel in the
mid-1990s. Today companies with 20 or
more categories of special cooking or finishing
salt are commonplace, and gourmet
flaked and finishing salts are a significant
part of many spice companies’ sales.
This is happening at the same time as attempts
to cut sodium in manufactured foods.
An April 2011 survey by the American Heart
Association found that a majority of consumers
believed that sea salt was a lowsodium
alternative to table salt, which is
incorrect. Sea salt contains minerals such as
magnesium, calcium and potassium, but has
every bit as much sodium as table salt.
But sea salt’s main allure is its raw, unprocessed
image, yet another aspect of the
drive to all things natural. Specific varieties
have an unusual appearance or color (from
minerals and clays) that makes them attractive
as differentiating specialty ingredients. has become the familiar face of the exotic
comes from Himalayan pink salt, which
Driving the salt craze is the salty-sweet salts. The two-year-old business, has gone
flavor combination. Salted caramel flavors from one employee to six, and from one
remain strong sellers despite complaints pallet annually to three by mid-year.
from industry professionals that it is old Also coming on strong are smoked salts.
news. Some versions of salty/sweet are While these have been available for a few
cookies with pretzels pieces, potato chips in years now, the popularity of grilled flavors
chocolate (or in chocolate bars, such as and barbecue has solidified demand. Bucks
sofi TM Gold winner Chuao Chocolate) and Fifth Avenue, a nearly 40-year-old spice
Vosges’ bacon+chocolate line, which raised shop that is an institution in Olympia,
eyebrows when it debuted but is now one of Washington, reports strong sales of bacon
the line’s anchor products.
salt to families from nearby Fort Lewis,
Blocks of pink salt, used for cooking, are who ship it to U.S. soldiers posted in porkfree
countries. SaltWorks, a specialty com-
also strong sellers. “I was skeptical, but I ordered
some as a test and had more orders pany that sells on the web, is getting good
than I could fill,” said Brett Cramer, a former
IT executive who founded The Spice strongly-flavored creation smoked for days
results with Bonfire Smoked Sea Salt, a
Lab in Florida two years ago.
over seven different kinds of wood. (Inspiration
came while the company’s owner
Strong invididual sellers for Cramer are
high-end blends like Lemon Citrus Salt and was grilling burgers.)
umami-filled White Truffle Salt. Volume Continued on page 3