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What’s on the Menu for 2025?
Despite the hospitality industry facing considerable challenges in 2024, venues proactively adapted and rose to the challenge to maintain a successful business. Born out the trials faced by operators this year and changing consumer preferences, predictions for what will shape the food and dining landscape in 2025 are beginning to take shape.
Various hospitality publications and research organisations have put forth their predictions for what’s next in dining. We’ve summarised our top picks to help you identify what may (or may not) hit the mark on your menu in 2025!
Future Food Predictions
- A surge in Filipino inspired cuisine and restaurants across Australia in recent years, making it a top culinary trend to watch in 2025. A country renowned for their fresh produce & bold flavours, Filipino inspired dishes are poised to captivate Australian palates over the coming 12 months.
- Understanding Origins – The journey of food (farm to plate) continues to captivate consumers across all price levels and will contribute to their decision where to eat.
- Streamlining menus – With price increases and shortages across many food sources in the past year, operators need to be smart with ingredients in 2025. Streamlining your menu may mean you can source higher quality ingredients for your champion dishes, reduce waste and rely on less labour to produce dishes.
Mintel’s 2025 Food & Drink Trends
- Growth in health-related medications and products has given rise to the ‘food as medicine’ trend. Functional ingredients may begin to appear on menus to address specific health goals of consumers.
- Recent global challenges have made consumers more aware of food production issues and their impact on prices. Venues can leverage these challenges by sourcing ingredients from diverse regions, highlighting the benefits to consumers and the environment.
Hospitality Magazine
- Offal – We’ve seen variations of using the whole animal on restaurant menus and cooking shows across recent years. Whilst cooking and consuming offal is commonplace for many people, is the traditional Aussie palette ready for foreign ingredients such as brain, feet and liver?
- A concept that has been making a classy comeback in 2024 is the trolley service. Certainly not a new addition to some dining rooms, the trolley has played host to several customisable food and drink services over the years, including martinis, negronis or even a coffee cart. The trolley gives your front-of-house team a unique avenue to engage with your customers and provides guests with the opportunity to enquire about their food and drink.
To ensure your restaurant’s continued success as consumers continue to battle with cost-of-living challenges, invest in your Chef’s (and your venue’s) future with CTA’s Certificate IV in Kitchen Management. This qualification offers the skills to create innovative menus, adapt to everchanging trends and preferences and create memorable dining experiences.
