NEW YORK, NY (June 23, 2022)  The Specialty Food Association Trendspotter Panel tasted its way through the 66th Summer Fancy Food Show in search of products gaining prominence in the specialty food industry. The Show, which took place June 12-14 at the Javits Center in New York City, had over 1,700 exhibitors featuring specialty foods and beverages from around the world.

"The specialty food marketplace has grown into a $175 billion industry fueled by the creativity of the producers of these foods and beverages,” said Denise Purcell, SFA’s vice president, content & education. "That innovation was on display at the Summer Show with our Trendspotters highlighting unexpected twists on classics, reconceived packaging options, better-for-you indulgences and comfort foods, global flavors, and growing interest in sustainability and ethical production.”

The Summer Trendspotter Panel included Melanie Zanoza Bartelme, Mintel; Mikel Cirkus, Firmenich; Jenn de la Vega, Put A Egg on It; Jonathan Deutsch, PhD, CHE, CRC, Drexel University; Victoria Ho, SherpaCPG; Lindsay Leopold, Martha Stewart (Marquee Brands); Patsy Ramirez-Arroyo, Homera Caribbean & LATAM; Stan Sagner, Founder, We Work for Food, LLC - Consultancy; and Kantha Shelke, Ph.D., CFS, IFT Fellow, Corvus Blue LLC

NEW YORK, NY (June 9, 2022) – The Specialty Food Association (SFA) has released its annual State of the Specialty Food Industry Report, revealing that the specialty food market reached total sales of $175 billion in 2021, up 7.4 percent versus 5.8 percent the year before, when foodservice’s steep decline offset outsized gains in brick-and-mortar retail and ecommerce.

TURKOFAMERICA is now covering stories of Turkish / Mediterranean restaurants in New York, New Jersey and Connecticut on a special issue. New York City, which has the most restaurants in the world, invents new places every year. There are 24,300 restaurants to meet the needs of people in New York City, which has an area of only 320 square miles. There are over 100 Turkish / Mediterranean restaurants in tri-state area. The history of Turkish restaurants in Manhattan goes back to the years when Turkish immigrants started working at Armenian restaurants. The oldest Turkish restaurant in Manhattan is Topkapı, which was established by Ugur Eğilmez. Bosporus, Butterfly, Genghis Khan’s Bicycle and Deniz Restaurant followed Topkapı. It is possible to make this list longer, but one of the drawbacks of such a list is that these people were not able to continue their business. Disputes between partners or the difficulties of business were the reasons for take-overs or closings.