New tendencies

We already advanced yesterday that Thermomix, to everyone's surprise (including its network of vendors and representatives), has launched a new model, internationally. The Thermomix TM6 comes to replace the TM5, whose presentation four and a half years ago we still have fresh in memory. On this occasion the development cycle of the new product has been faster than usual, with an average of 10 years between models.

Years ago it would have sounded like science fiction, but today it is no longer strange to have a speaker at home with which to interact. Ask to play music, read the news of the day, inform us of the time you are going to make or ask for a specific recipe. These are some of the actions that Google Home, Google's smart speaker, can perform and we, of course, have premiered with it cooking a potato and cod omelette.

Neither the folding smartphone nor the advances in artificial intelligence, the creation that has aroused more media interest at the Consumer Electronic Show in Las Vegas, the electronic fair par excellence, has been a vegan hamburger. Version 2.0 of the vegan hamburger from Impossible Foods, one of the leading companies in the emerging vegetarian meat industry, has been rated as the best invention of the fair by Digital Trends magazine and as the “most unexpected product” by Engadget .

The largest US food retailer, Kroger supermarket chain, has announced a collaboration agreement with Microsoft to launch a new connected store experience. The initiative, which is already being tested in two pilot stores, is based on the replacement of price tags with digital screens, which in addition to facilitating the cost of products, allows you to offer nutritional information and personalized offers.

Freshly baked bread, available every six minutes. This is what BreadBot promises, a machine that has aroused enormous interest in the Consumer Electronic Show (CES), which is being held these days in Las Vegas. The device, developed by the American company Wilkinson Baking Company, is designed to bake fresh bread in supermarkets, without much attention from employees to stock flour, yeast and water.

Just a week ago we talked about the union between Direct to the Palate and Nestlé to create the first Spanish recipe skill available in Alexa, Amazon's virtual voice assistant. Well, we return to the load to tell you that Alexa is already on sale in Spain and that those who bought it in pre-sale will receive it today in their homes.

Every time we talk about the food of the future, I end up opening a bottle of wine and having a drink with some cheese so that my anxiety passes and to enjoy what we now have with all my senses. Bacon or artificial meat? Insects? Plankton? Are we really going to eat these crap with the acquired culture?

Too Good To Go is an application that allows you to buy at a very reduced price - a third of its normal price - the food that is left over in restaurants, hotels or other establishments. After being implanted with tremendous success in eight European countries the service landed two weeks ago in Spain, and is already available in 50 establishments in Madrid (and new sites are incorporated every day).

Winemaking, like that of any agricultural product, has some variables that can be controlled - such as soil or grape variety - and others with which it is more difficult to deal with - such as pests and, above all, climatology - . Frost or excessive rains when they do not touch can spoil a good part of the harvest or alter the quality of a wine.

According to figures detailed by the World Economic Forum, if in 2014 311 million tons of plastics were produced, it is estimated that in 2050 we will reach about 1,124 million tons. This means that there will be more plastic than fish in the oceans. The alternative to disposable plastics will no longer be a matter of activism or CSR, but a legal obligation Luckily (or, rather, by obligation) disposable plastics have their days counted.

The German chain Lidl could open its first pub in the capital of the pints: Dublin. According to the Irish press, the food giant bought a huge bar at the southern end of the city five years ago, has demolished it and the council has given it permission to begin the construction of the new establishment, which in the plans to request The license includes a public house.

Although the quintessential beverage throughout Asia is tea, chains like Starbucks are making coffee be seen as a cooler drink by the new generations of wealthy young people. But a new trend is making the millenary drink of this part of the world recover the pulse and it is something as prorious as adding a layer of cream cheese to the drink.

Gin brand Gordon's, belonging to the giant of alcoholic beverages Diageo, launches a gin and tonic with only 0.5% alcohol. The soda aims to be an alternative to the famous combination that people who cannot or do not want to drink alcohol can drink, but seek to enjoy the drink.

Dutch startup Mosa Meat, a pioneer in the manufacture of laboratory meat, has received $ 8.8 million in a round of financing with the aim of having its products ready in 2021. The company, led by Mark Post, the scientist of The University of Maastricht, which managed to present the first hamburger grown in the history laboratory, is investigating the process of manufacturing meat without the need to sacrifice animals.

A group of biologists from the University of California at Berkeley has managed to create brewer's yeast strains that not only ferment this, but also provide the flavor that hops brings. And what is the need to do without hops? Today we do not conceive beer without the characteristic flavor of this plant of the Cannabaceae family (yes, the same as marijuana), but its production represents a problem.

Surely in recent years, you have all tried recipes that incorporated new techniques such as gelation, airs and foams, food spherification and the like. Today we want to explain what spherifications are and how they are made in a brief introduction to molecular cuisine.

This week we have learned that the American company Tyson Foods, the largest marketer of meat in the US (and the second in the world), has become one of the main investors of Memphis Meats, a start-up of Silicon Valley that works by recreating animal proteins at the laboratory. That is, producing synthetic meat.

Can you imagine a supermarket without a line of boxes to pay for your purchases? This is Amazon Go (and it is already a reality), at least in the city of Seattle in the US state of Washington where the first of these stores has been opened in which there is no queue to pay. The only requirement is to have the Amazon Go app on the mobile phone, and use it to enter the store and be identified.

The month of January always leads us to take stock of what has been experienced in the last twelve months and to fill the new year with plans. But it is not only the moment of the lists of good intentions, it is also time to look to the future to see what will be the gastronomic tendencies that will dominate the conversation, and that may influence the way we buy, cook and eat.

Last October McDonald's announced the pilot launch of McVegan, a hamburger to satisfy the growing group of vegan and vegetarian consumers. During these months the hamburger has been tested in the town of Tampere (Finland) and the experiment has been a success. "The test in Finland exceeded all our expectations," said Staffan Ekstam, head of McDonald's food strategy in Sweden to Business Insider, which has confirmed that the McVegan will be permanently available at all chain restaurants in Finland and Sweden.